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Writer's pictureEsl4everyone, Karen Peterson

Noun Clauses


Don't worry. You've got this. Now she doesn't. Her grammar is all wrong.

Let's do a little review and practice before we move on.

I.Positions of a noun clause.

1. subject – before the verb. Ex: What he did was insane.

2. Object – after the verb. Ex: I think that the weather will be cooler this week.

3.Object of preposition – after a preposition. Ex: I am thinking about what I am going to eat for lunch.

4. Complement – after an adjective. Ex: It is unbelievable how much time people spend on Facebook.

B. Commas -We don’t use commas.

C. Types.

1.From wh questions.

Do you remember the rules? You change the question to a noun clause. To do that, use this form: wh noun/pronoun + verb

Remember the rules: Delete do/does and did.

Where does he live? I don’t know where he liveS.

Where do you live? Ex: I don’t know where you live.

Where did he live? I don’t know where he liveD.

Let’s do a little practice as a review. Change the following wh questions to a noun clause.

1.(How do you play a guitar?) I don’t know ___________________________________________________.

2.(What time is it?) Could you tell me __________________________________?

3.(What did he do wrong?) Do you know ______________________________________?

4.(How many letters are there in the English alphabet?) I don’t remember ___________________________________________.

5.(Who is the mayor of Atlanta?) I don’t know _________________________________.

6. (What is your dog’s name?) I don’t know ___________________________________________________________________.

2.Statements and they are just sentences. In this type, you add the word that and put the noun class in the right place. The weather will be warmer on Thursday. Ex: I think that the weather will be warmer on Thursday.

3.Yes/no questions.

Are you going to go to Wild Animal Safari? Ex: I don’t know if you are going to Wild Animal Safari.

Here you can you 5 different choices:

Ex: I don’t know if you are going to Wild Animal Safari.

Ex: I don’t know whether you are going to Wild Animal Safari.

Ex: I don’t know if you are going to Wild Animal Safari or not.

Ex: I don’t know whether you are going to Wild Animal Safari or not.

Ex: I don’t know whether or not you are going to Wild Animal.

Let’s do a little exercise. Please change the yes/no questions to a noun clause. Don’t forget the rules for do/does and delete apply. Do the first type above.

1.Have you ever gone to an escape room? I don’t know ___________________________________________________________.

2.Do you ever watch shows on Netflix?

I don’t know ____________________________________________________________.

3.Does Saudi Arabia have four seasons?

I don’t know ________________________________________________________________________.

4.Did you go out of town last weekend?

I don’t know ________________________________________________________________________.

D.Adding sophisticated structures.

1.Using vocabulary for noun clauses.

2.Reducing noun clauses.

3.Using other positions for noun clauses.

4.Using more than one noun clause in a sentence.

Let’s look at #1 first, using vocabulary for noun clauses.

For summaries. They could be summaries of videos, an article, a book, etc. Please click on the links for the videos and then I will show you some examples of noun clauses. Please pay attention to the vocabulary for the verbs. As noun clauses are before or after verbs, then obviously we need to learn the verbs that go with noun clauses.

This video showed that/demonstrated that one cat could shove another cat down stairs.

Can you fill this example in using a noun clause showed that or demonstrated that?

This video taken from the movie “The Proposal” _______________________________________.

Here we do the same thing but we can say showed that/indicated that/concluded that

The poll_________________________________

5.Now the topic could be about a controversial topic. When we have a controversial topic, we can use different vocabulary: argue/maintain/claim that

Let’s look at some common controversial topics:

Please choose a controversial topic from the site and in our next lesson we will add the vocabulary for controversial topics.

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