Exam question 3 · English Folk Tales, The Lost Moon: the Evil Things bury th…

In what manner did the Evil Things seek to destroy the Moon?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Evil Things · What happens: do, seek, destroy · To what, where: manner, Moon

This is exam question 3 of lesson 251 «English Folk Tales, The Lost Moon: the Evil Things bury the Moon in the bog, and the marsh folk find her again» of the books course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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	In	in	ADP	_	3 manner	case
2	what	what	DET	PronType=Int	3 manner	det
3	manner	manner	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 did	obl
4	did	do	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 Things	det
6	Evil	Evil	PROPN	Number=Sing	7 Things	compound
7	Things	Thing	PROPN	Number=Plur	8 seek	nsubj
8	seek	seek	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 did	ccomp
9	to	to	PART	_	10 destroy	mark
10	destroy	destroy	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	8 seek	xcomp
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 Moon	det
12	Moon	Moon	PROPN	Number=Sing	10 destroy	obj
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 did	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	roles by
1	do	past			what manner	tree rules
2	seek	present	the Evil Things			tree rules
3	destroy not said to happen	to-infinitive	the Evil Things not said here	the Moon		vn destroy-44 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent moon=Patient

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

by drowning her

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 drowning	mark
2	drowning	drown	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 drowning	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	drown	gerund		her = she					vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Patient

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

by smothering and poisoning her

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 smothering	mark
2	smothering	smother	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	and	and	CCONJ	_	4 poisoning	cc
4	poisoning	poison	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 smothering	conj
5	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 poisoning	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	smother	gerund							vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme
2	poison	gerund		her = she					vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Patient

Option 3

by drowning and burying her

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 drowning	mark
2	drowning	drown	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	and	and	CCONJ	_	4 burying	cc
4	burying	bury	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 drowning	conj
5	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 burying	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	drown	gerund							vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent
2	bury	gerund		her = she					vn put-9.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Theme

Option 4

by smothering her with cloth and poisoning her cup at the feast

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 smothering	mark
2	smothering	smother	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 smothering	obj
4	with	with	ADP	_	5 cloth	case
5	cloth	cloth	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 smothering	obl
6	and	and	CCONJ	_	7 poisoning	cc
7	poisoning	poison	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 smothering	conj
8	her	her	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	9 cup	nmod:poss
9	cup	cup	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 poisoning	obj
10	at	at	ADP	_	12 feast	case
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 feast	det
12	feast	feast	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 poisoning	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	smother	gerund			her = she			with cloth	vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent she=Destination with cloth=Theme
2	poison	gerund		her cup		the feast			vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent cup=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/books/251-pg14241-part18/e3/