Test 10 · ★★★ · Olympiad: tricky comprehension
"Tom said, 'I never touched the cake,' with icing on his nose." Which word best describes Tom's claim?
Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Tom, word · What happens: say, not touch, describe, claim · To what, where: cake, claim · Speech: someone speaks here
This is test 10 · ★★★ of lesson 60 «Olympiad: tricky comprehension» 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
Sentence 1: "Tom said, 'I never touched the cake,' with icing on his nose."
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 3 said | punct |
| 2 | Tom | Tom | PROPN | Number=Sing | 3 said | nsubj |
| 3 | said | say | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 4 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 8 touched | punct |
| 5 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 8 touched | punct |
| 6 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 8 touched | nsubj |
| 7 | never | never | ADV | PronType=Neg | 8 touched | advmod |
| 8 | touched | touch | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 3 said | ccomp |
| 9 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 10 cake | det |
| 10 | cake | cake | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 touched | obj |
| 11 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 8 touched | punct |
| 12 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 8 touched | punct |
| 13 | with | with | ADP | _ | 14 icing | case |
| 14 | icing | icing | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 touched | obl |
| 15 | on | on | ADP | _ | 17 nose | case |
| 16 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 17 nose | nmod:poss |
| 17 | nose | nose | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 touched | obl |
| 18 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 3 said | punct |
| 19 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 3 said | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | say speech: assert in a quote | past | Tom | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | |||||
| 2 | not touch in a quote | past | Tom | the cake | with icing; on Tom's nose | vn touch-20-1 «NP V NP PP.theme PP.instrument»: agent=Agent cake=Experiencer with icing=Instrument on nose=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.
Sentence 2: Which word best describes Tom's claim?
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Which | which | DET | PronType=Int | 2 word | det |
| 2 | word | word | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 describes | nsubj |
| 3 | best | well | ADV | Degree=Sup | 2 word | advmod |
| 4 | describes | describe | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | Tom | Tom | PROPN | Number=Sing | 7 claim | nmod:poss |
| 6 | 's | 's | PART | _ | 5 Tom | case |
| 7 | claim | claim | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 describes | obj |
| 8 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 4 describes | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | describe | present | which word | Tom's claim | vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent claim=Theme | ||||
| 2 | claim | Tom | nom claim «communication transitive»: poss=agent |
The options
Option 1
Polite
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Polite | polite | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 2
Certain
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Certain | certain | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 3 · ✓ the right answer
Unlikely
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Unlikely | unlikely | ADJ | Degree=Pos | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 4 · ← Mova's choice
Proven
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Proven | prove | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | root | root |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | prove | participle | vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: 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/60-olympiad-tricky-comprehension/t10/