Lesson 6 — Activity 1: Expressing Complete Thoughts


This might be a time when a complete sentence is not that important.
In previous lessons, you reviewed the parts of speech. Now you will review how you can put the parts of speech together to create interesting sentences that express complete ideas.

Often when you are talking in informal situations to your friends or family, you don't use complete sentences. When you write, though, other than for informal notes, e-mails, or text messages, you need to use a complete sentence to express your idea clearly to the reader.


A complete sentence contains two parts: a subject and a predicate.

  • The subject is who or what the sentence is about.
  • The predicate is the part of the sentence that tells what the subject did.
  • In a simple two-word sentence, the subject is a noun or pronoun and the predicate is a verb.


You need a complete sentence when the occasion is more formal.


The singer performed at the concert last night. This is a complete sentence.
Here are some examples of sentences with the subject in italics and the predicate underlined:

  • Sam sings.
  • Sam Smith sings songs.
  • Sam Smith and Taylor Swift sing songs.


 If you look at the sentences above and ask the question,"Who?", the answer is the subject.

  • Sam sings.     Who sings?   Sam
  • Sam Smith sings songs.   Who sings?  Sam Smith
  • Sam Smith and Taylor Swift sing songs.  Who sings? Sam Smith and Taylor Swift

If you look at the sentences above and ask the question,"What did the subject do?", the answer is found in the predicate.

  • Sam sings.   What does Sam do?   sings
  • Sam Smith sings songs.  What does Sam Smith do?  sings songs
  • Sam Smith and Taylor Swift sing songs.   What do Sam Smith and Taylor Swift do?   sing songs


A sentence has a subject and a predicate.
Image courtesy of www.imagesgoogle.com

To recap:


  •  The subject of the sentence is the person, people or things (nouns or pronouns) who are doing something in the sentence.


  • The predicate is the part of the sentence that tells what action is taking place.


  • You need to have both of these parts to have a complete sentence.


Watch this video to find out more information about subjects and predicates.



Go to the next page to try a Self-check Activity on identifying subjects and predicates.