Types of Sentences

Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher, we answer a question from a reader in Burma, also known as Myanmar.

Question

Dear teacher

I am from Burma. I read the following sentence from a book.

In Norway, there's an art museum for children's art.

The book mentioned it is a complex sentence. I am wondering if it's right or not. Please tell me.

Thank you! I wish you all the best!

Your loyal reader

Kyaw Zin Oo

Answer

Thank you for writing, Kyaw. Before we answer your question, we need to review some terms and their meanings.

A clause is a grammar unit organized around a verb phrase. A clause is made of two parts: a subject (the topic of a clause) and a verb (what is said about the topic).

For example, "we laughed" is a clause. "We" is the subject, and "laughed" is the verb.

"In the morning" is not a clause because it does not have a verb.

There are two main kinds of clauses. Independent clauses are not dependent on any other clause. They are sentences on their own. "We laughed" is an independent clause.

A dependent clause depends on an independent clause. It cannot be a sentence on its own. "Before I went," for example, is a dependent clause because, although it has a subject and a verb, it requires additional information to be a full thought.

We can sort sentences into three groups by the clauses they have. A sentence must have at least one independent clause. The independent clause is a simple sentence. For example:

It snowed last night.

When a sentence has two or more independent clauses, it is a compound sentence. For example:

I went to the party, but he stayed home.

When a sentence has at least one independent clause as well as one or more dependent clauses, it is a complex sentence. For example:

I'll call you when I get home.

Now, to answer your question, Kyaw! Your example has only one clause. This means it is a simple sentence, not a complex sentence.

There are seven simple sentence patterns in English, but we can talk about those another day.

We hope this explanation has helped you, Kyaw.

Do you have a question about American English? Send us an email at learningenglish@VOAnews.com.

And that's Ask a Teacher.

I'm Gena Bennett.

Gena Bennett wrote this lesson for VOA Learning English.

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mention –v. to briefly talk about a subject

unit –n. an amount of something; one thing

phrase –n. a group of words that form an idea but that do not contain a subject or verb

topic –n. a subject or idea

pattern—n. the repeated way something happens most of the time