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Glossary: declarative clause

The most common clause type, which usually has regular grammatical ordering with the Subject before the finite verb, followed by the Object (if there is one), and which is usually, though not exclusively, used to make a statement. See also: exclamative clause, imperative clause, interrogative clause.

Statement, question, command and exclamation: discourse functions

In this starter activity we will look at text examples drawn from our corpus and think about how the clause types statement, question, command, and exclamation function within authentic discourse.

Click on the interactive whiteboard icon (top right) and work through the following slides with students. Read each extract and analyse it by answering the accompanying questions. After each extract, there are some suggestions and pointers.

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Word salads (primary)

In this lesson, students arrange words on the smart board in order to create acceptable sentences.

Goals

  • Use implicit grammatical knowledge to arrange word tiles on a smart board into sentences.

Lesson Plan

The teacher explains that today, we will arrange words to make sentences. All of the example sentences here have been drawn from our corpus.

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Word salads (primary): Statement activity

He
talked
to
people
.

I
saw
him
in
London
.

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Clause types: statements, questions, commands and exclamations

The National Curriculum recognises four clause types (also called ‘sentence types’ ). They are usually used to ‘do different things’. These are statements, questions, commands and exclamations.

Each clause type has its own typical pattern (i.e. word order).

In statements, the Subject comes in its typical position before the verb. Here are some examples:

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Englicious (C) Survey of English Usage, UCL, 2012-21 | Supported by the AHRC and EPSRC. | Privacy | Cookies