Mini Lesson Plan: Subject & Predicate
Subject and Predicate are the two basic building blocks of any complete sentence; and a complete sentence is the first step in your child’s journey in Grammar! Come on board and learn to have perfectly grammatical fun with us in another Mini Lesson Plan!
Activity 1: Twinkle Trails Episode 13 — Subject and Predicate
On this episode of Twinkle Trails, Miss Twinkle and class go on board the Subject & Predicate train destined to Complete Sentences town!
Quick Recap:
A complete sentence has to be made of two parts: the subject and the predicate.
Subject: the person or the thing that the sentence is about
In this sentence: The brown fox jumps over the low fence.
‘Fox’ is the simple subject, and ‘brown fox’ is the complete subject.
Predicate: verb form that tells something about the subject
In this sentence: The brown fox jumps over the low fence.
‘Jumps’ is the simple predicate, and ‘jumps over the low fence’ is the complete predicate.
Mini Task:
Can you identify the subject and the predicate in the following sentence?
A very merry Ethan danced to upbeat music. (Answer at the bottom!)
Mini Resource:
For a musical recap on Subject and Predicate, watch Mr. Morton’s tale below!
Activity 2: Story Time!
Travel with your little one off to a far away land — on the Subject and Predicate Train! Pick one of your child’s favourite books and get him to identify the subjects and predicates in the sentences.
Better yet, give your child highlighters so they can get down and colourful with their grammar homework! On top of making learning more fun, research has shown a high correlation between the presence of colours in learning, level of attention and subsequent memory retention.
Colour helps us in memorizing certain information by increasing our attentional level. The role played by colour in enhancing our attention level is undisputable. The more attention focused on certain stimuli, the more chances of the stimuli to be transferred to a more permanent memory storage.
— Mariam Adawiah Dzulkifli and Muhammad Faiz Mustafar
Researchers further tell us that warm colours such as yellow, red, and orange have greater impact on level of attention than cool colours such as gray and brown. One way to capitalize on this association between colours and learning is to colour code the types of predicates and subjects that we have learnt today.
For example:
Key:
Green highlighter: Simple Subject
Yellow highlighter: Simple Predicate
Red underline: Complete Subject
Blue underline: Complete Predicate
So what are you waiting for? Whip out your brightest colours and start putting your new skills to the test!
Activity 3: Hands-On
After some hard work spent reading and highlighting with vigor, your little one probably wants to move on to play time. Why not inject a shot of Subject and Predicate in that too?
When you’re done with the fairy tales and highlighting, allow your child to indulge in some computer time with this flash game!
Now that your child has learned to identify the subject and predicate in a sentence, it’s time for him to form proper sentences of his own! Invest in a Magnetic Poetry kit for your refrigerator or any magnetic surface in your classroom or home. Or if you’re in the mood for some classic DIY, why not create your own magnetic words with a simple tutorial?
A box of individual magnetized words plus curious children with grammatical knowledge to show off equals a world of possibilities!
Ask the children questions and have them form the answers in complete sentences using the magnets. Or simply leave the children to their own devices! You’d be surprised with the creativity they display; and maybe you’ll end up with a funny quote for the ages!
Activity 4: Step Up Your Grammar Game
This one’s for the advanced grammarians in your children. Once they have mastered the basics forming a simple sentence, take it further a notch by teaching them to form simple sentences with compound subject and compound predicate.
Mini Lesson:
Compound Subject: presence of more than one subject in a sentence
Example: Lisa and Ann like to go dancing.
‘Lisa’ and ‘Ann’ are two subjects present within one sentence.
Compound Predicate: presence of more than one predicate in a sentence
Example: Dolphins are swimming and splashing around in the nearby beach.
‘Swimming’ and ‘splashing’ are two predicates (verb forms) present within one sentence, where they both share the helping verb ‘are’.
You can even have multiple subjects and predicates within the same sentence!
Example: Lisa, Ann, and Judy love swimming and cycling.
‘Lisa’, ‘Ann’, and ‘Judy’ are the subjects.
‘Swimming’ and ‘cycling’ are the predicates, where they both share the helping verb ‘love’.
Notice that when there are multiple subjects or predicates within one sentence, the subjects or predicates are joined by a connector — ‘and’.
Again, we’re going to reiterate the lesson on Subject and Predicate with a dash of fun! And what’s more fun than a good old online quiz?
Here are a few of our favourite Subject and Predicate quizzes out there:
But don’t let this be the end — there are plenty of quizzes to make your child run circles around you with his perfect sentences!
That’s a wrap on this week’s Mini Lesson Plan! Hope you learnt a thing or two about putting the FUN in fundamentals of English grammar! For more Mini Lesson Plans, explore our LittleLives blog!
Answers to Mini Task:
Simple Subject: Ethan
Complete Subject: A very merry Ethan
Simple Predicate: danced
Complete Predicate: danced to upbeat music
SOURCES
My Schoolhouse
Powayusd
English Grammar 101
PICTURES
Pixabay
