Grammar Rules

Here are 20 simple rules and tips to help you avoid mistakes in English grammar. For more comprehensive rules please look under the appropriate topic (part of speech etc) on our grammar and other pages.

1. A sentence starts with a capital letter and ends with a period/full stop, a question mark or an exclamation mark. see Punctuation

• The fat cat sat on the mat.
• Where do you live?
• My dog is very clever!

2. The order of a basic positive sentence is Subject-Verb-Object. (Negative and question sentences may have a different order.)

• John loves Mary.
• They were driving their car to Bangkok.

3. Every sentence must have a subject and a verb. An object is optional. Note that an imperative sentence may have a verb only, but the subject is understood.

• John teaches.
• John teaches English.
• Stop! (ie You stop!)

4. The subject and verb must agree in number, that is a singular subject needs a singular verb and a plural subject needs a plural verb.

• John works in London.
• That monk eats once a day.
• John and Mary work in London.
• Most people eat three meals a day.

5. When two singular subjects are connected by or, use a singular verb. The same is true for either/or and neither/nor.

• John or Mary is coming tonight.
• Either coffee or tea is fine.
• Neither John nor Mary was late.

6. Adjectives usually come before a noun (except when a verb separates the adjective from the noun).

• I have a big dog.
• She married a handsome Italian man.
• (Her husband is rich.)

7. When using two or more adjectives together, the usual order is opinion-adjective + fact-adjective + noun. (There are some additional rules for the order of fact adjectives.)

• I saw a nice French table.
• That was an interesting Shakespearian play.

8. Treat collective nouns (eg committee, company, board of directors) as singular OR plural. In BrE a collective noun is usually treated as plural, needing a plural verb and pronoun. In AmE a collective noun is often treated as singular, needing a singular verb and pronoun.

• The committee are having sandwiches for lunch. Then they will go to London. (typically BrE)
• The BBC have changed their logo. (typically BrE)
• My family likes going to the zoo. (typically AmE)
• CNN has changed its logo. (typically AmE)

9. The words its and it's are two different words with different meanings.

• The dog has hurt its leg.
• He says it's two o'clock.

10. The words your and you're are two different words with different meanings.

• Here is your coffee.
• You're looking good.

11. The words there, their and they're are three different words with different meanings.

• There was nobody at the party.
• I saw their new car.
• Do you think they're happy?

12. The contraction he's can mean he is OR he has. Similarly, she's can mean she is OR she has, and it's can mean it is OR it has, and John's can mean John is OR John has.

• He is working
• He has finished.
• She is here.
• She has left.
• John is married.
• John has divorced his wife.

13. The contraction he'd can mean he had OR he would. Similarly, they'd can mean they had OR they would.

• He had eaten when I arrived.
• He would eat more if possible.
• They had already finished.
• They would come if they could.

14. Spell a proper noun with an initial capital letter. A proper noun is a "name" of something, for example Josef, Mary, Russia, China, British Broadcasting Corporation, English.

• We have written to Mary.
• Is China in Asia?
• Do you speak English?

Basic English Grammar Rules

Some of the most basic and important English grammar rules relate directly to sentence structure. These rules specify that:

• A singular subject needs a singular predicate.
• A sentence needs to express a complete thought.

Another term for a sentence is an independent clause: 

• Clauses, like any sentence, have a subject and predicate too. If a group of words does not have a subject and predicate, it is a phrase.
• If a clause can stand alone and make a complete thought, then it is independent and can be called a sentence.
• If clauses do not express a complete thought, they are called dependent clauses. An example of a dependent clause, which is not a sentence, is “when I finish my work.” A dependent clause needs an independent clause to make it whole.

Subjects and Predicates

Basic to any language is the sentence, which expresses a complete thought and consists of a subject and a predicate.

• The subject is the star of the sentence; the person, animal, or thing that is the focus of it. 
• The predicate will tell the action that the subject is taking or tell something about the subject.

Exploring Options

Asking for input


What do you think (about . . . )?
How do you feel (about . . . )?
Any ideas?
What are the alternatives?

Exploring Options


Let's look at Option 1.
What (do you think) about Plan B?
How about the third alternative?
Let's consider Bob's proposal.

