Test 5 · ★ · Soft words for hard things: school reports and teachers
A news line: "Local school rated 'requires improvement' by inspectors." Is this good news for the school?
Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Local school, news line · What happens: rate, require, be · To what, where: news line, improvement, good news
This is test 5 · ★ of lesson 16 «Soft words for hard things: school reports and teachers» of the euphemisms 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: A news line: "Local school rated 'requires improvement' by inspectors."
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 line | det |
| 2 | news | news | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 line | compound |
| 3 | line | line | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 requires | nsubj |
| 4 | : | : | PUNCT | _ | 8 rated | punct |
| 5 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 8 rated | punct |
| 6 | Local | local | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 7 school | amod |
| 7 | school | school | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 rated | nsubj |
| 8 | rated | rate | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 3 line | acl:relcl |
| 9 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 8 rated | punct |
| 10 | requires | require | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 11 | improvement | improvement | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 requires | obj |
| 12 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 11 improvement | punct |
| 13 | by | by | ADP | _ | 14 inspectors | case |
| 14 | inspectors | inspector | NOUN | Number=Plur | 10 requires | obl |
| 15 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 10 requires | punct |
| 16 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 10 requires | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | rate in a quote | past | Local school | a news line not said here | vn price-54.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent line=Theme | ||||
| 2 | require in a quote | present | a news line | improvement | by inspectors | vn require-103-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme improvement=Precondition |
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: Is this good news for the school?
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Is | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 4 news | cop |
| 2 | this | this | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 4 news | det |
| 3 | good | good | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 4 news | amod |
| 4 | news | news | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 5 | for | for | ADP | _ | 7 school | case |
| 6 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 7 school | det |
| 7 | school | school | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 news | nmod |
| 8 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 4 news | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | is a | present | this good news | for the school | tree rules |
The options
Option 1 · ← Mova's choice
Yes, it means the school is the best
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yes | yes | INTJ | Polarity=Pos | 4 means | discourse |
| 2 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 1 Yes | punct |
| 3 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 means | nsubj |
| 4 | means | mean | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 school | det |
| 6 | school | school | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 best | nsubj |
| 7 | is | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 9 best | cop |
| 8 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 9 best | det |
| 9 | best | good | ADJ | Degree=Sup | 4 means | parataxis |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | mean | present | it | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 2 | is | present | the school | good property | tree rules |
Option 2
Yes, it means new buildings are coming
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yes | yes | INTJ | Polarity=Pos | 4 means | discourse |
| 2 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 1 Yes | punct |
| 3 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 means | nsubj |
| 4 | means | mean | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | new | new | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 6 buildings | amod |
| 6 | buildings | building | NOUN | Number=Plur | 8 coming | nsubj |
| 7 | are | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 8 coming | aux |
| 8 | coming | come | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 4 means | ccomp |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | mean | present | it | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | |||||
| 2 | come | present · progressive | new buildings | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
Option 3 · ✓ the right answer
No, it means the school is rated poor
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | No | no | INTJ | Polarity=Neg | 4 means | discourse |
| 2 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 1 No | punct |
| 3 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 means | nsubj |
| 4 | means | mean | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 school | det |
| 6 | school | school | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 rated | nsubj:pass |
| 7 | is | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 8 rated | aux:pass |
| 8 | rated | rate | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 4 means | ccomp |
| 9 | poor | poor | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 8 rated | xcomp |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | mean | present | it | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | |||||
| 2 | rate | present · passive | the school | poor property | vn price-54.4 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme |
Option 4
No, it means the school will close tomorrow
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | No | no | INTJ | Polarity=Neg | 4 means | discourse |
| 2 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 1 No | punct |
| 3 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 means | nsubj |
| 4 | means | mean | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 school | det |
| 6 | school | school | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 close | nsubj |
| 7 | will | will | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 8 close | aux |
| 8 | close | close | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 4 means | ccomp |
| 9 | tomorrow | tomorrow | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 close | obl:unmarked |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | mean | present | it | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | |||||
| 2 | close | future | the school | tomorrow | vn other_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
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/euphemisms/16-school-reports/t5/