CLAUSES & SENTENCE TYPES

CLAUSE—a group of related words that has a subject and a verb.

• independent: presents a complete thought and can stand alone as a sentence.

• dependent: (aka subordinate clause) cannot stand alone in a sentence, but can add interesting and important detail to a sentence.

Label each clause as INDEPENDENT or DEPENDENT:

1. Weavers of this tribe make beautiful cloth.

2. Each one has a different pattern.

3. Because one is mostly yellow.

4. It is called “Gold Dust.”

5. When Ghana elected its first president.

6. Although the stew itself is filling.

7. Many languages are heard.

8. The sphinx guards the ancient pyramids in Egypt.

9. Pastures in Morocco feed grazing animals.

10. When animals graze.

SENTENCE STRUCTURE. Depending on the relationship between a sentences independent and dependent clauses, it can be classified as simple, compound, complex, or compound-complex.

• simple sentence: NO DEPENDENT CLAUSES.

examples:

My back aches.

My teeth and eyes hurt.

My memory and my logic come and go.

I must be getting old.

• compound sentence: TWO INDEPENDENT CLAUSES.

examples:

Energy is part of youth, so why am I so exhausted?

It couldn’t be my fault; I take good care of myself.

• complex sentence: ONE INDEPENDENT CLAUSE & ONE OR MORE DEPENDENT CLAUSES

examples:

When I can, I get eight hours of sleep.

If I get up on time, and if my brother hasn’t used up all the milk, I eat breakfast.

• compound-complex: TWO OR MORE INDEPENDENT CLAUSES & ONE OR MORE DEPENDENT CLAUSES

example:

If I’m not in a hurry, I take long, leisurely walks, and I stop to smell the roses.

Now use your knowledge of clauses and sentence structure to underline each independent clause once and each dependent clause twice. Based on the number of independent and dependent clauses, label each sentence as simple, compound, complex, or compound-complex.

1. South Africa is the southernmost country of Africa.

2. It is the most powerful and wealthiest country of the region.

3. Gold and diamonds are mined in both South Africa and Namibia, yet it was South Africa where the biggest diamond in the world was found.

4. Although it is not as wealthy as South Africa, Mozambique is the site of the

second biggest port in all of Africa.

5. Its capital, Maputo, is the city where the port is located; it is linked by rail with South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe.

6. Even though must people think of Africa as a desert, Zimbabwe has a hot, tropical climate, so mangoes, passion fruit, pineapples, and avocados grow well.

7. In fact, only a small percentage of southern Africa is desert.

8. However, because soil quality is poor, farms thrive only in places that receive more than 20 inches of rain annually.

9. One of the many surprising facts about west Africa is that the Sahara was not always a desert.

10. Rock paintings show that as recently as several thousand years ago, people hunted hippopotamuses in the region’s rivers and chased buffalo on its wide, grassy plains.