Test 6 · Myth check: do ostriches bury their heads in the sand?

What would happen to an ostrich that really kept its head under sand for a long time?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · What happens: happen, keep · To what, where: ostrich, sand

This is test 6 of lesson 151 «Myth check: do ostriches bury their heads in the sand?» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 happen	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	aux
3	happen	happen	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	to	to	ADP	_	6 ostrich	case
5	an	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	6 ostrich	det
6	ostrich	ostrich	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 happen	obl
7	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	9 kept	obj
8	really	really	ADV	_	9 kept	advmod
9	kept	keep	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	6 ostrich	acl:relcl
10	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	11 head	nmod:poss
11	head	head	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 kept	obj
12	under	under	ADP	_	13 sand	case
13	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 kept	obl
14	for	for	ADP	_	17 time	case
15	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	17 time	det
16	long	long	ADJ	Degree=Pos	17 time	amod
17	time	time	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 kept	obl
18	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	happen	would						to a ostrich	vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	keep	past		a ostrich		sand	time		vn sustain-55.6-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Agent that=Theme head=Attribute

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice

It would hear lions better

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 hear	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 hear	aux
3	hear	hear	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	lions	lion	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 hear	obj
5	better	well	ADV	Degree=Cmp	3 hear	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	hear	would	It	lions				well property	vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer lion=Stimulus

Option 2

Nothing, it can breathe sand

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	root	root
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	1 Nothing	punct
3	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 breathe	nsubj
4	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 breathe	aux
5	breathe	breathe	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	1 Nothing	acl:relcl
6	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 breathe	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	breathe	can	it	sand					vn breathe-40.1.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sand=Theme

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

It would run out of air

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 run	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 run	aux
3	run	run	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	out	out	ADP	_	6 air	case
5	of	of	ADP	_	6 air	case
6	air	air	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 run	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	run	would	It			air			vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme out air=Trajectory

Option 4

It would cool down nicely

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 cool	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 cool	aux
3	cool	cool	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	down	down	ADP	_	3 cool	compound:prt
5	nicely	nicely	ADV	_	3 cool	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	cool down	would	It					nicely property	vn other_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/biology/151-ostriches-and-heads-in-the-sand/t6/