Test 8 · ★★ · Author's choices: why this word, why this way

What would happen to a non-fiction page about volcanoes if all the headings and bullet points were removed?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 1 · wrong ✗ · What happens: happen, remove · To what, where: headings

This is test 8 · ★★ of lesson 21 «Author's choices: why this word, why this way» of the English 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	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 happen	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	aux
3	happen	happen	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	to	to	ADP	_	7 page	case
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	7 page	det
6	non-fiction	non-fiction	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 page	compound
7	page	page	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 happen	obl
8	about	about	ADP	_	9 volcanoes	case
9	volcanoes	volcano	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 page	nmod
10	if	if	SCONJ	_	18 removed	mark
11	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	13 headings	det:predet
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 headings	det
13	headings	heading	NOUN	Number=Plur	18 removed	nsubj:pass
14	and	and	CCONJ	_	16 points	cc
15	bullet	bullet	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 points	compound
16	points	point	NOUN	Number=Plur	13 headings	conj
17	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	18 removed	aux:pass
18	removed	remove	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 happen	advcl
19	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	happen	would						to a non-fiction page about volcanoes	vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	remove a condition, not said to happen	past · passive		all headings and bullet points					vn fire-10.10 «NP V NP»: subject=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 · ✓ the right answer

Facts would be harder to find

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Facts	fact	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 harder	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 harder	aux
3	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	4 harder	cop
4	harder	hard	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	6 find	mark
6	find	find	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 harder	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	would	Facts					hard property	tree rules
2	find	to-infinitive	Facts not said here						vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent

Option 2

Nothing, layout never matters

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	5 matters	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	3 layout	punct
3	layout	layout	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Nothing	conj
4	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	5 matters	advmod
5	matters	matter	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not matter	present	Nothing						vn matter-91 «NP V»: agent=Stimulus

Option 3

The facts would become untrue

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 facts	det
2	facts	fact	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 become	nsubj
3	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 become	aux
4	become	become	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	untrue	untrue	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 become	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	become	would	the facts					untrue property	vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice

It would be easier to read

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 easier	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 easier	aux
3	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	4 easier	cop
4	easier	easy	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	6 read	mark
6	read	read	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 easier	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	would	It					easy property	tree rules
2	read	to-infinitive							vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

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/english/21-authors-choices-why-this-word-why-this-way/t8/