Word, Phrase & Clause: What's the Difference? 👩‍🏫 English Grammar

Hi everyone. I'm Jennifer from English  with Jennifer. It won't surprise you  

to know that I believe everyone should  know at least a little bit of grammar.  

Grammar is all about patterns, and following the  usual patterns helps us have clear communication.

What's the difference between a word and a  phrase? A word is a single piece of language:  

cat, girl, sing, singing, beautiful,  beautifully, to, from, here.

A phrase is a group of two or  more words: a beautiful girl,

sing beautifully.

for me.

Phrases aren't complete ideas. They  don't have both a subject and a verb.  

Sometimes we speak in phrases if the rest is  understood. What do you see? A pretty cat.

There are different kinds of  phrases. We can have a noun phrase,

a verb phrase,

a prepositional phrase,

an infinitive phrase,

a gerund phrase.

There are other kinds of phrases, but  remember that no phrase is a complete idea.

A clause is a group of words with a subject  and a verb. Clauses can be short or long:

The girls sang.

Songs entertain us.

Birds are common pets in many  countries around the world.

Inside a clause, you may find a number of phrases.

Some clauses can stand alone. We call them  independent clauses. An independent clause  

is a simple sentence. Other  clauses are dependent clauses.  

We have to join these dependent clauses with an  independent clause to form a complete sentence.

If you don't know what to do  with this, I can show you.

Try two short quizzes. Here's the first. Can  you identify the phrases and the clauses?

Here are the phrases.

And here are the clauses. Notice how the  clauses each have a subject and a verb.

Here's the second quiz. Look at four clauses.  

Which of them are independent clauses Which of  them can stand alone as a complete sentence?

A and D are independent clauses. They  can stand alone as complete sentences.  

It's a traditional Chinese  dance. I wanted to learn.

B and C are dependent clauses.  These are adverb clauses.  

They have to join with independent  clauses to form a complete sentence.

That's all for now. I hope this  was helpful. Please like the video.  

As always, thanks for watching and happy studies!

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