Extension Exercises

Index | Chapter 20 - Major variants | Possible Answers

Exploring English

Study two or three pages of a magazine, newspaper or book. Look carefully at each sentence.

1. What proportion of adverbials occur at the end of a clause, at the beginning or in the middle? Is this affected by whether the clause includes one or more adverbials? Is this affected by the type of adverbial (for example, their length, whether the phrases begin with a preposition or a noun, whether the adverbials refer to place, time or manner)?
2. Are there any instances of either there or it used as a dummy subject? Why are these used to 'push' new information to the end of the clause?
3. Are there any other instances of fronting or spotlighting information? How would meaning or emphasis be affected if the standard ordering of constituents were followed?

Course materials

1. Study a coursebook for late intermediate or advanced learners.

1. How much attention is paid to ways of fronting information, pushing it back and putting it under the spotlight?
2. Does this attention extend to spoken English as well as written?
3. What kinds of guidance are given to learners in choosing and using variants on the standard order of sentence constituents?

2. Study a coursebook for elementary learners and consider the following:

1. Does it teach question forms tense by tense?
2. Does it teach that there is a pattern that underlies all question forms?