Studying Sentence Patterns to Improve Your Writing, Part Two

This is Everyday Grammar. I'm Lucia.

And I'm Kaveh. You know, I was bored the other day. And I wrote a song. The title is My Dog is Fluffy. Okay. Or cute?

No, fluffy. It has more mass appeal, in my opinion.

Well, in my opinion, you're using a very common sentence pattern in English.

Ah, that's true. Subject, be, subject, compliment.

Exactly. And one way to get better in English is to study common sentence patterns.

Subject plus be plus subject compliment is a very common sentence pattern. Like, my dog is fluffy.

Okay. But before we go any further, we should explain what a subject compliment is.

Well, a subject compliment is a word or phrase that describes or identifies the subject.

A subject compliment is either an adjective, a noun, or a pronoun.

So the subject compliment in the sentence, my dog is fluffy, is fluffy because it describes the dog.

Ben is a policeman. He is sad.

There might be sentences that appear to be more complicated, but they too use the same basic structure.

In those cases, you just need to recognize that the sentence has more information.

That pie is burnt and crispy. My mom is a great cook. And that's everyday grammar.