Is it possible to build such an understandable system that would make it easy to build sentences in English and quickly understand all tense forms? Let's see.

First you need to figure out what generally accepted standards exist, and how you can not get lost in the apparent complexity while teaching English.

If you look in more detail at the structure of a sentence in English, it becomes obvious that in order to quickly learn how to express yourself concisely and clearly, you just need to train yourself to recognize the subject (who does?) And the predicate (what does?) in an English sentence.

In most sentences, the subject comes before the verb. The only exceptions are interrogative sentences. But in any case, you need to start simple. Thus, it will be easy to learn how to write sentences in English.

Simplicity is the key to success

Let's start with the simplest. This will be the base from which you will need to build on in the future. Understanding it will greatly simplify the job of automating the construction of sentences in our head on the fly.

It is worth knowing that English sentences, unlike Russian ones, are distinguished by simplicity, conciseness and brevity. Perhaps this is due to the English mentality, but now is not about that.

Long and very complex sentences in English can still be found. They are found in legal texts or in fiction, i.e. where appropriate. However, in live communication, long sentences are extremely rare. But to start, you need to build on the simple.

Let's find out what a simple sentence is in English. Any sentence is built in order to describe the real life situation as clearly as possible.

In order to achieve this goal, it is necessary to use words to describe the current situation and connect them so that the meaning is conveyed as succinctly as possible. If it is possible to convey the meaning correctly, then in the head of the one to whom the information is transmitted, an image of the same picture will be obtained.

In Russian, words are connected with the help of endings. However, in English the situation is completely different, there is no change in many endings.

On the one hand, this simplifies the process of memorization and study, and on the other hand, it requires maximum clarity in sentence construction and the correct use of prepositions.

Golden Rule

So, let's define the first and most important rule - direct word order! First it says who does it, then what it does. In Russian, any variations are available, for example:

• The boy is fishing.
• The boy is fishing.
• The boy is fishing.
• The boy is fishing.

In English, there is always only one word order - "A boy is catching some fish".
Remember this golden rule that you should start with when learning English. Everything is tied to verbs (simple predicates). They will, of course, be in some form of one of the English tenses (from here you can immediately understand how to use tenses), three moods and two pledges. For beginners, the main thing is to understand the basics:

In English, sentence structure always follows a certain structure:

• Subject (who/what?),
• verb (what is he doing?),
• object (who/what? addition),
• place (where?),
• time (when?).

For example: "I like to walk with my dog ​​in the park in the evening."

• like to walk;
• with my dog;
• in the park;
• in the evening.

Time

For many who begin to learn a language, their head is spinning from an infinite number of temporary forms. If we take into account all of them, then it turns out 16. This is explained by the fact that the tense system is clearly different from the one used in the Russian language. Of course, there are also common points, but the main trump card of the system of English tenses is strict order, consistency, obedience to the laws of grammar and logic.

But times are not as terrible as they are painted. If you master at least six of the most consumed, you can feel confident in almost any communication situation - these are Present Simple, Past Simple, Future Simple, Present Continuous, Past Continuous, and Present Perfect.
Example:

• I go to work every day. - Present Simple (what happens regularly).
• I went to work yesterday. - Past Simple (stating a fact in the past).
• I will go to work tomorrow. - Future Simple (stating a fact in the future).
• I am going to work now. - Present Continuous (what is happening now).
• I was going to work when you called me. - Past Continuous (what happened at a certain point in time in the past).
• I have already gone to work. - Present Perfect (it is not known when the action took place, but there is its result in the present).

What is most important is the need to remember that each group of tenses has similar characteristics and norms for the formation of a semantic verb, as well as principles of use, and this is the key to the rapid assimilation of all tenses.

Once you can draw parallels and feel the differences, you can use all tenses without much difficulty. Therefore, for starters, just try to remember how the English sentences of the Simple group are built, starting with Present (present). It is extremely convenient to learn and memorize grammatical tenses by placing them in a table.

Readable tense tables are present in all textbooks used at the EnglishDom school.

So, do not be afraid of any difficulties. Everything starts simple, and everything ingenious is also simple. Having understood the basic principles of constructing a sentence, you can further attach and train all tenses, moods and pledges.

The main thing - you can not grab onto everything at once. Only after you have fully mastered one rule for yourself, move on to another. Review what you have learned from time to time so you don't forget. But what should never be forgotten is the basic principles of constructing an English sentence. So, it's always easy to start - train your skills on simple sentences, then, as you understand, complicate them.

