Simple and Compound Sentences

Simple and Compound Sentences

Last week, we learned about basic sentence rules. The examples you saw last week were all simple sentences.

Simple sentences:

• Express a complete thought

• Have a subject and a verb

• Usually has an object and/or other information after the verb

• May have more than one subject and more than one verb, but can only have one subject-verb relationship

Multiple Choice

Choose the subject of the following sentence:

Chile imports oil from Brazil.

• Chile

• imports

• oil

• Brazil

Multiple Select

Choose all the verbs of the following sentence:

Chile imports oil and exports copper.

• Chile

• imports

• exports

• copper

Multiple Select

Choose all the subjects of the following sentence:

Chile and Brazil import clothing and export copper.

• Chile

• Brazil

• import

• export

Take a look at these examples of simple sentences. Some have only one subject and/or one verb and some have more than one subject and/or more than one verb. However, each of these sentences have only one subject-verb relationship. That means even when we have two subjects, Chile and Brazil, and we have two verbs, import and export, the set of subjects are the actors of the action in the set of verbs.

Sometimes you will want to write longer sentences. One way to do this is to combine simple sentences and write compound sentences.

Chile imports oil from Brazil.

Brazil imports clothing from China.

-> Chile imports oil from Brazil, and Brazil imports clothing from China.

If the two simples sentences have the same subject, use a pronoun to replace the subject in the second sentence. Do not repeat the subject.

• Chile is an extremely long country, but it is not wide at all.

• Tourists can visit the pyramids, or they can relax on a beach.

Notice that compound sentences have two subject-verb combinations!

• Chile exports copper, and Brazil exports sugar.

• Chile has a very long seacoast, so fishing is a big business there.

Read the sentences that follow and figure out whether they are simple or compound sentences.

**Hint! Look for the subject-verb combinations. If there is only one subject-verb combination, it is a simple sentence. If you can find more than one subject-verb combination, it is probably a compound sentence.

Multiple Choice

1. Certain words in a title may catch the reader's attention, but some titles are too general and do not create interest.

• simple

• compound

Multiple Choice

2. All of the sentences in a well-written paragraph talk about one topic.

• simple

• compound

Multiple Choice

3. Sometimes a simple sentence has a compound subject or verb, but it never has more than one subject-verb combination.

• simple

• compound

Multiple Choice

4. The first step in writing feels like a storm of ideas in your mind, so it is called "brainstorming."

• simple

• compound

Multiple Choice

Some students think choosing a good topic and writing the first sentence is the hardest part of writing a paragraph.

• simple

• compound

Finally, it is important to know that the coordinating conjunction is used to show the relationship between the two simple sentences. The most commonly used coordinating conjunctions are and, but, or, and so.

• and: adds information

• but: adds contrasting (different) information

• or: gives a choice

• so: gives the result of the information in the first sentence

That's the end of our lesson today.

Now go to Canvas and submit your homework to show what you learned!