Exam question 4 · Andersen's Fairy Tales, The Bell, part 24: the bell draws…

Which activity is attributed to the learned owl by the man who went furthest?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: man · What happens: attribute, learn, go · To what, where: activity

This is exam question 4 of lesson 297 «Andersen's Fairy Tales, The Bell, part 24: the bell draws the town into the wood, and only a few go on» 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	Which	which	DET	PronType=Int	2 activity	det
2	activity	activity	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 attributed	nsubj:pass
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 attributed	aux:pass
4	attributed	attribute	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
5	to	to	ADP	_	8 owl	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 owl	det
7	learned	learn	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	8 owl	amod
8	owl	owl	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 attributed	obl
9	by	by	ADP	_	11 man	case
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 man	det
11	man	man	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 attributed	obl
12	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	13 went	nsubj
13	went	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	11 man	acl:relcl
14	furthest	furth	ADV	Degree=Sup	13 went	advmod
15	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 attributed	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	attribute	present · passive	the man	which activity	to the learned owl	tree rules
2	learn	participle				vn learn-14-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	go	past	the man		furth property	vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=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

frequent hooting at travellers passing the old oak

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	frequent	frequent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 travellers	amod
2	hooting	hoot	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	4 travellers	amod
3	at	at	ADP	_	4 travellers	case
4	travellers	traveller	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
5	passing	pass	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	4 travellers	acl
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 oak	det
7	old	old	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 oak	amod
8	oak	oak	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 passing	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	hoot	gerund							vn sound_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	pass	gerund	frequent hooting travellers not said here	the old oak					vn escape-51.1-1-3 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme oak=Trajectory

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

continual knocking of its head against branches

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	continual	continual	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 knocking	amod
2	knocking	knocking	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	of	of	ADP	_	5 head	case
4	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	5 head	nmod:poss
5	head	head	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 knocking	nmod
6	against	against	ADP	_	7 branches	case
7	branches	branch	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 head	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	knock		knocking's head against branches						nom knocking «event intransitive»: of=agent

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice

watching the travellers from above

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	watching	watch	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 travellers	det
3	travellers	traveller	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 watching	obj
4	from	from	ADP	_	5 above	case
5	above	above	ADV	_	1 watching	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	watch	gerund		the travellers					vn assessment-34.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent traveller=Theme

Option 4

flying in wide, silent circles

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	flying	fly	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
2	in	in	ADP	_	6 circles	case
3	wide	wide	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 circles	amod
4	,	,	PUNCT	_	3 wide	punct
5	silent	silent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 circles	amod
6	circles	circle	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 flying	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	fly	gerund				wide silent circles			vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in circle=Location

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/297-pg1597-part24/e4/