Big and friendly family EnglishDom

Word order in English significantly different from our word order. In Russian, due to the presence of many endings - the word order does not really matter, the meaning will be the same, you can only focus the interlocutor's attention on a certain fact. For example:

The kitten ran to me yesterday afternoon
A kitten ran up to me yesterday afternoon
Yesterday afternoon a kitten ran to me

We are accustomed to such freedom of speech and transfer it to the English language. However, in English this is absolutely forbidden everyone should stand in their place. Changing the word order, as a rule, completely changes the meaning of the sentence:

Anya hit Dima
Anya hit Dima

Dima hit Anya
Dima hit Anya

The main feature of sentences in English is a solid word order. Whatever way we would like to express our thoughts, it is always necessary to adhere to the following word order scheme in an English sentence:

1. (or just a verb).
2. - is located after the predicate, there may be several.
3. - can stand at the beginning before the subject or at the very end.
4. - can be in any part of the sentence, thereby making it difficult to understand.

To make it clearer and more understandable, this diagram can be represented as follows:

Perhaps this scheme will seem incomprehensible to you, but everything is simple here:
Subject- subject and predicate(verb) - predicate(verb) are the basis of the English sentence, they are present in 99 percent of phrases, we can say that this is " backbone"any sentence. Also after the predicate can go addition- object. Therefore, if the sentence consists of three words, and is not connected by any, then it is safe to say that the first word is the subject, the second is the predicate, and the third is the addition. To make it clearer, check out the examples and the 2-minute video below:

We (subject) do (predicate) our work (object)
We do our job

They faced problems
They ran into (many) problems

If you liked the video tutorial, subscribe to the channel of this author -.

After that, looking again at the diagram, it should be clear that circumstance can be at the beginning of a sentence or at the end (rarely in the middle):

We do our work with pleasure
We do our job with pleasure

At the moment I cannot talk
At present I can not talk

FROM definition the situation is a little more complicated, or rather, it complicates the definition of the members of the sentence. A definition can appear anywhere in a sentence and usually comes before or after the word being defined (usually a noun).

What else do you need to know so as not to get confused

As always in the English language, there are exceptions in everything and everywhere. Here are the main exceptions you may encounter:

• Formation of the interrogative form

Forming a question slightly breaks the usual sentence structure, but there is nothing complicated here, as a rule, the temporary auxiliary verb is placed at the very beginning of the sentence. See for yourself, in general, the proposal scheme is the same:

I am an engineer
I am an engineer
Am I an engineer?
I am an engineer?

I can speak English
I speak English / I can speak English
Can I speak English
I speak English? /I can speak English?

• Improving sentence rhythm

This is usually found in songs. You can even say that many songs are written grammatically incorrectly. The goal of the performer is usually to “get into” the rhythm and convey the meaning, sometimes the same applies to poems and fairy tales (not adapted).

The main thing you need to remember is that changing the location of words in an English sentence leads to a change in its meaning. All this, of course, is theory and it may seem complicated, but after a little practice and studying the simplest temporary forms of the English language, the correct construction of sentences will begin to be obtained on an intuitive level.

You probably noticed that the meaning of the sentence itself does not change from the rearrangement of words in a Russian sentence. What difference does it make whether we say "There are many wolves in the forest" or "There are many wolves in the forest." And so, and so it is said about the presence of a large number of wolves in the forest.

affirmative sentences

In English, word order is strictly fixed.

This means that every word has its place. Well, actually not to everyone, but only to two - the subject and the predicate. Let's remember our school days. The subject is who or what does the action; what or who the sentence is about. The predicate is what the person/thing does. From the latter follows the conclusion that the predicate is a verb. So, with regard to the English sentence, there is a central dogma, consisting of two points:

THE FIRST. The subject comes first, the predicate comes second, and everything else follows. Schematically, this can be represented as follows:

Table. Word order in an English sentence

1 PLACE	2ND PLACE	3RD PLACE
SUBJECT	PREDICATE	OTHER MEMBERS OF THE OFFER
Daniel
		toworkeveryday.
These flowers		so beautiful!
Cats	don't eat

The following remark should be made to this table: BEFORE the subject, you can put a definition. And secondly, this scheme is used for affirmative sentences, i.e. those that end with a dot.

SECOND. An English sentence ALWAYS has a predicate, i.e. verb! Even if you don’t hear this verb in the Russian translation of this sentence. For example: There are many wolves in the forest. (there is not a single verb here, although you can remake this sentence for a convenient translation: “There are many wolves in the forest.” This version already has a verb - there is). - There are many wolves in the forest.

