Transitive Clauses
Our third major clause pattern is the transitive pattern. This pattern consists of "Subject / Verb / Object", and we represent this pattern like this: (SVO).
Study the transitive pattern:
Subject | Verb | Object | |
transitive (SVO) |
Veronica | hit | the ball. |
Note the following points:
- The subject always comes first (with very few exceptions).
- The verb follows the subject. (It's always in the middle).
- The object follows the verb. The object is the thing that is being "acted upon" by the verb.
- To determine the object of a sentence, it is often helpful to turn the sentence into a question. For example, I could ask the question: "What did Veronica hit?" The answer is "the ball," therefore "the ball" is the object of the sentence.
Study the following examples of the transitive pattern.
Subject | Verb | Object |
I | love | my mother. |
John | built | shelves. |
I | taste | the cinnamon. |
I | doubt | his story. |
Oscar | forgot | his laptop. |
Allison | asked | a question. |
Einstein | proved | the theory. |
Mary | visited | a doctor. |
We | approached | the border. |
The doctor | stitched | the wound. |
Instructions for the Quiz
Identify the underlined portion of the sentence.
- subject
- verb
- object