Moving on


Let's move on to Option 2.
What about Plan C?
Let's look at the fourth choice.
How about Mary's idea?
Should we move on to the next point?
Before we move on, we need to consider . . .

Making Offers

How to make offers in English?

It is common that English speakers make offers in conversations in order to be polite and helpful. When they do so they use these expressions:

Can I… ?

Shall I… ?

Would you like … ?

How about ...?

English learner must be able to make offers as well as accept or reject them. The following are useful expressions to do so.

Making offers:

Can	I	help you?
Shall		get you some juice?
Would you like		a glass of water ?
How about		some pizza?

Examples:

• "Can I help you?"
• "Shall I open the window for you?"
• "Would you like another cup of coffee?"
• "Would you like me to clean the board?"
• "How about a juice? "

Remember:

• Shall, can and will are followed by the verb without to. 
  Example:
  "Can I help you?"
  "Shall I bring you the mobile phone?
• Shall is more formal than can.
• Would you like… is followed either by a noun, or by the verb with to.
  Example:
  "Would you like some tea ?"
  "Would you like to drink some coffee?

Possessive Adjectives

Possessive adjectives are used to show ownership or possession.

Subject pronoun	Possessive adjective
Singular
I	my
you	your
he	his
she	her
it	its
Plural
you	your
we	our
they	their

For example:

• I own a laptop. = It is my laptop.
• You own this computer (I presume). = It is your computer.
• David owns a black car. = It is his car.
• Karen owns a house. = It is her house.

ADJECTIVE ORDER

Adjectives can be used to describe lots of things, from physical size, age, shape, colour, material, to more abstract things like opinion, origin and purpose.

We can use adjectives together to give a detailed description of something.

Adjectives that express opinions usually come before all others, but it can sometimes depend on what exactly you want to emphasise.

For example: 

"That's a nice, big, blue bag." (You like the bag.)

"That's a nice blue." (You like the colour.)

When we group adjectives together there is a general (sometimes flexible) rule for the position of each type of adjective, these are:-

Position	1st*	2nd*	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th
	Opinion	Size	Age	Shape	Colour	Material	Origin	Purpose
	Nice	Small	Old	Square	Black	Plastic	British	Racing
	Ugly	Big	New	Circular	Blue	Cotton	American	Running

You might swap adjectives that express an opinion and an adjective based on fact depending on what you wish to emphasise:-

For example:

• "She had a long, ugly nose." emphasising the length of her nose.
• "He was a silly, little man." emphasising that the man was silly.

This is just for fun as you wouldn't normally see so many adjectives in one description.

For example:

• "She had a big, ugly, old, baggy, blue, stripey, cotton, British, knitting bag."

Does it matter if you get it wrong? Well outside of exams and tests, it won't kill you, but people reading or listening to you will find it odd if you mix up the order.

ENGLISH ADJECTIVES

When we compare things, people or even ideas we look at what makes them different from each other.

Comparative adjectives are used to show what quality one thing has more or less than the other. They normally come before any other adjectives.

!Tip - It's a good idea to learn opposites (antonyms) when learning adjectives.

For example:

TALL / SHORT

The man on the left is taller than the man on the right. 

The man on the right is shorter than the man on the left.

!Note - Have you noticed that when we are comparing two things like this we put than between the adjective and the thing being compared.

FAST / SLOW

 

A car is faster than a bicycle. 

A bicycle is slower than a car.

For example:

BIG / SMALL

 

The red bag is bigger than the blue bag. 

The blue bag is smaller than the red bag.

For example:-

• 'good' becomes 'better'
• 'bad' becomes 'worse'
• 'far' becomes 'farther' or 'further'

SUBJECTIVE / NOMINATIVE CASE

Used especially to identify the subject of a finite verb.

A noun or pronoun is in the subjective when it is used as the subject of the sentence or as a predicate noun. In the following examples, nouns and pronouns in the subjective case are italicized.

A noun in the subjective case is often the subject of a verb.

For example:

• "The tree fell on my car", "the tree" is in the nominative case because it's the subject of the verb "fell".

