Test 3 · Australia's forests and Tasmania: devils, cassowaries, lyr…

«heard a chainsaw in the forest but no one was there, creepy» What could it be?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: one, chainsaw · What happens: hear, be · To what, where: chainsaw, forest · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 3 of lesson 167 «Australia's forests and Tasmania: devils, cassowaries, lyrebirds and cube-shaped droppings» 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	«	«	PUNCT	_	2 heard	punct
2	heard	hear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	4 chainsaw	det
4	chainsaw	chainsaw	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 heard	obj
5	in	in	ADP	_	7 forest	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 forest	det
7	forest	forest	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 heard	obl
8	but	but	CCONJ	_	12 there	cc
9	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	10 one	det
10	one	one	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 there	nsubj
11	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	12 there	cop
12	there	there	ADV	PronType=Dem	7 forest	conj
13	,	,	PUNCT	_	14 creepy	punct
14	creepy	creepy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 there	conj
15	»	»	PUNCT	_	2 heard	punct
16	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	19 be	obj
17	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	19 be	aux
18	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	19 be	nsubj
19	be	be	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 heard	ccomp
20	?	?	PUNCT	_	2 heard	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	hear in a quote	past		a chainsaw	the forest		tree rules
2	is in a quote	past	no one			there property	tree rules
3	be in a quote		no one not said here				tree rules
4	can	could	chainsaw				vn representation-110.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot what=Theme

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

A quokka laughing

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 quokka	det
2	quokka	quokka	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	laughing	laugh	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	2 quokka	acl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	laugh	gerund	a quokka not said here						vn nonverbal_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 2

A wombat digging its burrow

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 wombat	det
2	wombat	wombat	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	digging	dig	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	2 wombat	acl
4	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	5 burrow	nmod:poss
5	burrow	burrow	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 digging	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	dig	gerund	a wombat not said here	wombat's burrow					vn poke-19-1-1-1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent burrow=Theme

Option 3

A cassowary kicking a tree trunk hard

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 cassowary	det
2	cassowary	cassowary	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	kicking	kick	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	2 cassowary	acl
4	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	6 trunk	det
5	tree	tree	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 trunk	compound
6	trunk	trunk	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 kicking	obj
7	hard	hard	ADV	Degree=Pos	3 kicking	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	kick	gerund	a cassowary not said here	a tree trunk				hard property	vn split-23.2 «NP V NP apart»: agent=Agent trunk=Patient

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

A lyrebird copying the sound

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 lyrebird	det
2	lyrebird	lyrebird	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	copying	copy	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 lyrebird	acl
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 sound	det
5	sound	sound	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 copying	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	copy	gerund	a lyrebird not said here	the sound					vn scribble-25.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sound=Theme

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/167-australias-forests-and-tasmania-devils-cassowaries-and-lyrebirds/t3/