Last Tuesday(which is an unusual day for our meeting), we had our make-up class for some meetings that will be cancelled because of some instances. James Bryan Buban was the reporter that day, and he reported things about Pronouns. He started the report with a game called What’s yours is mine: everyone should bring out anything from their bag and it should be passed around, and James will call someone to determine which pronoun to use. Things to remember:

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS – pronouns we use to point something specific such as items in space or in time.

                                                  - could replace a noun or a noun phrase.*In conversational English, we can use demonstrative by pointing/gesturing something we are talking about. *But in written English, we use specific pronouns to point out or determine the exact thing we are talking about. 

4 DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

“Near” demonstrative pronouns (1this and 2these) – are obviously used when the object you are talking about is/are near you. This – Singular These - Plural“Far” demonstrative pronouns (3that and 4those) – used when the object you are pertaining to is far from you. That – Singular Those ­– Plural *Other demonstrative pronouns: none, such, (n)either  Demonstrative Adjective – the four demonstrative pronouns (this, these, that, and those) are considered demonstrative adjectives because they modify the nouns. That basically means that they come before nouns in sentences. *All of the said demonstrative pronouns are either demonstrative pronouns as is, or demonstrative adjectives. The difference is, if a pronoun is used alone (without a noun), it is a demonstrative pronoun. On the other hand, if a pronoun is used before a noun and modifies it, it is considered demonstrative adjective.

 Interrogative Pronouns – represents the thing that we do not know. (What we are asking about)

5 interrogative pronouns:        

Who – used as an object to ask in a formal way. ·         Whom – used with preposition before the pronoun; used to ask in a more formal way.·         Whose – used when you are asking about a non-specific person.·        What – used when asking about a specific information/thing from a general range of possible answers.·         Which – used when asking about a specific information from a restricted range of possible answers. “-ever” – used to give emphasis. Examples: Whoever would want to do such a nasty thing? Whatever did he say to make her cry like that? They are all fantastic! Whichever will you choose? 

Adverbs acting as interrogatives

Examples: Who came to the party?        Who acts as the subject of the verb came.     Whom should we call?          Whom acts as the object of the verb call. Whose position did he fill?   Whose acts as the possessor of the noun position Where did Jim get his car?   Where acts as an adverb modifying the verb get. Relative Pronouns – (Who/whom, whoever/whomever, whose, that, which) pronouns that introduce relative clause; pronouns that “relates” to the word that its relative clause modifies; used after a noun; used to tell us more about a person or a thing.

 2 types of relative clauses:Restrictive (defining) clause – adds essential information about the antecedent in the main clause.

Relative Pronouns in Restrictive Relative Clauses: Relative pronouns that introduce a restrictive relative clause ARE NOT separated from the main clause by a comma.  

Relative Pronouns Used as a Subject of a Restrictive Relative Clause Examples: This is the house that had a great Christmas decoration. It took me a while to get used to people who eat popcorn during the movie.

Relative Pronouns Used as an Object in a Restrictive Relative Clause Examples: Formal English: This is the man to whom I wanted to speak and whose name I had forgotten. Informal English: This is the man I wanted to speak to and whose name I'd forgotten. *When the relative pronoun is the object of a preposition, which is used instead of that, for example, "in which," "for which," "about which," "through which," etc.   

Non-restrictive (non-defining) clause – provides non-essential information about the antecedent in the main clause.

Relative Pronouns in Non-restrictive Relative Clauses: Relative Pronouns that introduce a non-restrictive relative clause ARE separated from the main clause by a comma.

Relative Pronouns Used as a Subject of a Non-restrictive Relative Clause Examples: The science fair, which lasted all day, ended with an awards ceremony. The movie turned out to be a blockbuster hit, which came as a surprise to critics.

Relative Pronouns Used as an Object in a Non-restrictive Relative Clause Examples: The sculpture, which he admired, was moved into the basement of the museum to make room for a new exhibit. The theater, in which the play debuted, housed 300 people. 

 "That" vs. "Who" and "Which"·         *The relative pronoun that can only be used in restrictive clauses. It can also be substituted for who (referring to persons) or which (referring to things) in informal English.

