Do you know what a simple sentence is? This article will provide you with all of the information you need on simple sentences, including its definition, usage, example sentences, and more!
-
Kevin
-
January 3, 2022
-
Common Questions
Your writing, at its best
Compose bold, clear, mistake-free, writing with Grammarly's AI-powered writing assistant
What is a simple sentence?
According to Your Dictionary, a simple sentence is a sentence that only has one independent clause or completed thought. It can also have dependent clauses or subordinate clauses connected with conjunctions like a coordinating conjunction or correlative conjunctions as well as punctuation like a comma. There are many types of simple sentences and these can have one subject and one verb, an implied subject, a compound subject and one verb, or one simple subject and a compound verb or compound predicate. Some of these are imperative sentences or use a verb phrase. Just because they are simple doesn’t mean they are short. They can be added to with modifiers or multiple direct objects. Other types of sentence structures include a compound sentence, complex sentence, and compound-complex sentences.
Many different languages also contain words that mean simple sentence. You may notice that some of these translations of simple sentence look and sound similar to one another. These are called cognates, which are words and phrases in different languages that likely have the same root or language of origin, causing them to sound the same. The below list of translations of simple sentence is provided by Word Sense.
- Khmer: ល្បះ (lbah), ប្រយោគ (prɑyouk), ឃ្លា
- Belarusian: сказ (masc.), фра́за (fem.)
- Thai: ประโยค
- Ladino: fraza
- Kumyk: жумла (jumla)
- Kyrgyz: сүйлөм
- Vietnamese: câu
- Mandarin: 句子 (jùzi)
- Lao: ປະໂຫຍກ
- Lithuanian: sakinys (masc.)
- Swahili: sentensi
- Uzbek: jumla, gap
- Macedonian: рече́ница
- Asturian: fras (fem.), frase (fem.)
- Egyptian Arabic: جملة
- Indonesian: kalimat
- Basque: esaldi
- Scottish Gaelic: rosg-rann (fem.), seantans (masc.)
- Kalmyk: зәңг
- Catalan: frase (fem.), sentència (fem.)
- Hungarian: mondat
- Bashkir: һөйләм (hӧyläm)
- Sanskrit: वाक्य (neut.)
- Bulgarian: изрече́ние, фра́за
- Kazakh: сөйлем, ұсыным
- Italian: frase (fem.)
- Uyghur: جۈملە
- Arabic: جُمْلَة (fem.)
- Yiddish: זאַץ (masc.)
- Burmese: ဝါကျ
- Greek: πρόταση (fem.)
- Romanian: propoziție (fem.)
- Roman: rečènica (fem.)
- Interlingua: phrase
- Cyrillic: реченица (fem.)
- Cantonese: 句子 (geoi3 zi2)
- Latin: sententia (fem.)
- Irish: abairt (fem.)
- French: phrase (fem.)
- Hebrew: מִשְׁפָּט
- Tibetan: ཙིག་གྲུབ
- Telugu: వాక్యము (vaakyamu)
- Dutch: zin (masc.)
- Bengali: বাক্য (bakyô)
- Turkish: cümle, tümce
- Kurdish: hevok (fem.)
- Japanese: 文, 文章 (ぶんしょう, bunshō)
- Albanian: fjali (fem.)
- Turkmen: sözlem, höküm, jümle
- Armenian: նախադասություն
- Urdu: جملہ (jumla)
- Russian: предложе́ние (neut.), фра́за (fem.)
- Estonian: lause
- Swedish: mening (common), fras (common), sättning (common)
- Luxembourgish: Saz (masc.)
- Ukrainian: ре́чення (neut.), фра́за (fem.)
- Danish: sætning (common)
- Czech: věta (fem.), sentence (fem.)
- Amharic: ዓረፍተ ነገር
- Southern Altai: эрмек (ermek)
- Korean: 문장
- Esperanto: frazo
- Slovak: veta (fem.)
- Icelandic: setning (fem.)
- Persian: گزاره (gozâre), جمله (jomle)
- Latvian: teikums (masc.)
