Gamom3 Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 We are confused on "substantives" we understand that they are a noun or a pronoun, but we don't understand how to find the phrase or clause. Ex. Eating food from the king's table would have brought defilement. The result of the test was that these four faithful Jews were the healthiest of all. Figuring out today's math problems required patience and hard work. The substantive clauses or phrases are underlined. How do you find the phrase or clause? **Please explain in simple terms. We have the definition that a substantive is any word or word group that names something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trixie Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 (edited) We are confused on "substantives" we understand that they are a noun or a pronoun, but we don't understand how to find the phrase or clause. Ex. Eating food from the king's table would have brought defilement. The result of the test was that these four faithful Jews were the healthiest of all. Figuring out today's math problems required patience and hard work. The substantive clauses or phrases are underlined. How do you find the phrase or clause? **Please explain in simple terms. We have the definition that a substantive is any word or word group that names something. I'll explain in the simplest terms I can, but it might get a bit fussy depending on how much you know/remember about phrases and clauses and gerunds (oh my!). :001_smile: A "substantive" is anything that serves as a noun, including phrases (groups of words that don't contain a S/V) and clauses (groups of words that do contain a S/V) that function as nouns. You find the phrase or clause by looking for things that "head" phrases and clauses--prepositions, gerunds, subordinating conjunctions, etc.--and including all of the "stuff" that goes with that head to complete the thought. In the first sentence, the underlined phrase is a "gerund phrase." That is, it's a noun phrase headed by a gerund (a noun formed from a verb) that includes everything that goes with that gerund. So the entire "gerund phrase" functions as a noun; in this case, it's the subject of the sentence. In the second sentence, "test" is the object of the prepositional phrase "of the test." "That these four faithful Jews were the healthiest of all" is a dependent clause (meaning that it contains a S/V but can't stand alone as a sentence) headed by the subordinating conjunction "that" and including the rest of the clause (subject, verb, and all the stuff that completes the idea). In the third sentence, "patience" and "work" are nouns functioning as direct objects. "Figuring out today's math problems" is a gerund phrase (just like in the first sentence) functioning as the subject. (ETA: I hope that first sentence didn't sound snarky. I don't use Rod & Staff materials, so I don't know what you might already have covered in the course. :) ) Edited October 2, 2009 by Trixie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rhondabee Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 (edited) I think perhaps the easiest way to find phrases and clauses that are acting as nouns is to follow R&S's questions that leads you through diagramming a sentence: First, find the verb. Then ask "Who? or What?" about the verb. So, in this sentence: Eating food from the king's table would have brought defilement. the first step is to locate the verb phrase "would have brought", and then ask, "What would have brought?" The answer is "Eating food from the king's table would have brought" so the entire phrase (gerund) "eating food from the king's table" is the subject. Since you can't really call that entire phrase a "noun", you call it a "substantive" instead. ***** ETA: Technically, "eating food" would be the simple subject, and "from the king's table" is a prep phrase modifying food. But, as I explain at the end, you will learn the particulars of each type of substantive as you go through R&S-7. I think for now they just want you to identify all the words that go together to make up the subject (tho' it's been a while - I may be mistaken). ***** The next question to ask is to say the subject and verb together and then ask "What?" to get a direct object. So, for the sentence above, you ask, "Eating food from the king's table would have brought what?" And, the answer is defilement - so that's the DO. It is a noun, but nouns are also called substantives. (Think, every noun is a substantive, but not every substantive is a noun.) If memory serves, I *think* that basically you'll be looking for substantives (nouns or phrases/clauses used as nouns) only as Subjects & direct objects at first. But, basically anywhere you can have a noun as a sentence part (Sub, DO, Indirect Object, object of preposition), you can have a phrase or clause acting as a noun (and for now you can clump them all together and call them "substantives"). Most of R&S-7 (or, the hardest part!) is learning the different types of substantives and how to diagram them. So, for now, just understanding which words go together as "the subject" or "the direct object" is good. Best wishes! R&S is all downhill after Book 7! =) Edited October 2, 2009 by Rhondabee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trixie Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 I think perhaps the easiest way to find phrases and clauses that are acting as nouns is to follow R&S's questions that leads you through diagramming a sentence: First, find the verb. Then ask "Who? or What?" about the verb. So, in this sentence: Eating food from the king's table would have brought defilement. the first step is to locate the verb phrase "would have brought", and then ask, "What would have brought?" Good point! :001_smile: I kind of started in the middle, sorry about that. I hope my explanation didn't muddle things further. I'm not at all familiar with the curriculum in question, so I didn't know whether or not finding the verb had been covered yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rhondabee Posted October 3, 2009 Share Posted October 3, 2009 Good point! :001_smile: I kind of started in the middle, sorry about that. I hope my explanation didn't muddle things further. I'm not at all familiar with the curriculum in question, so I didn't know whether or not finding the verb had been covered yet. No apologies necessary - you made great points I didn't recover. I only jumped in because I have done R&S and whenever my kids have trouble analyzing a sentence, it's usually because they haven't asked themselves the questions like they're supposed to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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