Subject and Predicate

Introduction

A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought. It should be grammatically correct, meaningful and clear. This lesson focuses on helping learners distinguish the two major parts of a sentence—the subject and the predicate—and understand how sentence elements combine to form different sentence patterns. Learners develop these skills through collaborative and task-based activities connected to real-life communication.

Key Concepts

• Sentence: A group of words that expresses a complete thought and is grammatically correct, meaningful and clear.
• Subject: The part of a sentence about which something is said. It is usually a noun, noun phrase, pronoun or noun clause and performs the action.
• Predicate: The part of a sentence that says something about the subject. It always contains the verb, either alone or with other words.
• Simple Subject: A subject consisting of a single word.
• Compound Subject: Two subjects joined by a conjunction.
• Implied Subject: A subject that is understood rather than stated, commonly found in commands.

Explanation

Every sentence has two major parts: the subject and the predicate. The subject tells who or what the sentence is about, while the predicate tells what the subject does or what is said about the subject.

The subject may appear in different forms. A simple subject consists of one word, for example, Hamza danced very well at the party. A compound subject consists of two subjects joined by a conjunction, as in Books and pens are writing materials. An implied subject occurs in commands where the subject is understood but not stated, for example, (You) Eat the food.

Sometimes the subject is expressed as a noun phrase or noun group, such as All the students or The little cat.

The predicate always contains the verb and may consist of the verb alone or together with other words. For example, in Birds fly, the predicate is fly, while in The students of Tamale Girls School have arrived, the predicate is have arrived.

Sentences are made up of different elements including the Subject (S), Verb (V), Object (O), Complement (C) and Adjunct (A). These elements combine to produce sentence patterns such as SV, SVO, SVOO, SVC, SVOA, SVA and ASV.

Examples

Example 1

Problem: Identify the subject and predicate in the sentence: Mensah plays well.

1. Identify who performs the action.
2. Identify what is said about the subject.

Final Answer: Subject – Mensah; Predicate – plays well.

Example 2

Problem: Identify the type of subject in the sentence: Books and pens are writing materials.

1. Identify the subjects.
2. Determine whether they are joined by a conjunction.

Final Answer: The sentence has a compound subject.

Application and Activities

• Explain the meaning of a sentence.
• Identify and explain the subject and predicate in given sentences.
• Create sentences and distinguish their parts.
• Analyse sentences into their corresponding sentence patterns.
• Work collaboratively to examine the composition of subjects and predicates in different texts.

Practice

• Define a sentence and give one example.
• Differentiate between the subject and the predicate.
• Analyse a given sentence into its corresponding sentence pattern.

Summary

A sentence expresses a complete thought and consists primarily of a subject and a predicate. Subjects may be simple, compound or implied, while predicates contain the verb and provide information about the subject. Sentence elements combine to form different sentence patterns that help learners construct meaningful and grammatically correct sentences in both speech and writing.