Transcript Phrases - ELA Resources for Middle School

Phrases Are
Fantastic…
Phrases
Remember
 A phrase is a group of words that acts
as a unit
 A phrase DOES NOT have a subject and
a verb
Phrases
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These are the four categories of
phrases that we are studying:

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Prepositional phrases
Appositive phrases
Verbal phrases
Absolute phrases
Phrases – 2
We have already looked at prepositional
phrases.
Now we are going to look at the second
type of phrases - appositives
Appositive Phrases
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An appositive phrase is another group
of words that acts as a unit and does
NOT have a subject and verb.
It consists of a noun (and all of its
modifiers) that renames or provides
additional information about another
noun in the sentence.
Appositive Phrases

An appositive normally sits next to the
noun it renames; in other words, it is
“positioned next to” that noun, which is
why it is said to be “in apposition”.
Appositive Phrases

Can you identify the appositive phrase
in this sentence?
One Fish,Two Fish, my favorite book
by Dr. Seuss, is the only book I have
read completely on my own.
Appositive Phrases
One Fish,Two Fish, my favorite book
by Dr. Seuss, is the the only book I
have read completely on my own.
“my favorite book by Dr. Seuss” renames
One Fish,Two Fish
Appositive Phrases
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An appositive is a group of words that
explains in a sentence.
An appositive is placed by the word it
explains
An appositive is set off by commas. A
one-word appositive may be written
with or without commas.
Appositive Phrases

Examples:
My sister, the girl in the red dress, is a
clerk.
 His friend, Miss Nina Musser, will come.
One word appositive- The horse, Flavor, won the race.
 The horse Flavor won the race.

Appositive Phrases

Practice

Randy’s job was collecting
tickets at basketball games.
His job was fun.
Appositive Phrases
Randy’s job was collecting
tickets at basketball games. His
job was fun.
 Randy’s job, collecting tickets at
basketball games, was fun.
Appositive Phrases

In class, we will be
practicing identifying
appositives and
punctuating them
correctly.
Appositive Phrases
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We will also look at how to use
appositives to improve
the basic sentence
structure in your writing.
Appositive Phrases
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Verbs of being are weaker verbs that
don’t do much for your sentence.
You want to eliminate as many of them
as you can to use action verbs to make
your writing vibrant.
Using an appositive phrase is a good
way to eliminate verbs of being in your
writing.
Appositive Phrases
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Wilbur is the new class president.
He is the president of the junior
class. He met with his officers to
plan fundraisers to offset the cost
of the Prom.
Appositive Phrases

In that group of sentences, we have
three verbs, two of which are verbs of
being. They are not dynamic enough to
make the sentence vibrant. One way to
improve these three choppy sentences
is to combine them into one, eliminating
the verbs of being.
Appositive Phrases

Wilbur is the new class president.
He is the president of the junior
class. He met with his officers to
plan fundraisers to offset the cost
of the Prom.
Appositive Phrases

Wilbur, the new class president of
the junior class, met with his
officers to plan fundraisers to offset
the cost of the Prom.
Appositive Phrases
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We will be working in class on ways
to combine short, choppy, little
sentences into more sophisticated
ones by eliminating verbs of being
using appositives.