54.Thecar was wrecked.- We could hearaman’s voice coming upthestairwell.
- After our ordeal, we had to search foranalibi.
Teaching Tip
Nonnative speakers of English have a difficult time with articles, especially if
their first language is Asian. Japanese, for example, does not have articles,
so native Japanese speakers tend to leave them out when writing English. An
effective activity to help ELL students with articles is to have them team up
with a partner (a native English speaker, if possible). Students should read
the first three paragraphs of each other’s papers, underlining all nouns. Then
have them check for articles using the criteria listed for definite and indefi-
nite articles.Conjunctions
A characteristic of language is that it allows people to take small linguistic units
and combine them into larger ones, in an additive fashion. Sometimes the units
are equal, in which case they are coordinated; other times they are unequal, in
which case some units are subordinated to others.Conjunctionsare function
words that make many of these combinations possible, and there are two major
types:coordinatingandsubordinating.
Coordinating Conjunctions. Coordinating conjunctions, shown here,
join equal linguistic units:
and, but, for, nor, or, yet, soThe following sentences illustrate coordinating conjunctions joining indi-
vidual words/phrases:
- FritzandMacarena joined the party.
- Buggsy drove to the casinoandbet $100 on the upcoming race.
In sentence 57, the conjunction joins the two nouns,FritzandMacarena.In
sentence 58, the conjunction joins two verb phrases,drove to the casinoandbet
$100 on the upcoming race.
Coordinating conjunctions also join equal clauses, as shown here, produc-
ing what is referred to as acompound sentence:
- Fred opened the door,butMacarena wouldn’t come inside.
84 CHAPTER 3