What Is a Clause?

In many ways, a clause is the same thing as a sentence. In fact, we can think of a clause as "a sentence that has been reduced to its simplest form." And, in truth, we often use the words "clause" and "sentence" interchangeably. However, they are not the exact same thing.

So . . . what's the difference?

Not much. An independent clause can be turned into a sentence simply by capitalizing the first word and putting a period at the end.

Clause	Sentence
the dog chased the rabbit	The dog chased the rabbit.

However, there are other kinds of clauses that can't be turned into sentences quite so easily.

To better understand a clause, let's zoom in and take a look at its parts:

The first thing we notice is that a clause consists of a subject and a predicate.

Clause
Subject	Predicate

• The subject comes first; it's the thing that the clause is about.
• The predicate tells us something about the subject.

Study the following examples:

Subject	Predicate
the dog	chased the rabbit
the singer	is talented
my friend	won the race
Betty	likes music
the horse	drank water

Key Points

• A clause is a pattern of words that consists of a subject and a predicate.
• The subject always comes first.
• The predicate follows the subject. Loosely speaking, we might say that the predicate is "the second half of the sentence".

Instructions for the Quiz

Identify the underlined portion of the sentence.

Quiz