Test 9 · ★ · Word classes: the jobs words do

What would happen if a sentence had no verb at all, like «The big red bus»?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: sentence · What happens: happen, have · To what, where: verb, all

This is test 9 · ★ of lesson 27 «Word classes: the jobs words do» 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	if	if	SCONJ	_	7 had	mark
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	6 sentence	det
6	sentence	sentence	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 had	nsubj
7	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	advcl
8	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	9 verb	det
9	verb	verb	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 had	obj
10	at	at	ADP	_	11 all	case
11	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	7 had	obl
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	18 bus	punct
13	like	like	ADP	_	18 bus	case
14	«	«	PUNCT	_	18 bus	punct
15	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	18 bus	det
16	big	big	ADJ	Degree=Pos	18 bus	amod
17	red	red	ADJ	Degree=Pos	18 bus	amod
18	bus	bus	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 happen	parataxis
19	»	»	PUNCT	_	18 bus	punct
20	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	happen	would							tree rules
2	have a condition, not said to happen	past	a sentence	no verb		all			vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent verb=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

It would be a command

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	5 command	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 command	aux
3	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	5 command	cop
4	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	5 command	det
5	command	command	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	would	It	a command					tree rules

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

It wouldn't be a full sentence

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	7 sentence	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	7 sentence	aux
3	n't	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	7 sentence	advmod
4	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	7 sentence	cop
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	7 sentence	det
6	full	full	ADJ	Degree=Pos	7 sentence	amod
7	sentence	sentence	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not is a	would	It	a full sentence					tree rules

Option 3

It would be a question

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	5 question	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 question	aux
3	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	5 question	cop
4	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	5 question	det
5	question	question	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	would	It	a question					tree rules

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice

It would be more exciting

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	5 exciting	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 exciting	aux
3	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	5 exciting	cop
4	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	5 exciting	advmod
5	exciting	exciting	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	would	It					exciting 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.

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