*When referring     to people, both that and who can be used in informal     language. "That" may be used to refer to the characteristics or abilities of an individual or a group of people:    

Examples:

He is the kind of person that/who will never let you     down.  I am looking for someone that/who could give me a ride to     Chicago. ·         However, when speaking about a particular person in formal language, who is preferred: The old lady who lives next door is a teacher. The girl who wore a red dress attracted everybody's attention at the party. ·         that/which

*There are several cases when that is more appropriate than which:After the pronouns "all," "any(thing)," "every(thing)," "few," "little," "many," "much," "no(thing)," "none," "some(thing)": The police usually ask for every detail that helps identify the missing person.Dessert is all that he wants.

*After the noun modified by an adjective in the superlative degree: This is the best resource that I have ever read!

Three down, and a whole lot of reporting to go. Last meeting, Jessica, Kathleen, and Roxanne had their own respective reports in three different categories. Though the temperature of our room was unbearably hot, we still manage to listen and take some of the most important things. Starting with Jessica Ablang, she started her report with the game called “Wikarambulan” (which is actually new to me) - a game in which the players should get the actual title of the song by reading the irrelevant words combined to make a sound that is similar to the real title. Things to remember:

Noun Cases- tells us the position/function of a noun in a particular sentence

There are actually five(5)  categories of noun cases:

Nominative case- indicates the subject of the sentence. For example: The painter paints the portraits.                       Mr. Lee is an intelligent man.

Objective Case(Accusative Case)- indicates direct object(of verb and of preposition) For example: I met your sister.                      This is on of my policies. 

Possessive Case(Genitive Case)- indicates ownership or possession.                             - certain prepositions are needed.                             - displays/uses apostrophe-s (‘s) For example: The land of the church.                       John’s sister has been hospitalized.                       It is our idea.

Dative Case- indicates indirect object(of the verb)                     - recipient of the direct object. For example: The Postman brought me a letter.                       The teacher gave the students few exercises.

Vocative Case- indicates the word/s being addressed.  For example: Mr. Brown, students are waiting for you in the main hall.                       Chairman, all the letters are posted two days ago.

********** The second reporter is Kathleen Anatalio who discussed things about Collective and Compound Nouns. The game for her motivation is that she picked 5 of our classmates to get as much tissue paper as they can without having an idea, then she gave the mechanics of the game that the participants should give as many compound and collective terms/nouns as the number of tissue they have.

Things to remember: 

Collective Nouns - words for single term that are made up of more than one person, animal, place, thing, or idea.

                            - considered as single thing/noun

For example: Staff, Crew, Pack, Flock, Swarm, Group, Crowd, Gang. *When a collective noun is used for a unit acting in unison or as one, the noun is ought to be used in its singular form. E.g. “Today, Ms. Kennedy’s class takes its SOL test. class - singular collective noun takes - singular verb its - singular pronoun (All the students in Ms. Kennedy’s class are taking the same test at the same time.)

*When the members of the unit are acting as individuals, it is appropriate to use plural forms of verbs and pronouns. E.g.”After taking a test, the class start their papers on Shakespeare’s Sonnets” class - plural collective noun start - plural verb their - plural pronoun (Kathleen said in her report that although these students are in the same class, they are beginning their papers on their own, individually.)

Compound Nouns - nouns that describe or represent things, made up of two or more words.

                              - the first word modifies the following word, the second usually identifies the item or the use of the term. Types of compound - Closed/Solid  - e.g. fireflies, grandmother, basketball, homework, etc. Hyphenated - e.g. mother-in-law, one-year-old, runner-up, etc. Open/Spaced - e.g. swimming pool, heart attack, movie star, etc. *Compound nouns can be made up of: Two nouns: bus stop, movie star, rock star, etc. Adjective and a noun: full moon, high school, etc. -and- Verb and a noun: washing machine, swimming pool, frying pan, etc.

************* The last reporter of the last meeting is Roxanne Balanon who tackled a lot of things about Pronouns. She started the report with a game in which everyone is allowed to guess what song she will be playing, and after guessing, she will ask somebody to determine the pronoun in the titles of every song. Things to remember(again):

Pronoun - a word or a phrase that may substitute a noun or a noun phrase.

