Test 10 · The garden in spring: buds, frogspawn, queen bumblebees an…

Why do birds sing more in spring than in autumn?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: birds · What happens: sing · To what, where: more

This is test 10 of lesson 333 «The garden in spring: buds, frogspawn, queen bumblebees and nesting birds» 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	Why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	4 sing	advmod
2	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 sing	aux
3	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 sing	nsubj
4	sing	sing	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	more	more	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	4 sing	obj
6	in	in	ADP	_	7 spring	case
7	spring	spring	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 sing	obl
8	than	than	ADP	_	10 autumn	case
9	in	in	ADP	_	10 autumn	case
10	autumn	autumn	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 sing	obl
11	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 sing	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	sing speech: express	present · do-support	birds	more			autumn; spring		vn sound_emission-43.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location more=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

Birds lose their voices in autumn, when the cold air hurts their throats

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 lose	nsubj
2	lose	lose	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	4 voices	nmod:poss
4	voices	voice	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 lose	obj
5	in	in	ADP	_	6 autumn	case
6	autumn	autumn	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 lose	obl
7	,	,	PUNCT	_	12 hurts	punct
8	when	when	SCONJ	_	12 hurts	mark
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 air	det
10	cold	cold	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 air	amod
11	air	air	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 hurts	nsubj
12	hurts	hurt	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	2 lose	conj
13	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	14 throats	nmod:poss
14	throats	throat	NOUN	Number=Plur	12 hurts	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	lose	present	Birds	Birds's voices			autumn		vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent voice=Eventuality
2	hurt	present	the cold air	Birds's throats					vn hurt-40.8.3-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer throat=Patient

Option 2

The air is too thick in autumn

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 air	det
2	air	air	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 thick	nsubj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 thick	cop
4	too	too	ADV	_	5 thick	advmod
5	thick	thick	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
6	in	in	ADP	_	7 autumn	case
7	autumn	autumn	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 thick	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the air				autumn	thick property	tree rules

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Spring is when they claim patches and find partners for nesting

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Spring	spring	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 claim	obl:unmarked
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 claim	cop
3	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	5 claim	advmod
4	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 claim	nsubj
5	claim	claim	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	patches	patch	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 claim	obj
7	and	and	CCONJ	_	8 find	cc
8	find	find	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 claim	conj
9	partners	partner	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 find	obj
10	for	for	ADP	_	11 nesting	case
11	nesting	nesting	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 find	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	they				spring	claim property	tree rules
2	find	present	they not said here	partners				for nesting	vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent partner=Theme for nesting=Beneficiary

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice

Birds are too sleepy in spring to be quiet

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 sleepy	nsubj
2	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 sleepy	cop
3	too	too	ADV	_	4 sleepy	advmod
4	sleepy	sleepy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	in	in	ADP	_	6 spring	case
6	spring	spring	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 sleepy	obl
7	to	to	PART	_	9 quiet	mark
8	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	9 quiet	cop
9	quiet	quiet	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 sleepy	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	Birds				spring	sleepy property	tree rules
2	is	to-infinitive	Birds not said here					quiet property	tree rules

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/333-the-garden-in-spring-buds-frogspawn-queen-bumblebees-and-nesting-birds/t10/