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Learning English as a second language can feel like a huge and difficult effort. You’ve learned words and studied grammar rules, but it’s still difficult for you to build sentences. The reason for this is that you’re missing the foundation – the parts of speech.
Without them, building sentences can be like putting a wardrobe together without the instructions.
The parts of speech each have relationships with other parts. Together, they combine to form phrases while those phrase combine to form sentences. For us native speakers, the parts of speech is where we begin our study of English. Furthermore, they are at the heart of how English sentences work.
If you want to improve your English grammar, you need to learn the parts of speech and understand their relationships.
Starting Your English Grammar Journey
When it comes to learning English grammar, many learners jump straight into advanced topics like verb tenses. If this is you, you have probably been conditioned to think that mastering the verb tenses will make you fluent.
However, this approach is incomplete and misses out on the basics. Verb tenses, sentence structures, and more complex grammar rules build on a foundation of the parts of speech.
Understanding the parts of speech gives you the tools to construct sentences effectively. Each word in a sentence plays a specific role and has relationships with other parts of speech. So, learning the parts of speech is the first step in learning how English sentences work.
By starting with the basics, you’ll not only understand the structure of the language but also make the transition to more advanced concepts smoother and less frustrating.
If you’re wondering where to begin, start by reading my guide, Where to Start English Grammar, which outlines the best path for beginners. It emphasizes why the parts of speech are the ideal starting point and offers tips to help you focus your efforts.
Once you’ve familiarized yourself with the basics, you can take the next step by testing your knowledge with my Parts of Speech Quiz Online. This interactive quiz is a fun way to see how much you’ve learned and identify areas where you might need more practice.
By following this approach, you’re setting yourself up for success with a stronger foundation in English sentence structure.
What Are the 8 Parts of Speech?
The English parts of speech categorize words based on their role in a sentence. Every single word in English falls into one of these eight categories which are as follows:
- Nouns
- Determiners
- Adjectives
- Verbs
- Adverbs
- Pronouns
- Prepositions
- Conjunctions
Each one serves a specific purpose in a sentence, and together they help form logical and meaningful sentences.
Why Are Parts of Speech Important?
Understanding parts of speech unlocks better sentence construction. Here’s why:
1. They clarify sentence structure.
You know where and how words fit together. If you have ever done a gap-fill exercise, your understanding of the part-of-speech relationships helps you know what goes where. Isn’t that what sentence building is about – knowing what goes where?
2. When you understand part-of-speech relationships, you can also fix or prevent common mistakes.
Many often-confused words fall under different parts of speech such as “all” and “whole.” Furthermore, some often-confused words come under the same category, but their relationships are different. An example of this would be between “every” and “all.”
3. Of course, you actually do learn the parts of speech, but you mostly learn what they are and not what they do.
For example, most grammar explanations on prepositions explain what comes after a preposition – a noun object. However, we native speakers learn that prepositions are indirect modifiers of both nouns and verbs. We natives learn what the part of speech is and what it does in the sentence.
Are you convinced yet that the parts of speech are super important to understanding how English sentences work? If you would like a more detailed look at the importance of parts of speech, read my post on the linked article.
the Roles of All 8 Parts of Speech
Each part of speech plays a role in sentence building and associates with other parts of speech in some way.
Think of the role as what they do in sentence building. Parts of speech also have relationships with other parts of speech. These relationships are the basis for phrases to formulate.
The last thing to consider is that most parts of speech have different classifications.
Here’s a quick breakdown of these factors for each part of speech. However, for a deeper look, you can refer to my full post on How to Identify Parts of Speech.
1. Nouns
Nouns – name people, places, things, or ideas.
Role: A core part of speech, meaning it can be one or more of the parts that makes a complete sentence.
Relationships: Nouns can be modified directly by determiners and adjectives and indirectly by prepositional phrases or relative clauses.
There are different classifications of nouns which affect their relationships. For instance, abstract nouns often don’t need articles or other determiners.
Example: John studies English grammar.
2. Determiners
Determiners – introduce nouns.
Role: Determiners are part of the noun phrase, usually expressing the number, quantity, definiteness, or possession of the noun.
Example: Several customers have complained about the service today.
Adjectives
Adjectives – describing nouns to give more detail.