Interrogative sentences

This word order applies only to sentences that end with a period, that is, affirmative sentences. There are also interrogative sentences that end with a question mark. And this is where the difficulties with word order and all sorts of confusion begin.

So, there are 2 basic types of questions: general and. We answer “yes” or “no” to the first, and to the second we answer something specific, special (depending on what is asked in the question itself). Remember that the word order in any English sentence is FIXED, and this also applies to questions.

0 PLACE - QUESTION WORD

• What - what? which?
• Who - who?
• Who(m) - to whom? by whom?
• Where - where? where?
• When - when?
• Why - why?
• How - how?
• How much (many) - how much?
• Which - which?
• What - what?
• Whose - whose?

1 PLACE - AUXILIARY VERB

• is/are/am
• do / does / did
• will / would / shall
• have / has
• can / could
• may/might
• ought
• should

2 PLACE - SUBJECT

3 PLACE - BASIC (SENSITIVE) VERB

3rd PLACE - OTHER WORDS

There are also a few comments about this structure.

NOTE 1. How to choose an auxiliary verb? Very simple: the auxiliary verb is the one that is first present in the original sentence. For example:

• Danny is a worker ---> is
• Anna will drive ---> will
• They have finished the report ---> have

Therefore, to ask a question, you just need to rearrange the subject and predicate in places.

What if there is no auxiliary verb? For example: We visited the museum. Here we have only the main verb - visited. Therefore, when there is no visible auxiliary verb, then it is - do/does/did, depending on time. In our case, this did, because the verb is in .

NOTE 2. The main (semantic) verb, when you ask a question, goes clean, that is, without any endings, in the initial form.

NOTE 3 How to understand 0 place? This position in the question is called so because interrogative words are only in special questions, but they are not in general ones. It is by the question word that you determine what to answer. For example:

Mother gave her son a tasty medicine yesterday because he was ill.

• Who? -Mother
• Whom? - son
• Whose son? - her
• What? - medicine
• What medicine? - tasty
• When? - yesterday
• Why? - because he was ill

In general questions (those to which you answer “yes” or “no”) there is no interrogative word, that is, the auxiliary verb immediately goes.

In conclusion, we offer you a small test:

Often, especially at the initial stage of learning a foreign language, there is a desire to build a phrase or sentence by analogy with the native one. Nevertheless, this is the failure and the very first mistake. Simple things become incomprehensible and confusing.
In order to have a conversation (doesn't matter orally or in writing, dialogue or monologue), we put words into sentences. What could be easier than translating the phrase into English:

I love you.
I love you.

Children eat apples.
Children eat apples.

But these cases are more the exception than the rule. It is worth swapping the terms, as the value changes.

"Apples eat children" takes on a bloodthirsty nature and translates as "Apples eat children", which could be part of a horror movie storyline. Why is this happening?
The fact is that the logic of the structure of the English language does not coincide with the logic of Russian. There are a number of reasons for this.

Reason #1. No endings

The English language is analytical in nature, with a clear structured structure, while the Russian language can afford to be more chaotic, being inflectional.
What does it mean: inflectional languages ​​can change word forms, expressing grammatical functions (gender, case, number) by changing endings (inflections), while in analytical groups we can express grammatical relations only through functional words, modal verbs, intonation, context , fixed word order.

Reason #2. No cases

The absence of cases and case endings in English makes it impossible for a word to independently express a grammatical relationship with another word. Here are suggestions to help:

"table leg" will by no means become "a leg the table", but will take advantage of the preposition "a leg OF the table", where "of" conveys the nature of the Genitive case.

monster apples will become peaceful again when using the preposition “by”: Apples are eaten BY children. (in this example, you can see that eaten not only becomes part of the compound predicate, which is characteristic of the analytical system, but changes the form (eat - ate - eaten), which is characteristic of inflectional languages, which English was originally. The loss of inflections (endings) is a tendency.

Reason #3. The difference in intonation structure

The English language has a structured intonation pattern. Certain types of sentences are pronounced with certain intonation patterns.
There is no mandatory standard in Russian.

We go on the instruments: schemes of declarative and interrogative sentences.

In the first place in the English declarative sentence is the one who performs the action. The second position is occupied by the action itself. The secondary parts of the sentence follow.

1. subject group 2. predicate group 3. everything else

(1) We (2) like (3) black coffee.
(1) Little children (2) don't go (3) to the park alone.
(1) My husband (2) never watches (3) news on TV.

In a question, the predicate and the subject are reversed.

0. asks. word 1. strong/modal verb 2. subject group 3. everything else

(0) (1) Do (2) you (3) like black coffee?
(0) Why (1) did (2) he (3) go abroad by himself?
(0) What color (1) are (2) the walls (3) of his house?

These are two fundamental schemes that work like clockwork in the English language. There are many smaller cases of "arrangement" of words. We offer you some of them:

1) adverbs of time often take place between subject and predicate / predicate and predicate:
He never smokes indoors.
You can always come back.

2) adverbs usually come after the verb:
You must work quickly.

3) put adjectives before the noun they define:
red drapes
a green round table

4) circumstances of time are used either at the very beginning or at the very end of the sentence:
In summer people have fun.
I usually walk in the evening.

5) sentences with structures there is / are (at all times) are translated into Russian from the end
There are a lot of rules and exceptions in English.
The English language has many rules and exceptions.

Victoria Tetkina

In Russian, we can build a sentence however we want. We can say: “I bought a dress yesterday”, or “I bought a dress yesterday”, or “I bought a dress yesterday”, etc.

In English, the word order in a sentence is fixed. This means that we cannot rearrange the words as we like. They must stay in their designated places.

It is difficult for beginners to learn English to understand and get used to this.

Therefore, many often build English sentences using the word order as in Russian. Because of this, it is difficult for the interlocutor to understand the idea that you want to convey.

In this article, I will explain to you how to build sentences in English correctly, so that you can compose them competently, and any foreigner can easily understand you.

From the article you will learn:

What is a fixed word order in a sentence?

Sentence- a combination of words that expresses a complete thought.

As I said, in Russian we can rearrange the words in a sentence the way we want.

For example:

We'll go to the cinema.

We'll go to the cinema.

Let's go to the cinema.

As you can see, we can rearrange the words in a sentence, and this will not prevent the other person from understanding the idea that we want to convey to him.

In English, word order is fixed.

Fixed- fixed in a certain position.

This means that the words in the sentence have their places and cannot be rearranged.

Correctly:

We will go to the cinema.
We'll go to the cinema.

Not properly:

To the cinema we will go.

Esl and the word order in the English sentence is wrong, then it will be difficult for the interlocutor to understand what idea you want to convey to him.

Let's take a closer look at how to correctly build all kinds of sentences in English.

Attention: Confused by the English rules? Find out how easy it is to understand English grammar.

Word order in an affirmative English sentence

affirmative sentences- this is proposals where we affirm some idea. Such sentences do not contain negation and do not imply an answer.

We can claim that something:

• Happening in the present (We are building a house)
• Will happen in the future (We will build a house)
• Happened in the past (We built a house)

In English, affirmative sentences use direct word order.

The direct word order is that the 1st and 2nd places in a sentence are always occupied by certain words.

Let's take a closer look at this scheme for constructing affirmative sentences.

1st place - main character

Actor (subject)- the person/thing that performs the action in the sentence.

It could be:

• The object or person itself: mother (mother), Mary (Mary), cup (cup), chairs (chairs), etc.
• A word that replaces an object or person (pronoun): I (I), you (you), we (we), they (they), he (he), she (she), it (it)

For example:

Tom...
Volume....

She….
She is....

2nd place - action

action (predicate)- shows what happened, is happening or will happen.

That is, the action itself (verb) can stand:

1. In the present tense: study (study), work (work), sleep (sleep), eat (eat)

2. Past tense, which is formed with:

• adding the ending -ed to regular verbs: studied (studied), worked (worked)
• 2nd / 3rd forms of irregular verbs: slept / slept (slept), ate / eaten (ate)

Whether the verb is correct or incorrect, we can look in the dictionary.

3. In the future tense, which is usually formed using the auxiliary verb will: will study (I will study), will work (I will work), will sleep (I will sleep).

For example:

We travel.
We are travelling.

Tom left.
Tom is gone.

She will work.
She will work

Important nuance

It is worth remembering one important nuance. In Russian there are sentences in which we omit the action.

For example:

She is a teacher.

Children in the park.

Tom is smart.

In English sentences, the action must always be present, we cannot omit it. This is a very common mistake among students.

In such cases, we use verb to be. This is a special kind of verb that we use when we say that someone:

• Is somewhere (Children in the park)
• Is someone (She's a teacher)
• Is somehow (Tom smart)

Depending on the time in which we use this verb, it changes its form:

• Present tense - am, are, is
• Past tense - was, were
• In the future tense - will be

For example:

She is a doctor.
She is a doctor. (literally: She is a doctor)

Children are smart.
Children are smart. (literally: Children are smart)

I am at home.
I'm home. (literally: I am at home)

Read more about the verb to be in each tense in the following articles:

• Verb to be in present tense
• Verb to be in past tense

So, direct word order means that certain words are in the 1st and 2nd places.

Let's see what it looks like again.

1 place	2nd place	3rd place
Actor	Action or verb to be	Other members of the proposal
I	work	here
my sister	lived	in New York
A cat	is	gray
They	were	at school

Now let's look at how to build negative sentences.

Word order in a negative English sentence

Negative sentences- when we deny something. That is, we say that something:

• Doesn't happen (She doesn't work)
• Didn't happen (She didn't work)
• Won't happen (She won't work)

In Russian, to form a negation, we put the particle "not" before the action: not I come not I will read, not bought.

In English, to form a negation, we use the particle "not" and an auxiliary verb. See how this changes our word order:

Let's take a look at this diagram in detail.

1st place - character

Negative sentences also use direct word order, so the protagonist comes first.

2nd place - auxiliary verb + not

Auxiliary verbs- these are words that are not translated, but only serve as pointers.

They help us determine:

• Time of what is happening (present, future, past);
• Number of actors (many or one).

Read more about auxiliary verbs in this article.

Each tense in English has its own auxiliary verb (do/does, have/has, did, had, will). Let's look at the auxiliary verbs of the three most used tenses.

1. Present simple tense (Present Simple Tense):

• does, when we talk about someone in the singular (he, she, it)
• do, for all other cases (me, you, we, they)

2. Past Simple Tense: did

3. Future Simple Tense: will

To show negation, we add the particle not to our auxiliary verb or the verb to be: does not, do not, did not, will not.

3rd place - action

After the auxiliary verb with the not particle, we put an action, which is now negative.

For example:

He does not work.
He does not work.

They will not buy.
They won't buy.

Remember: When we say that we did not do something in the past and use the auxiliary verb did, we no longer put the action itself in the past tense.

Since the auxiliary verb already shows us that it happened in the past.

Not properly:

We didn't work ed.
We didn't work.

Correctly:

We didn't work.
We didn't work.

So let's take another look at the construction of a negative sentence.

1 place	2nd place	3rd place	4th place
Actor	Auxiliary verb + not	Action	Other members of the proposal
I	do not	work	here
my sister	does not	study	study
People	will not	buy	a car
They	did not	build	the house

Negative sentences with the verb to be

If the sentence uses the verb to be, then we simply put not after it.

Let's look at the plate.

1 place	2nd place	3rd place	4th place
Actor	verb to be	Particle not	Other members of the proposal
I	am	not	a doctor
They	were	not	at home
A cat	is	not	gray

Now let's look at the last type of sentence - questions.

Word order in an interrogative English sentence

Interrogative sentences These are sentences that express a question and suggest an answer to it. For example: Do you work?

In Russian, affirmative and interrogative sentences differ only:

• intonation (in speech)
• sign "?" at the end of a sentence (in writing)

In English, a statement and a question look different. Unlike statements, interrogative sentences have reverse word order.

The reverse word order means that the main character will not come first.

Let's take a closer look at how to construct such sentences.

1st place - auxiliary verb

To make a sentence interrogative, you need to put an auxiliary verb in the first place in the sentence. I talked about them Auxiliary verb

Actor Action Other members of the proposal Does she work here? Did they study English? Will you buy a car?

Interrogative sentences with the verb to be

If the sentence uses the verb to be instead of the usual action, then we simply transfer it to the first place in the sentence.

Let's look at the diagram:

1 place	2nd place	4th place
verb to be	Actor	Other members of the proposal
Is	she	a doctor?
Are	they	at home?
was	a cat	grey?

Exception:

When we build a question with the verb to be in the future tense - will be, then we put only will in the first place. And be itself comes after the character.

For example:

Will she be a teacher?
Will she be a teacher?

Will they be at home?
Will she be at home?

So, we examined the word order in affirmative, negative and interrogative sentences. Now let's practice building such sentences in practice.

Reinforcement task

Translate the following sentences into English:

1. I will go to the store.
2. She is beautiful.
3. We didn't buy a dress.
4. My girlfriend is in the park.
5. Has she read the book?
6. Is the house expensive?