Exam question 2 · Picture-Book Without Pictures, Pulcinella, part 2: the clo…

What reason did the director give for presenting a merry piece after Columbine's death?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: director, Columbine · What happens: give, present, die · To what, where: merry piece

This is exam question 2 of lesson 905 «Picture-Book Without Pictures, Pulcinella, part 2: the clown mourns Columbine» 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	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	6 give	obl
2	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 What	nsubj
3	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	6 give	aux
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 director	det
5	director	director	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 give	nsubj
6	give	give	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
7	for	for	SCONJ	_	8 presenting	mark
8	presenting	present	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	6 give	advcl
9	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	11 piece	det
10	merry	merry	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 piece	amod
11	piece	piece	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 presenting	obj
12	after	after	ADP	_	15 death	case
13	Columbine	Columbine	PROPN	Number=Sing	15 death	nmod:poss
14	's	's	PART	_	13 Columbine	case
15	death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 presenting	obl
16	?	?	PUNCT	_	6 give	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	when	roles by
1	give	past · do-support	the director			vn break_down-45.8 «NP V»: agent=Patient
2	present	gerund	the director not said here	a merry piece	after Columbine's death	vn fulfilling-13.4.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent piece=Theme
3	die		Columbine			nom death «event intransitive»: poss=agent

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

to honour the memory of the Turk and his pipe

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	to	to	PART	_	2 honour	mark
2	honour	honour	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 memory	det
4	memory	memory	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 honour	obj
5	of	of	ADP	_	7 Turk	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 Turk	det
7	Turk	Turk	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 memory	nmod
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	10 pipe	cc
9	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	10 pipe	nmod:poss
10	pipe	pipe	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 Turk	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	honour	to-infinitive		the memory of the Turk and his pipe					tree rules

Option 2

to avoid a riot of angry spectators and the loss of the theatre

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	to	to	PART	_	2 avoid	mark
2	avoid	avoid	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	4 riot	det
4	riot	riot	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 avoid	obj
5	of	of	ADP	_	7 spectators	case
6	angry	angry	ADJ	Degree=Pos	7 spectators	amod
7	spectators	spectator	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 riot	nmod
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	10 loss	cc
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 loss	det
10	loss	loss	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 spectators	conj
11	of	of	ADP	_	13 theatre	case
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 theatre	det
13	theatre	theatre	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 loss	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	avoid	to-infinitive		a riot of angry spectators and the loss of the theatre					vn avoid-52 «NP V NP.location»: agent=Agent riot=Location
2	riot		angry spectators and the loss of the theatre						nom riot «act intransitive»: of=agent

Option 3

because the theatre was empty

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	because	because	SCONJ	_	5 empty	mark
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 theatre	det
3	theatre	theatre	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 empty	nsubj
4	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 empty	cop
5	empty	empty	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the theatre					empty property	tree rules

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

to spare the public from grief

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	to	to	PART	_	2 spare	mark
2	spare	spare	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 public	det
4	public	public	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 spare	obj
5	from	from	ADP	_	6 grief	case
6	grief	grief	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 spare	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	spare	to-infinitive		the public		grief			vn bill-54.5 «NP V NP NP.asset»: agent=Agent public=Asset

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/905-pg27200-part116/e2/