*Antecedent - a word that is being replaced and represented by another word.

Classification: Personal Pronouns - words associated with a person, animal, things or places.                                    - nouns representing people.                                    - used to avoid repetition in a sentence. Characteristics:

Three Persons (Point of view):

1st person point of view: the speaker in a sentence.

For example: I, me, mine, we, us, our, ours

2nd person point of view: the one spoken to. For example: You, your, yours

3rd person point of view: the one being talked about. For example: He, him, his, she, her, hers, it, its, they, their, theirs

Three Genders:

Feminine - She, her, hers

Masculine - He, him, his

Neuter - It, its, they, them, their, theirs

Two Numbers:

Singular: I, me, my, mine, your, yours, he, him, his, she, her, hers, it, its

Plural: We, us, our, you, your, yours, they, them, their, theirs

Three Cases:

Subjective(Nominative) - used to replace a common or proper noun as the subject of the sentence *Subject of the sentence - doer of the action *Subject complement - a word that renames or gives more information about the subject. *Linking Verb - (is, are) word/s that connects the subject to the subject complement.

Objective(Accusative Case) - any pronoun that is affected by the action of the subject in a sentence.

*Direct object - a pronoun, or noun phrase that indicates the person or thing that is the receiver of the action. *Indirect object - pronouns that occurs in addition to a direct object after some verbs, and indicates the person or thing that is the recipient of the thing being given or done *Object of the preposition - when a pronoun is linked to a preposition (at, in, on, to, with), it becomes a prepositional phrase or the object of the preposition.

Possessive(Genitive Case) - Any pronoun used to show possession or ownership.

*Possessive Pronouns - my,  your, his, her, its, our, their *Possessive Adjective - mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours, theirs

(Possessive pronouns don’t use apostrophes)

Indefinite Pronouns - pronouns used to describe non-specific things.

*Singular indefinite pronouns: one, each, (n)either, someone, somebody, something, anyone, anybody, anything, no one, nobody, nothing, everyone, everybody, everything. *Plural indefinite pronouns: both, few, several, many, others, they, all, any, more, most, none, some, such,

Note: *Most indefinite pronouns also function as other parts of speech. For example: Clarke has one job in the day and another at night.

*Indefinite pronouns use apostrophes to indicate ownership. For example: The accident that happened is nobody’s fault.

*Some indefinite pronouns can also be used as determiners. For example: Each person has a chance.

Here we go again! This is my third time posting a journal and I still have no idea what am I doing. By the way, last Monday(July 31 2017) was a start of something new - actually, the reporting started, it’s just that. It was Jerlyn Almanon who started the reporting by giving an energizer/motivation using tic-tac-toe of proper and common nouns; and the only rule is to get four consecutive answers to win. The whole class was cooperative and, as usual, booming. According to her, the things below are the information about proper and common nouns.

Proper Noun - refers to specific names of people, places, and things.

                       *the first letter of a proper noun is always written in uppercase.

Common Noun - used to name same types of people, places, or things in general, without being specific.

  *************

Next is Charlene Alonzo! Who discussed things about Countable, Uncountable, Abstract, and Concrete Nouns. She started her report with a motivation by giving different words and categorizing them whether they are under a specific type of noun while playing a background song.

Countable Nouns - (Obviously) things that can be counted.

                                *use determiners as a/an or the for singular nouns in singular form

                                *use determiners some or any for nouns in plural form.

Uncountable Nouns - Immaterial things, e.g. ideals, thoughts, concepts, etc.

                                *always in singular form but we can never use article like a/an, instead, we have to use determiners for plural nouns such as some or any.                                

Abstract Nouns -  intangible things(mostly concepts and ideas, for example: love, life, etc.)

Concrete Nouns - tangible things(for example:objects like fruit,keys, cake, etc.)

Note: To count uncountable nouns, you should use Partitives:

·         A glass of water

·         A cup of coffee

·         A piece of cheese

·         An item of news

*************

The third reporter is Abbylene Anciano, who reported material nouns, and gender-specific nouns and their categories.

Material Nouns – material substances or things made up of alloy.

