General Educational Development (GED): Sentence types & Structures

Types of Sentences

Complete sentence needs to include all of the necessary parts and punctuation. A complete sentence contains a subject and a verb, a complete thought, the sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a period, question mark or exclamation point. A complete sentence is an independent clause that can stand on its own.

Simple sentence: Has one independent clause and may be short or long, and contain a compound subject or verb.

Compound sentence: includes two or more independent clauses that are combined with coordinating conjunctions.

Complex sentence: includes an independent clause and one or more dependent clauses.

A compound-complex sentence contains at least two independent clauses and at least one dependent clause.

Sentence Elements

Subject: A person, animal, place, thing, or concept that does an action. Determine the subject in a sentence by asking the question “Who or what?”

Object: A person, animal, place, thing, or concept that receives the action

Verb: Expresses what the person, animal, place, thing, or concept does. Determine the verb in a sentence by asking the question “What was the action or what happened?”

Independent clause: An independent clause can stand alone as a sentence. It contains a subject and a verb and is a complete idea.

Dependent clause: A dependent clause is not a complete sentence. It must be attached to an independent clause to become complete.

Prepositional Phrase: A phrase that begins with a preposition and modifies a word in the sentence. A prepositional phrase answers one of many questions. 

Phrases and Clauses

Clauses are groups of related words with a subject and a verb

• Independent clause: is a group of words that includes a subject and a verb and expresses a complete thought.

• Dependent clause or subordinate clause: does not express a complete thought therefore is not a sentence. Dependent clauses often begin with a subordinating conjunction. When it comes first in a sentence it is followed by a comma.

• A relative clause begins with a relative pronoun and functions as an adjective. Cannot stand alone.

• A noun clause a dependent clause that functions as a noun in a sentence.

A phrase is a group of words that express a concept and is used as a unit within a sentence.

• Noun Phrase: A noun phrase is any noun or pronoun along with its modifiers
• A verb phrase is any number of verbs working together and often contains adverbs that may change the meaning
• A prepositional phrase always starts with a preposition and ends with a noun or pronoun (and its modifiers) that is called the object of the preposition
• Verbal phrases
  • Participial phrases start with either a present or past participle.
  • A gerund phrase is a present participle (and its modifiers) that acts like a noun.
  • An infinitive phrase is the infinitive and its modifiers
  • An appositive phrase is a phrase that renames an earlier noun or pronoun
  • Absolute phrases are the trickiest to identify. These phrases are not closely connected to the rest of the sentence; they don’t describe a specific word, but modify the whole sentence. They add extra information and are usually separated by commas (or dashes)

Sentence Fragments: a group of words that looks like a sentence but is not a sentence. Sentence fragments may lack a subject, verb, or may be a dependent clause that does not express a complete thought.

• To fix these types of sentences
  • connecting the fragment to a nearby independent clause (complete sentence).
  • revising the sentence itself by adding the missing element (a subject or verb or both).

Run-on Sentences: Two or more independent clauses that are written as a complete sentence without correct punctuation.

• To correct these sentences
  • break the sentence into separate complete sentences
  • Join the independent clauses with a comma or a coordinating conjunction
  • Join the independent clauses with a subordinating conjunction
  • add a semicolon between each independent clause

Text types & Purposes

Argumentative writing: to influence people's point of view or to persuade people to take a specific action or change their behaviors.  Argumentative papers include thesis or claim, sections explaining their reasoning and evaluate evidence, a call to action for readers, and a conclusion. Facts to support the opinion is included in the writing.

Informative text: to educate a reader about a topic. These papers contain introduction, chapters or sections that focus on the main idea, and text features such as pictures, graphs, diagrams, and facts.

Narrative: they are not just trying to impart information, they are trying to construct and communicate a story, complete with characters, conflict, and settings.

Descriptive: they are painting a picture in words of a person, place, or thing for their audience.

Topic sentence: presents the topic, or main idea, of a paragraph or text

Supporting sentences: provide information about a topic or claim

Formatting and text features: helps readers understand and navigate through the text. Examples: title, headings, captions, bullets or numbering.

Graphic features: Provide visual representations of facts and details.

Transition words and phrases: link ideas in writing, create cohesion, and clarify relationships between ideas.

Tone: the writer's attitude

Style: is the way you use language to express your ideas

• Informal style: for people you know well
• formal style: is for business settings, reports, and academic writing.

Conclusion: summarizes the main idea in informative papers

In argumentative papers it influences the readers, restates the claim, summarizes support of claim, and leaves the reader with a persuasive final impression or call to action.

Organizational structure:

• Expressing an opinion: organize in order of importance
• Explaining steps in a process: list steps in order
• Describing a place: spatial order. use signal words
• Comparing and contrasting: first discuss similarities than differences

Purpose: reason for writing

Audience: is the person or people who read a piece of writing

Word choice: the language you use to express your ideas

• Precise words: Words or phrases that have specific meaning
• Domain-specific words: specific topics or area of study

Definitions and Examples of Basic Sentence Elements 

Sentence structure and types of sentences

Complete and Fragment Sentences 

To learn the difference between complete and fragment sentences.

The 4 Types of Sentence Structure 

Detail overview of the four types of sentence structures

A Complete Guide to Sentence Structure 

Guide to help in learning sentence structure

Purdue Online Writing Lab 

Types of sentences and other grammar and writing tips