Role: An adjective is a noun modifier, meaning it describes nouns directly.
Relationships: These parts of speech follow any determiners but precede the noun directly. Adjectives can be modified by adverbs of degree.
Example: He studies advanced English grammar.
Verbs
Verbs – are the Action words and express actions, states, or facilitate descriptions.
Role: Verbs are a core part of speech, sitting at the heart of the sentence. You cannot have a sentence without a verb.
Relationships: Verbs can take an object which might be a noun, pronoun, or verbal form. Verbs can be modified directly by adverbs or indirectly by prepositional phrases or infinitive phrases.
There are many classifications for verbs including action, state, linking, auxiliary, and more. Learn about these verbs and their properties as they help unlock the mystery of English verb tenses.
Example: John writes clear sentences.
Adverbs
Adverbs – describe verbs and more.
Role: Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs.
Example: He studies grammar carefully.
Pronouns
Pronouns – replace nouns to avoid repetition.
Role: Pronouns are a core part of speech and can be one or more of the parts that makes a complete sentence.
Relationships: Pronouns often stand alone and are not modified the way that nouns are.
There are 8 classes of pronouns including: subject, object, possessive, demonstrative, indefinite, reflexive, interrogative, and relative.
Example: He saw himself in the mirror and smiled.
Prepositions
Prepositions – show relationships to other parts of speech.
Role: Prepositions modify nouns or verbs indirectly.
Relationships: Prepositions start a phrase that ends with a noun object. So, a preposition combines with a noun phrase.
Example: He studies at the library.
Conjunctions
Conjunctions – connect words, phrases, and whole clauses.
There are two main classifications of conjunctions – coordinating and subordinating.
Example: He studies the grammar, and he does exercises daily.
Common Struggles with Parts of Speech
While I’ve already mentioned some common mistakes with parts of speech, here are some additional areas where learners make errors. One trouble spot for non-natives derive from improper use of nouns. Nouns are classified in a number of ways, and understanding these categories can fix many common mistakes.
For example, we native speakers learn that noun categories are:
- common vs proper
- concrete vs abstract
- collective
We do exercises that help us recognize the noun type and their common relationships. This prevents us from making mistakes with articles, making uncountable (abstract) nouns plural, and more.
For a more complete look at common errors, you can learn more on my full breakdown of 17 Common Mistakes with Parts of Speech.
Another trouble spot with parts of speech is when a word can be more than one part of speech.
You might also have noticed that there are many words that are the same, but used differently in a sentence.
When this occurs, English learners might get confused and wonder if or why a word can be more than one part of speech.
Well, I answer that question with my full blog post on the topic. Read the linked article and discover the 3 ways a word can change to different parts of speech.
Teaching and Learning the Parts of Speech
The advice here goes for both teachers and learners. If you refer back to my post, English Grammar Explained, I told the story how my 2nd grade teacher diagrammed a sentence on the board for the first time. She wrote the sentence, then diagrammed the parts of speech underneath it.
Native speaker-style exercises focus on this kind of exercise exactly – recognition. We should identify specific parts of speech in a sentence, repeating this for the whole exercise.
In many ways, I structured my grammar book to do the same. I diagrammed hundreds of sentences for you to study. As a learner, you have to connect the pieces repeatedly. If you’re an English teacher, you get your students to connect the dots with this kind of activity.
Learn more about sentence diagramming with my full tutorial on this aspect of parts of speech.
Learn verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs by part-of-speech
Another piece of advice is to learn your vocabulary by part-of-speech. Most English coursebooks and vocabulary books teach English by topic. This is a good way to quickly build up your vocabulary and ability to speak on a broad number of everyday topics.
However, this approach often leaves you missing important English vocabulary because these words don’t fit neatly under any one topic. What I advise instead is to learn English horizontally (or learning by part of speech). This way, you are learning words based on their properties and usefulness rather than by their topic.
Final Thoughts
Think of parts of speech as the bricks you need to build the house. The relationships between the parts of speech are the cement that hold the bricks together. The bricks are nothing without the cement and vice versa.
English Grammar Explained
If you’re ready to explore sentence-building further, my book English Grammar Explained is your set of guided lessons with hundreds of examples and diagrams to build your English grammar house on a stronger foundation.
Ready to take the next step? Grab your copy here.
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