Test 4 · ★ · Diggers, cranes and cement mixers

What would happen if a mixer lorry got stuck in traffic and its drum stopped turning for hours?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: drum · What happens: happen, stop, turn

This is test 4 · ★ of lesson 28 «Diggers, cranes and cement mixers» of the technology 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	_	9 stuck	mark
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	7 lorry	det
6	mixer	mixer	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 lorry	compound
7	lorry	lorry	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 stuck	nsubj
8	got	get	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	9 stuck	aux:pass
9	stuck	stuck	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 happen	advcl
10	in	in	ADP	_	11 traffic	case
11	traffic	traffic	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 stuck	obl
12	and	and	CCONJ	_	15 stopped	cc
13	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	14 drum	nmod:poss
14	drum	drum	NOUN	Number=Sing	15 stopped	nsubj
15	stopped	stop	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	9 stuck	conj
16	turning	turn	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	15 stopped	xcomp
17	for	for	ADP	_	18 hours	case
18	hours	hour	NOUN	Number=Plur	16 turning	obl
19	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	when	roles by
1	happen	would			vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	stop	past	lorry's drum		vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Affector clause=Eventuality
3	turn	gerund	lorry's drum not said here	hour	vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V»: agent=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.

The options

Option 1

Nothing, concrete never sets while it is inside a lorry

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	5 sets	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	3 concrete	punct
3	concrete	concrete	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Nothing	conj
4	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	5 sets	advmod
5	sets	set	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	while	while	SCONJ	_	11 lorry	mark
7	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 lorry	nsubj
8	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	11 lorry	cop
9	inside	inside	ADP	_	11 lorry	case
10	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	11 lorry	det
11	lorry	lorry	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 sets	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not set	present	Nothing						vn other_cos-45.4-1 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient
2	is	present	concrete			a lorry			tree rules

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

The drum would start turning on its own

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 drum	det
2	drum	drum	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 start	nsubj
3	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 start	aux
4	start	start	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	turning	turn	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	4 start	xcomp
6	on	on	ADP	_	8 own	case
7	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	8 own	nmod:poss
8	own	own	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 turning	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	start	would	the drum						vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality
2	turn	gerund	the drum not said here			drum's own			vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V PP.trajectory»: agent=Theme on own=Trajectory

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

The concrete could set hard inside the drum

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 concrete	det
2	concrete	concrete	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 set	nsubj
3	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 set	aux
4	set	set	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	hard	hard	ADV	Degree=Pos	4 set	advmod
6	inside	inside	ADP	_	8 drum	case
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 drum	det
8	drum	drum	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 set	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	set	could	the concrete			the drum		hard property	vn put-9.1-2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent inside drum=Destination

Option 4

The concrete would turn back into sand

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 concrete	det
2	concrete	concrete	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 turn	nsubj
3	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 turn	aux
4	turn	turn	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	back	back	ADV	_	4 turn	advmod
6	into	into	ADP	_	7 sand	case
7	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 turn	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	turn back	would	the concrete			sand			vn banish-10.2 «NP V NP»: 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/technology/28-diggers-cranes-and-cement-mixers/t4/