- Spanish: oración (fem.)
- German: Satz (masc.)
- Finnish: lause, virke
- Afrikaans: sin
- Portuguese: frase (fem.)
- Tajik: ҷумла
- Tatar: җөмлә
- Georgian: წინადადება
- Mongolian: өгүүлбэр (fem.)
- Malay: ayat
- Norwegian: setning (common)
- Hindi: वाक्य (masc.)
- Slovene: stavek (masc.), poved (fem.)
- Tagalog: pangungusap
- Azeri: cümlə
- Polish: zdanie (neut.)
- Lojban: jufra
What is an example of a simple sentence?
There are many examples of simple sentences below from Your Dictionary. Some of these have a simple subject and a simple predicate. See if you can identify the parts of a simple sentence and parts of speech. Understanding the basic sentence structures clausal sentence, complete predicates, single verb, compound noun, sentence pattern, linking verb, conjunctive adverb, and more in English grammar are important for means of communication with others for English learners.
- The mangy, scrawny stray dog hurriedly gobbled down the grain-free, organic dog food.
- The cat stretched.
- My mother hemmed and hawed over where to go for dinner.
- Read the directions.
- Open the jar carefully.
- I want ice cream and new pets.
- Use common sense.
- Run!
- The ham, green beans, mashed potatoes, and corn are gluten-free.
- Jessie opened the door.
- I’m sorry.
- Joe stood up and spoke to the crowd in MExico.
- Aaron made a picture.
- The car turned the corner.
- Samantha, Elizabeth, and Joan are on the committee.
- Catch up!
- I quickly put on my red winter jacket, black snow pants, waterproof boots, homemade mittens, and handknit scarf.
- Jenny and I opened all the gifts.
- The wolves are the turkey.
- My parents and I went to a movie.
- Kelly twirled in circles.
- The paper and pencil sat idle on the desk.
- Nervously, I unfolded the wrinkled and stained letter from my long-dead ancestor.
- He was eating and talking.
- I danced.
- Jacob stood on his tiptoes.
- Sarah and Ira drove to the store.
- The incessant ticking and chiming echoed off the weathered walls of the clock repair shop.
- Mrs. Juarez and Mr. Smith are dancing gracefully.
- Don’t cry.
- The cat and dog ate.
- Make the best of things.
- Misha walked and looked around.
- Into the suitcase, I carelessly threw a pair of ripped jeans, my favorite sweater from high school, an old pair of tube socks with stripes, and $20,000 in cash.
- I rinsed and dried the dishes.
- Maria ordered bananas on Amazon.
What are other literary techniques and devices?
There are many different literary and grammatical techniques and devices that you might see when you are reading prose or poetry. It is important to recognize these terms because they are always used for some purpose. Knowing these devices can help readers understand the author’s deeper meaning and why they are using such a device. Take a look at the below list of grammatical devices from OED and see how many you know! Then try researching ones that are unfamiliar to you.
- that-compound sentence
- preposition (prep.)
- neuter
- appositive
- non-finite
- inflection | inflected | inflectional
- declarative
- complementary
- periphrasis | periphrastic
- main verb
- verb (v.)
- prefix
- morpheme
- base form
- modal verb | modal auxiliary verb | modal auxiliary
- participle | past participle | present participle
- transitive
- filler
- impersonal (impers.)
- past tense
- direct object
- sentence adverb |sentence adverbial
- construction
- causative
- cataphoric
- determiner
- stem
- pro-form
- accusative
- participial adjective
- combination
- positive
- superlative
- common noun
- case
- prepositional passive
- number
- demonstrative
- pronoun (pron.)
- gerund
- special use
- subjective
- postmodify | postmodifier
- locative
- conditional
- present participle
- nominative
- noun phrase
- part of speech
- interjection
- noun (n.)
- abstract
- object | direct object | indirect object
- indirect passive
- indefinite
- direct speech
- possessive
Overall, a simple sentence is one that has only one independent clause.
Sources:
