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Overview
In this easy-to-use and fun guide to writing and grammar, children (aged 12+), their parents and teachers will learn all they need to know about the elements of grammar, punctuation, spelling and sentence construction. With practical tips and helpful step-by-step examples, this book will help students master everything from apostrophes to essay writing.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781742244419 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | UNSW Press |
| Publication date: | 02/01/2019 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 288 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
| Age Range: | 12 Years |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
NOUNS
You need nouns to name things. Easy. Nouns are the most common part of speech in English, for that simple reason.
People who study language and sort words into groups have come up with five different types of nouns. The main reason that classification is useful is because we treat some types of nouns differently from others. (As we're only at the beginning, you'll have to wait and see how this unfolds.)
The five types of nouns
1 Common nouns are basic names for things: feet, legs, knees, pants, shirt, neck, head, hat, brain, table, fridge, house, cat, gum. Look around, there are plenty for you to pick.
2 Proper nouns are specific: they name a single thing, and for doing that they are awarded a capital letter. Australia, Gerald, Government, Westmead Hospital, New South Wales, Ms Duffy. The capital letter matters. If you can't be bothered to use one, then it's 'goodbye marks' and 'hello embarrassing myself'.
3 Collective nouns refer to a group. A school of fish, an audience, a flock of sheep, a gang of robbers. Be careful here. A collective noun makes many things into one, a single collection, so the language around them should show this. 'A flock of sheep is lost on the hillside', not 'are lost on the hillside'. It's one whole flock that IS lost, not the many sheep that ARE within it. 'The gang of robbers was arrested.' (There was only one gang.) 'The audience is on its feet', not 'are on their feet'. (There is only one audience.)
At least, that's what some people will tell you. Others will say that it's OK to use the plural because we are talking about multiple things. 'That flock of sheep are lost', and 'the gang of robbers were arrested'. Listen to the people around you and see what they do in this case. It's probably OK to follow along. The audience for this book is going to have to decide for itself / themselves.
4 Abstract nouns name things that you can't see or touch, or find anywhere in the real world. These are intangible things (from the Latin word tangere, meaning 'to touch'). Emotions, feelings and ideas, like love, success, sadness, interest, favour, anger and joy are all abstract nouns. Because many children have been taught that a noun is the name for a person, place or thing, and they don't realise that 'misery' and 'hope' are things too (just things you can't touch), spotting abstract nouns can be a challenge.
5 Compound nouns occur when we use two words to create one noun. The words that are joined don't have to be nouns, and the new noun can either be written as two words or one. That can cause confusion. Examples are washing machine, skipping rope, greenhouse, software, input. There may be two words in there, but once they've been joined to refer to a single thing, they're one noun.
So that's it for the five basic types of nouns. Now for the extras.
6 Gerunds are so cool. They are my very favourite thing. They are a special, unique breed, with a bit of noun and a bit of verb.
Look at this sentence: 'Dancing is fun, but I also love kayaking'. Now ask yourself: are those 'ing' words nouns (because they name things?) or verbs (because they're action words?). Hard to tell, isn't it?
The answer is that they're called gerunds, and they're nouns. But I like to think of them as hybrids, or 'half and half'. They always end in 'ing'.
Singular and plural
Nouns have two versions or 'forms': singular (just one thing) or plural (more than one thing). I'm guessing you already know that. Mostly we make plurals in English by adding an 's', but there are so many exceptions to that statement that we could probably spend the rest of the book listing them. Here are some examples – just a taster – of some complicated irregular plurals.
man – men
mouse – mice
child – children
tooth – teeth
knife – knives
fungus – fungi
moose – moose
tomato – tomatoes
crisis – crises
criterion – criteria
sheep – sheep
radius – radii
It's a good idea to search online for yourself, as the internet is awash with lists of this type. Make sure that you know the correct plurals of the words you like to use.
Noun phrases
Sometimes, when a group of words works together as if it were a noun, we call that a noun phrase. It's hard to show these out of context, but phrases like 'The important documents' or 'Aunt Sally's cat' are both multi-word nouns. They name things. Don't get too worried about this – we don't need to work with noun phrases yet and I will explain them fully later in the book.
Nominalisation
This is nothing but a fancy way of saying 'making a noun out of something that wasn't'. It is useful, especially when you want to write in a formal way.
• The colour of the leaves changes as autumn comes.
• The change in the leaves' colour is because autumn comes.
Change was a verb the first time round, but is a noun in the rewrite.
Writing well with nouns
Because you need nouns to name things, nouns create a sense of what those things are like: how they look, sound, feel, taste and smell. You should build a healthy vocabulary so you have a good range of nouns to choose from.
1. Well-chosen, precise nouns convey lots of information, making your writing more interesting and varied. They create a clear, vivid scene in the mind of your reader, and they impress markers.
For example, don't say 'bird' if you can say 'magpie' (or 'sparrow' or 'kookaburra' or whatever works in context). Maybe the garden you're describing is full of 'trees and flowers', but the reader will get one idea if they are 'oaks and daffodils', and quite another if they are 'gums and bottlebrush'.
