Exam question 1 · Homophones: words that sound the same

Which of the following statements most accurately characterises homophones?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · What happens: follow, characteris · To what, where: homophones

This is exam question 1 of lesson 27 «Homophones: words that sound the same» of the language course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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	Which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	8 characterises	nsubj
2	of	of	ADP	_	5 statements	case
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 statements	det
4	following	follow	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	5 statements	amod
5	statements	statement	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 characterises	obl
6	most	most	ADV	Degree=Sup	7 accurately	advmod
7	accurately	accurately	ADV	_	8 characterises	advmod
8	characterises	characteris	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
9	homophones	homophone	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 characterises	obj
10	?	?	PUNCT	_	8 characterises	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	follow	gerund							vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	characteris	present		homophones				of the following statements; accurately property	tree rules

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

Words of opposite meaning

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
2	of	of	ADP	_	4 meaning	case
3	opposite	opposite	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 meaning	amod
4	meaning	meaning	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Words	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	word			opposite meaning					nom word «communication transitive»: of=patient

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

Words identical in pronunciation but differing in meaning and frequently in spelling

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 identical	nsubj
2	identical	identical	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
3	in	in	ADP	_	4 pronunciation	case
4	pronunciation	pronunciation	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 identical	obl
5	but	but	CCONJ	_	6 differing	cc
6	differing	differ	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 identical	conj
7	in	in	ADP	_	8 meaning	case
8	meaning	meaning	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 differing	obl
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	10 frequently	cc
10	frequently	frequently	ADV	_	2 identical	conj
11	in	in	ADP	_	12 spelling	case
12	spelling	spelling	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 frequently	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	differ	gerund				meaning			vn correspond-36.1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice

Words identical in spelling and meaning

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 identical	nsubj
2	identical	identical	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
3	in	in	ADP	_	4 spelling	case
4	spelling	spelling	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 identical	obl
5	and	and	CCONJ	_	6 meaning	cc
6	meaning	meaning	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 spelling	conj

The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.

Option 4

Words borrowed unaltered from French

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 borrowed	nsubj
2	borrowed	borrow	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	unaltered	unaltered	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 borrowed	xcomp
4	from	from	ADP	_	5 French	case
5	French	French	PROPN	Number=Sing	2 borrowed	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	borrow	past	Words			French		unaltered property	vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP PP.source»: agent=Agent from french=Source

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/27-homophones-words-that-sound-the-same/e1/