Idioms and Phrases

Phrasal Verbs

1. Cut off                    -    remove/stop

2. Come upon             -    upset/ troubled/ extends

3. Draw up                 -    to drive up to a place/ to prepare something

4. Pass out                  -    faint

5. Take off                  -    start/ remove

6. Take off                  -    start/ remove

7. Turn away              -    reject/ oppose

8. Stand by                 -    support/ help

9. Bank on                  -    depend on

10. Turn on                 -    to open

11. Turn off                -    to close

12. Took over             -     take lead

13. Set off                  -    start a journey

14. Put off                  -    postpone

15. See/ send off        -    accompany to say bye

16. Stop/ lay over      -    to stay for a short period

17. Get in                   -    enter a bus/ train/ plane

18. get off                   -    leave a bus/ train/ plane

19. Get on                   -    arrive inside train/ bus etc

20. Get away               -    go away for vocation

21. Check in               -    register at airport/ hotel

22. Check out             -    pay bill when leaving a hotel.

Idioms

1. Save one's skin                               -    to protect oneself from difficulty

2. Make both ends meet                     -    manage one's expenses within one's income

3. a bolt out of a clear sky                  -    a sudden unexpected event or news

4.Go to grave                                      -    to exit the world

5. Have the whip hand                        -    to be a most powerful

6. Under a cloud                                  -    viewed with suspicion and distrust

7. Wait for the dust to settle                 -    to wait for a situation to become clear

8. Get/ have all your ducks in a row    -    to make all preparations

9. Fetch and carry                                -    to do a lot of little jobs as if you were their servant

10. Do the math                                   -    to think and calculate before doing

11. Round the corner                           -    very near

12. The icing on the cake                     -    something added extra to make it better

13. Break the ice                                  -    to say something to make people feel relaxed

14. Let down                                        -    disappointed

15. Chuckled to himself                       -    laughed softly to himself   

16. Take cheer                                      -    to be encouraged

17. Raise the devil                               -    to complain or scold

18. Black with anger                            -    become enraged

19. Take chances                                  -    try one's luck/ take a risk

20. Cup of tea                                       -    One's favourite activity

21. Thrash around                                -    to move about restlessly.

 

 

Degrees of Comparison

Degrees of Comparison

Positive Degree

        To compare people, places or things that are equal in some way.

                    (eg) He is as tall as Tom.

                            Very few flowers are as beautiful as sunflower.

Comparative Degree

        It is used to compare two people, place or things.

                    (eg) Tom is taller than his friends.

                            Apples are costlier than oranges.

Superlative Degree

        It is used to show the highest or lowest limit of a quality when comparing more than two people, place or things.

                    (eg) Tom is the tallest of all friends.

                            Teaching is the noblest of all profession.

Degrees of comparison - Transformation

1. No other planet is as large as Jupiter. (P)

    Jupiter is larger than any other planet. (C)

    Jupiter is the largest planet. (S)

2. Very few flowers are as beautiful as Sunflower. (P)

    Sunflower is more beautiful than many other flowers. (C)

    Sunflower is one of the most beautiful flowers. (S)

                            

Sentence Pattern

What is a sentence pattern ?

              A sentence pattern is also called as a verb pattern. We call it Verb pattern because it determines the type of sentence structure. There are five important components in a sentence. They are subject, verb, object, complement and adjunct.

 1. Subject

            The part which names the person or thing we are speaking about is called the subject of the sentence.

                     (Eg) Tom wrote a poem.

 2. Verb

                           Verb is a word that denotes an action.

                      
                       (eg) Jerry bought a pen.

 3. Object

            The object of a sentence is the person or thing that receives the action of the verb. It answers for the question What? Or Whom?

             Direct object answer for the question “What?”
             Indirect object answers for the question “To Whom?”
                     

                       eg) My grandmother/ told/ me / a story.
                                                                   IO      DO

 4. Complement

              The words required to complete the meaning of a sentence are called complement of a sentence.

                       (eg) She is a  Doctor.

 5. Adjunct

             An adjunct is a word or group of words that gives extra information to a sentence, but, when removed makes no chance to its grammar.

                  Why ,      When ,   Where,      How ?

                           ↓                ↓                   ↓                 ↓
                       Reason      time            place         manner

                      (eg)   Tom will be punished because of what he did.
                                He will come tomorrow.
                                They were sightseeing around the city. 
                                He slowly paced the book on the counter.

•  Exercise:

          1. The lion/ killed/ a dear.

                   S            V           O

          2. We/ watch/ television.

                S       V            O

          

          3. The cow/ gives/  us/  milk.

                    S          V      IO     DO

          4. He/  is/  a teacher.

               S      V        C

          5. They/ made/ her/ famous.

                 S         V       O         C

          6. He/ writes/ slowly.

               S        V         A

       

          7. He/ asked/ him/ to stand up.

                S       V        O           V

          8. He/ will come/ at 5pm.

               S          V              A

          9. I am/ going/ to chennai.

                S          V             A

         10. He/ painted/ his house/ green.

                S          V             O              C

Kinds of Sentence

 

There are four kinds of sentences according to structure. They are Simple sentence, Compound sentence, Complex Sentence and Compound Complex Sentence.