Your character might fall into the water, but was it the sea, a pond, a river, a puddle, a lake or the dam on the farm? Each of those words will create a completely different scene in the mind of the reader.
2 Precise nouns also let you know when and where something is happening: 'Across the lawn he heard the distant sound of a gramophone.'
Gramophone tells us that we're in the early twentieth century, and are probably at a posh, grand sort of place – nice enough to have a big lawn.
Imagine the difference if you wrote 'Across the paddock he heard the distant sound of a piano.'
Now we're probably in Australia, on a farm, possibly long ago when piano playing was more common than now.
Either one gives us much more information than simply saying 'From far off he heard music.'
3 Choosing nouns that relate helps you develop detail.
Let's say you're describing the inside of a shed. What would you find there? Garden rakes, spades and shovels, a wheelbarrow? Maybe there are tins of nails, bags of fertiliser, paint brushes, rags, bottles of turps and kerosene. You don't need to list all these nouns at once, you can release them slowly, little by little throughout the story.
4 Proper nouns (names) provide wonderful hints at the nature of a person or a place.
You don't need to be told that a family called Dursley who live in Privet Drive won't be very nice. (Privet is a weed in Australia, but in England, where the story is set, it's used for suburban hedges. The Dursleys are small-minded and conventional). What about Hideaway Tom or Storm Boy? They've got something odd going on. Would you expect Cruella De Vil to come over with chicken soup next time you've got a cold? Wuthering Heights doesn't sound like a place to go for a holiday. (It isn't.) And as for Darth Vader – I don't need to know anything more about him. He's a bad guy.
CHAPTER 2ADJECTIVES
These are the words that we add to give a noun more life, and to make it more specific and interesting. Adjectives are usually called 'describing words', and in grammar-speak we say they modify or qualify nouns, which means they make a difference to the 'boss' noun.
It's easy to find and use adjectives. Here's a list that just toppled out of my head: big, slimy, sturdy, blue, quick, lazy, heavy, old, exhausted, sharp, transparent. What would be good nouns to attach any of those to?
Adjectives often sit right in front of the noun they work for, as in 'the tired child', 'the nutty professor'. However, they can also be located away from their 'boss' noun. In the sentence 'the child is tired', tired still describes the child, but the linking verb is has pushed in and split the adjective / noun couple up. (You can read about linking verbs on pages 44 and 46.) That's OK. In fact, it's often a sign of a well-constructed, complex sentence. Exam markers LOVE it.
Adjectives don't have to be single words. Two or more words can work together to do the work of an adjective. When they do, we call it an adjectival phrase. Here are some examples:
The child is tired of travelling.
The professor is quite nutty, and really bad tempered.
When you're trying to find adjectives, remember to search the whole sentence, and don't look only for single words.
Comparatives and superlatives, or 'how much is that?'
One of the great things about adjectives is that they describe how much of whatever it is they provide to their boss noun. It's called degree. It's a bit like when you adjust the heat under a saucepan – you can dial the intensity of an adjective up or down so it provides more or less of whatever-it-is. You usually do this by adding the suffix (a syllable at the end of a word) '-er' or '-est'.
Here's what I mean:
I am old er than my sister, in fact I'm the old est in my family.
This is weird, and getting weird er. It's the weird est thing I've ever done.
The '-er' form is called comparative, because you're looking at this thing in comparison to at least one other.
If the adjective has two syllables, we usually compare by using the word more, rather than adding 'er' to the end. And when the adjective has three syllables you definitely use more and don't use '-er'. For example, it would be awkward (though not wrong) to say 'I was more lucky than my sister', but it would be quite wrong to say 'She was intelligenter than I am'. I can be luckier. She is more intelligent.
The '-est' form is called superlative. See how the word 'super' is in there? It comes to us from Latin and it means 'above' or 'beyond'; these days it often means 'first rate' or 'fantastic'.
A superlative is top of the tree. Unimprovable. It doesn't get any better. If I'm the old est in the family that's it, no one can beat me at that. I can also be the shortest, smart est and funniest, but sadly not the intelligent est. As we just saw, intelligent can't be modified by adding a suffix, so we have to use more to make it comparative and most to make it superlative. My sister is more intelligent than I am (I'm just comparing the two of us), and she is the most intelligent in the family (best in a big group).
Some adjectives don't have any low or high-powered forms. They are absolutes. They describe a one-and-only item. We call them non-comparable. Think about the meaning of unique or extinct. Logically a species can't be extincter, and an event couldn't be uniquer. A childless person can't be more or less childless, a wooden boat can't be more or less wooden. Either they are or they aren't.
Because this is English, of course there are exceptions. Some adjectives have irregular comparatives and superlatives that don't relate obviously to each other. Common ones are:
little, less, least much, more, most good, better, best bad, worse, worst
Writing well with adjectives
Adjectives are essential for describing things. They give the details that help a reader form a clear, sharp picture in their mind. You need them to give precise descriptions, and to build atmosphere and imagery. You need them to bring a scene to life.
