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The Parts of Speech: A Quick Overview

Can you name the nouns in this photo? 

The eight parts of speech are nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives and articles, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections. With a little practice and within some interesting sentences, it's easy to begin telling them apart.


Nouns

Nouns are proper names (like of people, pets, and special places), general places ("home,"" garden," "park"), things ("leaf," "trees," "building," "shed"), or ideas ("love," "sadness," "mathematics," "dancing").  I can show you pictures of most nouns, whether they are singular or plural, common or proper: Monarch butterfly, shed, grass, trees, wheelbarrow, sunflowers.

Nouns play very specific roles in sentences: Nouns can be subjects, objects, or predicate nominatives. In fact, a subject, object, or predicate nominative will always be a noun or pronoun. In order to understand parts of speech, always look at how words are used in a sentence.

In the following examples, the nouns are green, including the gerund, "dancing" and the infinitive, "to dance." In sentences, nouns often answer the questions Who? Whom? or What?
  • Jean loves dancing. Who loves dancing? Jean!  What does Jean love? Dancing!
  • Walter loves to dance with Jean. Give Jean the ticket. To whom do I give the ticket? Jean! With whom does Walter love to dance? Jean!
  • Her name is Jean. What is her name? Jean! Jean is what? Her name!

Pronouns

Pronouns are like nouns, but they are less specific. Instead of saying "bicycle," for example, I might refer to the bicycle as "that" or "it." Instead of referring to "Jean" or "grandma," I might say "she" or "her," depending on where or how the pronoun is used in the sentence. In order to use a pronoun so that it has meaning, a pronoun must have an antecedent, or a noun to which it refers (so readers or listeners know what "it" is.) In the following sentences, the pronouns are blue, and the antecedents are green.
  • My grandma, Jean, bakes pies. She bakes the best pies.
  • The baby hugged grandma after walking to her on his own. 
  • Is that woman your grandma? It is her!

Ownership

Nouns show ownership when we add an apostrophe "s", like the announcement, "That is Matthew's new guitar."  In that sentence, "Matthew's" is a possessive noun that modifies, or tells a little more about the guitar. Pronouns can also show ownership or possession, and we call those possessive pronouns. Those pronouns tell us a little more about the words they modify, too. The nouns in the following sentences are in green, and the possessive pronouns are in blue. 
  • That is Shelia's bike, and its tires are flat.
  • My mother went to see her doctor.
  • Sam's brother is in his room.

Verbs

Verbs indicate action with action verbs, like "climbs", "flew," "loved,"or a state of being  with linking verbs, like "is," and "sounds." The "has" and  "been" in  "has been dancing," are examples of helping verbs. Helping verbs help indicate tense and aspect: Verbs have tenses (past, present, future) and aspects (simple, perfect, progressive, and perfect progressive), which help explain when something started happening, when it happened, and if it's still happening.

I cannot show you pictures of verbs without showing you the nouns that are completing the actions (or the nouns that are in a state of being). Even in a one-word sentence, like "Sit," as I might say to my dog, there is the subject of "understood you," or the dog being asked to do the sitting. In the same way, if I yelled "Run!" at my friend's race, my friend would know that he was the "understood you" I was encouraging to run.

Sometimes words that look like verbs are used as nouns or modifiers and vice-versa, like "dancing" and "to dance" in the previous examples. Again, it's always important to look at how words are being used in sentences before trying to determine a word's part of speech.

The verbs in the following sentences are in red. Notice how verbs are conjugated in order to match the subjects. Regular verbs are conjugated according to consistent rules of conjugation, but irregular verb conjugations, like "to be," should be memorized.
  • Jean loves dancing. Jean and Walter love dancing. (Action verb)
  • That woman is my grandmother! Those people are my grandparents. (Linking verb)
  • The dog is laying in the garden, (Action verb with helping verb) and he smells terrible! (Linking verb)

Adjectives and Articles

Adjectives modify nouns and pronouns. They give us more information about people, places, things, or ideas by identifying them, or telling us about their qualities or quantities. The three articles are "a," "an," and "the." Adjectives and articles help answer What kind?, Which one?, or How many? in a sentence. It is important to place adjectives either before the words they modify, directly after the words they modify, or directly following a linking verb to connect to the words they modify.

In the following examples, the adjectives and articles are in orange, and the nouns they modify are in green.

  • Five dogs are now laying in the garden bed.
  • The soup is cold
  • My grandparents, happy and kind, love dancing.

Adverbs

Adverbs modify verbs, other adverbs, or even adjectives. It often does not matter where an adverb is placed in a sentence when it modifies the verb, but there are some instances where placement of an adverb can change the meaning of a sentence. In the following examples, the adverbs are orange. The verbs are in red. Notice in the second set of sentences how much the meaning of a sentence can change depending on the placement of "only."

  • A far-off Mourning Dove sang sadly. A far-off Mourning Dove sadly sang.
  • We are almost ready to go on vacation. 
  • Open the bottle of pop very slowly.
  • Only rain wrecked our vacation. Everything else was lovely.
  • Rain only wrecked our vacation. It did not do worse than "wreck."
  • Rain wrecked only our vacation. It did not wreck the vacations of others.
  • Rain wrecked our only vacation. Too bad we get only one vacation.

Prepositions

Prepositions are linking words that show the relationship of a noun or pronoun to some other word in a sentence. Prepositions show position of a noun, direction, causation, or possession. People often explain that a preposition is anything a squirrel can do to a tree or an airplane can be to a cloud. The prepositions in the following sentences are in purple, and the rest of the prepositional phrase of each is underlined. Notice that prepositions are followed by nouns (or sometimes pronouns), in green. Notice that even when a prepositional phrase begins a sentence, the noun that is part of the prepositional phrase will never be the subject of the sentence.

  • The squirrel climbed up the tree and across its branches.
  • The airplane is to the West of the cloud cover.
  • According to the pilot, we are going to be late because of the clouds.

Conjunctions

Like prepositions, conjunctions show relationships between ideas. Conjunctions can either be coordinating (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so, either, neither), or subordinating (since, if, while, although, as, so that, because). Because conjunctions show logical relationships between ideas, it's always important to be sure to use the correct conjunction in order to make meaning most clear. Because they are also linking words, like prepositions, they are also in purple.

  • The search for treasure has been rewarding, yet we should investigate further.
  • Because the search for treasure has been rewarding, we should investigate further.
  • Either the search for treasure has been rewarding, or we should investigate further.

Interjections

Interjections are simply exclamatory words that add emotion to our statements. The interjections are in the following sentences are in grey.

  • Great!  We're lost.
  • Hey! Give that back.
  • No way! I beat the game.

Short Practice: Parts of Speech Exercise

Are you able to pick out the parts of speech in the following sentences? When you're ready to check your answers, scroll to the bottom of the post.

  • Wonderful! The black and blue butterfly is resting on the sunflower in my garden.
  • Be sure to trim the vines from around the shed.
  • Martha used the wheelbarrow to move the apple tree to the back of the yard.

Want to read more about grammar before you see the answers? Try



Practice Answers


  • Wonderful! The black and blue butterfly is resting on the sunflower in my garden.
  • Cut the vines from the shed.
  • Martha used the wheelbarrow and moved the apple tree to the back of her yard.

Copyright Amy Lynn Hess. Please contact the author for permission to republish.


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