1. Simple Sentence:

           It is a group of words which makes sense. It has a Subject and a predicate.

                (eg) The birds  fly in the sky.

                            Sub          Predicate

                        The Sun  rises in the east.

                            Sub           Predicate

                     

Clause:

The Clause is of two types

    1. Main clause or Independent clause
    2. Subordinate clause or dependent clause.

Main Clause:

A main clause can stand alone and give a complete meaning.

               (eg) She wrote a letter.

                       He is a good boy.

                       Tom likes to draw pictures.

                       Ria sang a song.

Subordinate clause:

The subordinate clause cannot stand independently. It always depend on the main clause to give a complete meaning.

               (eg) Though I am poor

                       As she was ill

                       Unless you work hard

                       I you study well

2. Compound Sentence:

        A Compound Sentence is a sentence that contains two or more main clause.

                (eg) The bell rang and the music began.

                        He ran out of money, so he had to stop playing cards. 

                        She drank her morning coffee, and then she showered and dressed.

3. Complex Sentence:

        A complex sentence is a sentence that contains one main clause and one or more subordinate clause.

                (eg) Although he was wealthy he was unhappy.

                        When he was younger, he believed in fairy tales.

                        Unless you work hard, you will not pass. 

4. The Compound-Complex Sentence:

        The Compound-Complex Sentence is comprised of at least two main clauses and one or more subordinate clauses.

                (eg) Annie doesn't like cartoons because they are loud, so she doesn't watch them.

                        The dog started barking so the cat ran away and I couldn’t keep up, so I stopped.

                        When we won the world cup, the team captain jumped for joy, and the fans

Cheered.

Question Tags

Do you Know how to use Question Tags ?

The question given at the end of the sentence are question tags. It is a statement followed by a mini-question. We use tag questions to ask for confirmation. Question tags are more common in speaking than writing. Tag questions are made using an auxiliary verb and a subject pronoun.

 

         (eg) He is a good musician, isn’t he?

                 You will come tomorrow, won’t you?

                 She hasn't eaten all the cake, has she?

                 The trains are never on time, are they?

Question tags are used after affirmative and negative sentences, but not after questions. If the statement is positive, the question tag is formed by auxiliary verb + n’t + subject.

                 It was raining that day, wasn't it?

                 They have completed their work, haven’t they? 

If the statement is negative, the question tag is formed by auxiliary + subject.

                 He isn’t honest, is he?

                 It couldn’t be true, could it?

If the Verb in the statement is in simple present tense then ‘do’ or ‘does’ is used in the question tag,

   

                 Sheela sings well, doesn’t She?

                 They know English, don’t they?

If the Verb in the statement is in simple past tense ‘did’ is used in the question tag.

                 John looked ill, didn’t he?

                 The doctors attended to the patient, didn’t they?

Rules in Auxiliary verb:

If the main sentence has an auxiliary verb or ‘be’ verb, the auxiliary verb is repeated in the question tag.

                 She can speak French, can’t she?

                 The music was quite good, wasn’t it?

                 You wouldn’t like to be cheated, would you? 

If the main sentence has no auxiliary verb, the question tag will have ‘do’ form of verb.

                 You like tea, don’t you?
                 He gave you a present, didn’t he? 

Rules:

1. The Subject of the question tag is always a pronoun and never a noun.

                 (eg)  Tom didn’t speak to you, did he?

2. Anybody, nobody, everybody, none of them take the plural ‘they’ in the question tag.

                 (eg) Everybody doesn’t know the truth, do they?

                         None of those customers were happy, were they? 

                         Nobody has called for me, have they?

3. Imperative Verbs showing request usually take ‘will you’, both in the positive and negative sentences.

                (eg) Give me that book, will you?

                        Don’t be late for the party, will you? 

4. Wont you is used to give urgency to the request.

               (eg) Have some tea, won’t you?

                       Remember to come on time, won’t you?

5. Words like little, few, hardly, scarcely, rarely and seldom are regarded as negatives. So they take a positive tag.

               (eg) Few students know the right answer, do they?

                       We could scarcely see him, could we?

                       They seldom come here, do they?

6. A few and a little have positive meaning. So they take a negative tag.

                (eg) A few students know the right answer, don’t they?

                         A little progress has been made, hasn’t it?

7. If the main verb or auxiliary verb in the statement is ‘am’, the positive question tag is ‘am I’? but the negative question tag is usually aren't I?

                 (eg)  I'm never on time, am I?

                          I'm going to get an email with the details, aren’t I?