Precision
First let's think about precision. Adjectives help you tell one thing from another. Imagine a sea of school students, at Assembly perhaps. In a big group they all look much the same. Can you describe someone so that a stranger could find that person in the crowd? Not without adjectives you can't.
My tall, dark-haired friend has messy hair, his grubby trainers are unlaced, and his blue shirt is untucked.
The risk with adjectives is that you can overdo it. Do you need a few adjectives for effect? If so, avoid a long list, as it tires the reader out. Just use two or three at a time. Multiple adjectives can be grouped next to the boss noun, or strung out throughout a sentence, like this:
The little blonde child in the car is cold, tired and grumpy.
The basic connection between the boss noun and the adjectives is still there. Little, blonde, cold, tired and grumpy all modify the noun child, but separating them sounds much better than clumping them all together:
The little, blonde, cold, tired and grumpy child is in the car.
Atmosphere and imagery
Now let's consider atmosphere and imagery. We're going to look at adjectives in action.
This is an eyewitness account of the volcano Mount Vesuvius erupting almost two thousand years ago. Fantastic descriptive adjectives make us feel as though we can see it.
The sea seemed to roll back upon itself ... driven from its banks by The convulsive motion of the earth ... On the other side, a black and dreadful cloud, broken with rapid, zigzag flashes, revealed behind it variously shaped masses of flame ...
(Pliny the Younger, Letter to Tacitus)
And here's someone you may recognise:
Toto was ... a little black dog, with long silky hair and small black eyes that twinkled merrily on either side of his funny, wee nose.
(L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz)
See how the adjectives help us get a sense of Toto's appearance and character? Being little, silky, funny and wee are associated with the playful pleasures of childhood. The author has chosen these adjectives for that reason. This has been written for a young audience. His purpose is to make us fond of this creature.
Imagine if he'd said:
Dorothy's dog Toto was small, long-haired and black, with dark eyes and a small nose.
This is factually accurate but it wouldn't make us smile and feel warm and fuzzy about Toto.
Getting the order right – The Big Red Ball rule
You don't really need to know about this because you do it automatically, but it is fun. If a number of adjectives modify the same noun, we line them up this way: 1 size, 2 age, 3 shape, 4 colour, 5 origin, 6 material, 7 purpose.
Do you happen to have a leather round English old red cricket big ball anywhere round the house?
No? Perhaps you didn't fully understand my question.
How about a big old round red English leather cricket ball?
You do? That's amazing!
And if you have a personal opinion about that cricket ball, that comes first: It's 'a beautiful (smelly? filthy?) big old round red English leather cricket ball'.
Try and mess around with a few adjective lists of your own.
CHAPTER 3VERBS
Nouns and Verbs are the Adam and Eve of English. They're the founders, they get the whole thing started, and their DNA is running through everything. They exert huge influence over the Grammar family.
We have seen already how vital nouns are, but if you ask me, verbs are the king of the grammar castle. They rule. They're the motherboard, the control panel of the whole English language. You need verbs before you can talk or write about anything at all. You can't even have a sentence without a verb. That's how important verbs are.
Verbs are doing words, or action words. At least that's what you've been taught. More accurately, verbs let you know what's occurring. When you start the engine of a car, it powers up and off you go. This is what a verb does. No engine, no go. Verbs make your language move along, they cause things to happen, they give it life, bounce around, or if need be, they hold it back and settle it down.
Regular and irregular verbs
Verbs are organised in a systematic way, but only up to a point. This is English. Prepare to be confused!
Most verbs are regular. These verbs change to show different meanings, and they do it in a predictable way.
To create the past tense, you add 'ed' to the stem: climb / climbed, play / played.
When we're talking about he, she or it doing something we put an 's' at the end: I love him, but he loves me.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Australian Students' Guide to Writing and Grammar"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Claire Duffy.
Excerpted by permission of University of New South Wales Press Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Introduction 1
How to use this book 10
Part 1 Good grammar, great writing 13
1 Nouns 16
2 Adjectives 24
3 Verbs 33
4 Pronouns 58
5 Adverbs 75
6 Prepositions 79
7 Articles 84
8 Conjunctions 85
Part 2 Essential skills for writing well 93
1 Spelling 94
2 Vocabulary 104
3 Punctuation 108
4 Sentences 125
5 Syntax: get your words in order 140
6 Tone: reaching your audience 145
7 Paragraphs 147
Part 3 How to be a good writer 153
1 Planning 156
2 Drafting and writing 168
3 Editing and proofreading 189
Part 4 Writing for marks 199
1 Grades explained 201
2 Creative writing 205
3 Persuasive writing 221
4 Analytical writing 232
Part 5 Writing support 247
1 Words that work 248
2 Editing 255
3 Creative plots: genres explained 257
4 More advanced grammar 261
Acknowledgments 269
Index 271