Pronouns are inflected to show the subjective case

PERSONAL PRONOUN
Subjective/Nominative
Referring to the subject in a sentence.
I
You
He
She
It
We
They
Who

For example:

• Lynne owns this web site.
• I hope to finish my homework tomorrow.
• She enjoyed her English lessons.
• He is an idiot. (The word idiot is a predicate noun because it follows is; a form of the verb "be")

.

CASE

Case is the grammatical function of a noun or pronoun. There are only three cases in modern English, they are subjective (he),objective (him) and possessive (his). They may seem more familiar in their old English form - nominative, accusative and genitive. There is no dative case in modern English. Yippee!

First more good news. You cannot really go wrong here, we got rid of most of our cases and as a result English is easier than many other languages because nouns and some indefinite pronouns (anyone, someone, everyone, and so on) only have a distinctive case form for the possessive. There are a few remnants of old English though, and pronouns have distinctive forms in all three cases and should be used with a bit more care.

The pronoun cases are simple though. There are only three:-

1. Subjective case: pronouns used as subject. 

2. Objective case: pronouns used as objects of verbs or prepositions. 

3. Possessive case: pronouns which express ownership.

NO ARTICLE

We don't usually use an article to talk about things in general:-

Inflation is rising. People are worried about rising crime. (Note! People generally, so no article)

You do not use an article when talking about sports.

For example:

My son plays football. Tennis is expensive.

You do not use an article before uncountable nouns when talking about them generally.

For example:

Information is important to any organisation. Coffee is bad for you.

You do not use an article before the names of countries except where they indicate multiple areas or contain the following words: state(s), kingdom, republic, union...

For example:

No article - Italy, Mexico, Bolivia, England Use the - the UK (United Kingdom), the USA (United States of America), the Irish Republic Multiple areas! the Netherlands, the Philippines, the British Isles

DEFINITE ARTICLE - THE

You use the when you have already mentioned the thing you are talking about.

For example:

"She's got two children; a girl and a boy. The girl's eight and the boy's fourteen."

We use the to talk about geographical points on the globe.

For example:

the North Pole, the equator

We use the to talk about rivers, oceans and seas

For example:

the Nile, the Pacific, the English channel

We also use the before certain nouns when we know there is only one of a particular thing.

For example:

the rain, the sun, the wind, the world, the earth, the White House etc..

Adverbs of Time

Some adverbs tell us when something happened or will happen.

These include:afterwards, later, now, soon, yesterday etc.

For example:-

Yesterday all my troubles seemed so far away. - In this sentence yesterday shows us when the singers troubles seemed so far away..

Other adverbs of time include:-

Time	Example
Saturday, Sunday ...	I am going to the shops on Monday.
Today	I've been to the shops today.
Yesterday	I went yesterday.
Next week/month/year	I am going next week.
Last week/month/year	I went last year.
Finally	I finally went.
Eventually	I eventually went to the shops.
Already	I've already been to the shops.
Soon	I'm going to the shops soon.
Just	I'm just going to the shops.
Still	I'm still at the shops.

Superlative form of Adverbs

The superlative form of an adverb is used to say what thing or person does something to the greater degree within a group or of its kind. Superlatives can be preceded by 'the'. In general the superlative forms of adverbs are the same as for superlative forms of adjectives.

The rule for forming the superlative of an adverb is if it has the same form as an adjective add the suffix -est to the end.

Adverbs of Frequency

Adverbs of frequency tell us how often something is done.

Adverbs of frequency include; always, constantly, continually, frequently, infrequently, intermittently, normally, occasionally, often, periodically, rarely, regularly, seldom, sometimes etc.

For example:

I always do my homework on time. - In this sentence always shows us the frequency (how often) I do my homework on time.

She goes out occasionally. - In this sentence occasionally shows us the frequency (how often) she goes out.

Most frequent	always
	constantly
	nearly always
	almost always
	usually
	generally
	normally
	regularly
	often
	frequently
	sometimes
	periodically
	occasionally
	now and then
	once in a while
	rarely
	seldom
	infrequently
	hardly ever
	scarcely ever
	almost never
Least frequent	never

Adverbs of frequency appear between the subject and the verb in a sentence:-

For example:

I always update the calendar at the beginning of the month.

Poetria often takes notes during the Skype sessions.