Module 1 - Handout: Grammar
What is grammar?
Grammar is a set of rules and guidelines to help us use and structure language correctly.
All of us have some knowledge of grammar that we use without thinking.
If we read the sentence:

The learner the test passed.
we would automatically correct the word order to:

The learner passed the test.
We would apply our knowledge of sentence structure and word order.
If we say:

It were a bad accident.
or

Me and him was going to college.
we are not following the rules of grammar.
Often we know if something doesn’t look or sound right – we need to apply the correct grammar rule to
correct the mistake. It would be pointless to learn all the rules of grammar, as we would probably get
confused or quickly forget what we have learnt, but it is useful to focus on correcting common errors,
such as:

would have, should have – not would of, should of
The main parts of grammar include sentences and their structure, and parts of speech including nouns,
adjectives and verbs.
Definitions of words used when talking about grammar
Sentence
A group of words put together to make complete sense. A sentence must have a verb in it:

The tutor showed the learner how to do the assignment.
Noun
The name of an object, person or place:

Liverpool

book

John
Adjective
A word that describes a noun:

a clever learner

a boring meeting
Verb
A word that relates to the action in a sentence. Sometimes referred to as the doing word:

We will report the accident.

The assessors were marking the assignments.