Examples: Cotton, gold, calcium, plastic, air, etc. (Things that are actually uncountable nouns that need partitives to be counted)

Categories:

Material Nouns from nature: like water, air, gold, iron, copper, sand, coal, rock, sunlight, rain, earth,  salt, etc.

Material Nouns from animals: for example: egg, meat, honey, milk, silk, leather, wool, etc.

Material Nouns from plants: namely: cotton, food, oil, wood, jute, coffee, medicine, tea, rubber, perfume, etc.

Man-made Material Nouns: such as, acid, alcohol, asphalt, brick, cement, butter, chalk, cheese, ghee, Dacron, ebony, enamel, felt, gelatin, paraffin, cloth, etc.

Rules:

·         Articles like a, an, or the are not used to determine these nouns but are allowed if there are  partitives used to be count these nouns.

·         The and some may, sometimes, be used in the ways like: The honey in the bottle is mine. I saw there is some milk in the glass.

Gender-specific nouns – nouns that specifically refer to male and female gender.

Types of gender-specific nouns:

·         Masculine - nouns that denote male sex. Specifically for male, boys, and male animals. Examples: dad, fireman, bull, drake, ram, boar, etc.

·         Feminine – nouns the denote female sex. Specifically for female, women, girls, and female animals. Examples: actress, waitress, vixen, bitch, sow, etc.

·         Common Gender – nouns that denote either male or female sex. Examples: soldier, student, cat, whale, etc.

·         Neuter Gender – nouns that denote lifeless things. Represents neither male nor female sex. Examples: book, pen, room, tree, chair, etc.

Abbylene also gave some examples of the terms for both male and female nouns. For humans:

·         Father for male, and Mother for female

·         Son and daughter

·         Man and woman

·         Emperor and Empress

·         Bachelor and Spinster

For animals:

·         Gander for male, and goose for female

·         Fox and vixen

·         Boar and sow for pigs

·         Staliion and mare for horses

·         Jack and jenny for donkeys

And for the last, she gave some examples using things to personify the male and female genders.

Like the moon, earth, spring, and nature for female personification, because she said that women are often viewed as beautiful as those examples. And the sun, summer, winter, and death for male personification because of men’s strong and dominant personality.

*************

The fourth and final reporter is Ann Pauline Aspacio who discussed things about Singular and Plural nouns, and Regular and Irregular nouns. She engaged all of us by having a game in which the participants are instructed to find particular nouns in the lines of a song (change it into its plural form if it’s singular, and vice versa) then guess the title and the artist of the song given. P.S. she could have use better song choice.

 Things to consider:

 With regular nouns, they are usually just being added with –s and –es at the end of the words to change it into plural form. Like nouns ending in: ch, s, sh, x, or z. Also nouns ending in ce, ge, se, or ze.

 But of course, there is always an exception: Nouns ending in –y, if preceded by a consonant turns into –ies, and if preceded by a vowel, you just have to add –s. Nouns ending in –o, if preceded by a consonant, you just have to add –es at the end of the word. (but there cases the even though –o is preceded by a consonant, the rule is to just add ­–s at the end of the word like: photos, memos, etc. which is the same as the rule in turning a vowel-preceded ­–o into its plural form) Nouns ending in –f, -fe, or ff: ‘f’ to ‘ves’ transition – sheaf into sheaves /and/ -self into selves

‘f’ by adding an –s  - proof into proofs /and/ surf into surfs

 Now with irregular nouns! There are nouns that use Suppletion when changing into their plural form, for example:

Adding or changing into -en

·         From man to men

·         From child to children

·         From ox to oxen

‘oo’ to ‘ee’ transition

·         From foot to feet

·         From goose to geese

‘ouse’ to ‘ice’ transition

·         From mouse to mice

·         From louse to lice

‘us’ to ‘I’ transition

·         Alumnus to alumni

·         Cactus to cacti

·         Focus to foci/focuses

·         Fungus to fungi

·         Radius to radii

·         Stimulus to stimuli

‘is’ to ‘es’ transition

·         Analysis to analyses

·         Crisis to crises

·         Thesis to theses

·         Oasis to oases

·         Ellipsis to ellipses

‘ix’/’ex’ to ‘ces’ transition

·         Appendix to appendices

·         Index to indeces/indexes

·         Matrix to matrices

‘eau’ to ‘eaux’/eaus transition

·         Beau to beaux

·         Bureau to bureaux/bureaus

·         Tableau to tableaux/tableaus

‘um’, ‘ium’, ‘us’, ‘on’ to ‘a’ transition

·         Stratum to strata

·         Datum to data

·         Bacterium to bacteria

·         Genus to genera

·         Corpus to corpora

·         Phenomenon to phenomena

‘a’ to ‘ae’ transition

·         Antenna to antennae/antennas

·         Formula to formulae

·         Vita to vitae

There are also nouns that don’t add any affix to them but are already in their plural form:

·         deer

·         sheep

·         fish

·         offspring

·         series

·         means

·         species

·         pliers

·         news

·         money

·         scissors

·         coffee

·         wheat

 Plurality form of hyphenated nouns:

·         Fathers-in-law

·         runners-up

 Numbers and letters in their plural form are just added an ‘s’ to indicate their plurality, for example:

·         3’s

·         B’s

·         %’s

 *************

 That was pretty long!!!! And I’m sure that this is not the last (long) e-note. This is it for now. Until next meeting!

After a couple of times of class postponement, we finally had our third official meeting in Advance English Grammar class last Monday. There wasn’t a surprising episode in that meeting unlike what happened in the previous one, but that three-hour-class was definitely a great learning experience. At the beginning of the class, we had a little review about the definition of language and grammar, and how the two differ from each other, had an exchange of ideas pertaining to different linguistic terms. Lastly, we did a draft of our lesson plan for our demo teaching. In the course of the discussion, as usual, there are things that need to be taken for data. Linguistic Competence - unconscious knowledge about a language. Linguistic Performance - observable use of language. (Specifically, the study of how language are constructed and used) 2 Approaches in Grammar Instruction: Descriptive - describing how a grammar is used instead of correcting it. Prescriptive - giving/using rules in order to correct the construction of a sentence. Grammatical Theories: Universal Grammar(Noam Chomsky) - states that all language have the same features and that the ability to learn language is innate and distinct to humans only. Functional Grammar - a theory concerned with the function of words in a particular sentence. Methodological Grammar - a process of teaching grammar. ****Other things to remember**** (Psycholinguistics) Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis [Started by Edward Sapir then developed by Benjamin Whorf]  - language directly influence and determines your thoughts.   (language shapes your thoughts)  - says “you cannot think outside your language”   Ferdinand de Sassurre (Father of Modern Linguistics) *Langue et parole - a linguistic term distinguished by Ferdinand de Sausurre which is also the same as linguistic competence, but was set aside and linguists decided to focus on linguistic performance that result to different linguistic aspects, namely: Phonology, Phonetics, Morphology, Syntax, Semantics, and Pragmatics.

Last Monday(July 3,2017), was a day of astonishment. We had our diagnostic test in vocabulary, and I thought that it would be easy, because of the reason that we just have to spot the incorrect structure of sentences then replace it with the right one, but it was more than what we thought. I actually used to believe that I’m good at speaking/writing with the use of the English language, then the unexpected happened. I only got 2 right answers out of 25 items in the test. We were all appalled by the idea that there are still a lot of things we should learn about our vocabularies and about the English language itself.

There are plenty of things to remember, like:

There is no such word/term as “Handcarry”.

We should be using “Prefer–to”, instead of “Prefer–than”.

Don’t forget to use hyphen if you’re going to use compound terms.

We can never park on “both sides” of a road, but instead, we park on “either side”.

Biennial - takes place every other year or happens every two years. Biannual - happens twice a year.

(When talking about date&time) Use the words: At - for exact time On - for exact date In - if you’re talking about a non-specific date, like: inside a month, a year, a decade etc.

Words: “jewelry” and “luggage” are already in their plural form or are collective nouns (Yeah, I know, common sense) 

Incorrect terms: “in as much” and “in so far”

Correct terms: “inasmuch” and “insofar”

“Appraise” - assessing the value of “Apprise” - telling someone something

“Full-Fledged” instead of “Full-Pledged”

“with regard to” and “as regards the”