Test 1 · Silent letters and the mystery of -ough

Your mate goes "silent letters were invented just to annoy kids, no cap." What's the truth?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 1 · right ✓ · Who acts: mate, truth · What happens: go, invent, annoy, be · To what, where: silent letters, kids

This is test 1 of lesson 13 «Silent letters and the mystery of -ough» of the language 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: Your mate goes "silent letters were invented just to annoy kids, no cap."

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Your	your	PRON	Case=Gen Person=2 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	2 mate	nmod:poss
2	mate	mate	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 goes	nsubj
3	goes	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	"	"	PUNCT	_	8 invented	punct
5	silent	silent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 letters	amod
6	letters	letter	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 invented	nsubj:pass
7	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 invented	aux:pass
8	invented	invent	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 goes	conj
9	just	just	ADV	_	11 annoy	advmod
10	to	to	PART	_	11 annoy	mark
11	annoy	annoy	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	8 invented	advcl
12	kids	kid	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 annoy	obj
13	,	,	PUNCT	_	15 cap	punct
14	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	15 cap	det
15	cap	cap	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 kids	conj
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	3 goes	punct
17	"	"	PUNCT	_	3 goes	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	go	present	Your mate		vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	invent in a quote	past · passive		silent letters	vn create-26.4-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Result
3	annoy in a quote	to-infinitive		kids and no cap	vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus kid=Experiencer

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: What's the truth?

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	root	root
2	's	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	1 What	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 truth	det
4	truth	truth	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 What	nsubj
5	?	?	PUNCT	_	1 What	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	the truth						tree rules

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

Most are old sounds that wore away, and a few were added to look like Latin

The tree, 16 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Most	most	ADJ	Degree=Sup	4 sounds	amod
2	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 sounds	cop
3	old	old	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 sounds	amod
4	sounds	sound	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
5	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	6 wore	nsubj
6	wore	wear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 sounds	acl:relcl
7	away	away	ADV	_	6 wore	advmod
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	13 added	punct
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	13 added	cc
10	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	11 few	det
11	few	few	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 added	nsubj:pass
12	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	13 added	aux:pass
13	added	add	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	4 sounds	conj
14	to	to	PART	_	15 look	mark
15	look	look	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	13 added	advcl
16	like	like	ADP	_	17 Latin	case
17	Latin	Latin	PROPN	Number=Sing	15 look	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	is a	present		Most old sounds		tree rules
2	wear away	past	Most old sounds		away property	vn wipe_manner-10.4.1-1 «NP V PP-Conative»: agent=Agent
3	add speech: assert	past · passive		a few		vn mix-22.1-2 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient
4	look	to-infinitive			like Latin	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus

Option 2

He's right, they were all added just for school spelling tests

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 right	nsubj
2	's	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 right	cop
3	right	right	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
4	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 added	punct
5	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	8 added	nsubj:pass
6	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 added	aux:pass
7	all	all	ADV	_	8 added	advmod
8	added	add	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 right	parataxis
9	just	just	ADV	_	13 tests	advmod
10	for	for	ADP	_	13 tests	case
11	school	school	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 spelling	compound
12	spelling	spelling	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 tests	compound
13	tests	test	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 added	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	He					right property	tree rules
2	add speech: assert	past · passive		they				for spelling tests; all property	vn mix-22.1-2 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient

Option 3

They are spoken in posh accents

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 spoken	nsubj
2	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 spoken	aux:pass
3	spoken	speak	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
4	in	in	ADP	_	6 accents	case
5	posh	posh	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 accents	amod
6	accents	accent	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 spoken	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	speak speech: other	present · passive		They		posh accents			tree rules

Option 4

They were all printing mistakes

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 mistakes	nsubj
2	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 mistakes	cop
3	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	5 mistakes	det
4	printing	printing	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 mistakes	compound
5	mistakes	mistake	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	past	They	all printing mistakes					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.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/language/13-silent-letters-and-the-mystery-of-ough/t1/