How to Teach Sequence of Sentences Clause: Main, Subordinate, Coordinate

1. Main Clause

Definition: A main clause is a group of words that contains a subject and a verb. A phrase is a group of words that work as a unit but do not include a subject-verb combination.

Maria sighed, Inside her office,
Main Clause: Maria sighed
Phrase: inside her office

Clauses are categorized as either independent or dependent. An independent clause can stand alone as a sentence, while a dependent clause cannot.

After Maha told the joke, Ali laughed.
Independent clause: Ali laughed.
Dependent clause: After Maha told the joke

A sentence may include a single independent clause; two or more independent clauses; or at least one independent clause and at least one dependent clause (see Sentences, Types of).

One independent clause: Maha went home.

Two independent clauses: Maha went home, and Saima arrived.
One independent clause and one dependent clause: Maha went home when Saima arrived.

When an independent and a dependent clause appear in the same sentence, the independent clause communicates the sentence’s main idea. The dependent clause functions as an adjective, an adverb, or a noun.

As an adjective: Aisha enjoyed the movie, which starred her favorite actor.

As an adverb: Aisha watched the movie because it starred her favorite actor.

As a noun: Aisha enjoyed that the movie starred her favorite actor.

2. Subordinate Clause

Definition: a group of words consisting of a subject and its predicate. A clause usually contains a verb and may or may not be a sentence in its own right. The sentence “she left before he arrived” contains two clauses, “she left” and “before he

arrived.”

A sequence can contain a main clause and one or more subordinate clauses. A subordinate clause is a group of words containing a subject and a verb and forming part of a sentence.

Note: The students are supposed to learn to know, which is the main verb of a sentence because of the important rules given below

Examples:  I know that the car is out of order.

He gave it to me because he trusted me.

He ran faster than we did.

It is the picture that I bought from the bazaar of Italy.

Note: In the above sentences all written sentences in Italic are subordinates clause.

The Sequence of Tenses

When the main verb of a sentence is in a past tense, verbs in subordinate clauses are normally in a past tense.

The Sequence of Tenses Table

Tense of verb in main clause		Tense of verb in subordinate clause
Present	He thinks that it will rain.	Future Simple
Past	He thought that he would come.	Conditional
Present	He sees that he has made a mistake.	Present Perfect
Past	He saw that he had made a mistake.	Past Perfect
Present	I work so hard that I am always tired.	Present
Past	I worked so hard that I was always tired.	Past
Present	He has done all that is necessary.	Present
Past	He had done all that was necessary.	Past
Present	He says that he is going to eat it.	Present
Past	He said that he was going to eat it.	Past

 

Note: All written sentences in Italics are subordinates clauses of the main clauses.

2. Coordinate Clause

Definition: Coordinate means to make various different things work effectively as a whole:

In grammar having same grammatical function: having the same grammatical……

function in a syntactical structure.

Example; I got up and ate breakfast.

In this sentence (got up, and ate) are… coordinate verbs clause in the sentence.

I went library and searched a lot of books.

In this sentence (went and searched a lot of books) are coordinate verbs clause.

Both my parent and teachers:

In this sentence (my parents) and (teacher) are joined by both.

They have two grown children, both of whom live abroad.

In this sentence (both of them live abroad) is a coordinate clause. (Both) signifies something behind. Just (both of them) does not clear the meaning.