what makes a complete sentence

What makes a complete sentence?

If it helps you, think about a sentence as if it were a skeleton, the skeleton contains various bones and these bones are put together to form different parts of the body. So are sentences formed by words, the words are the bones and they are put together in different ways to form sentences.

Simple Sentences

A simple sentence contains a single subject and predicate. It describes only one thing, idea or question, and has only one verb - it contains only an independent (main) clause.

Any independent clause can stand alone as a sentence. It has a subject and a verb and expresses a complete thought.

For example:

• Jill reads.

Even the addition of adjectives, adverbs, and prepositional phrases to a simple sentence does not change it into a complex sentence.

For example:

• The brown dog with the red collar always barks loudly.

Even if you join several nouns with a conjunction, or several verbs with a conjunction, it remains a simple sentence.

For example:

• The dog barked and growled loudly.

Compound Sentences

Compound sentences are made up of two or more simple sentences combined using a conjunction such as and, or orbut. They are made up of more than one independent clause joined together with a co-ordinating conjunction.

For example:

"The sun was setting in the west and the moon was just rising."

Each clause can stand alone as a sentence.

For example:

"The sun was setting in the west. The moon was just rising."

Every clause is like a sentence with a subject and a verb. A coordinating conjunction goes in the middle of the sentence, it is the word that joins the two clauses together, the most common are (and, or, but)

For example:

• I walked to the shops, but my husband drove.
• I might watch the film, or I might visit my friends.
• My friend enjoyed the film, but she didn't like the actor.

Complex Sentences

Complex sentences describe more than one thing or idea and have more than one verb in them. They are made up of more than one clause, an independent clause (that can stand by itself) and a dependent (subordinate) clause (which cannot stand by itself).

For example:

"My mother likes dogs that don't bark."

Dependent clauses can be nominal, adverbial or adjectival.