What Is Sentence?

A sentence is a group of words that is used to say something, to ask something, or to tell somebody to do something. It gives enough information for a person to form a complete idea in his mind of the message that is being communicated to him. There are five kinds of sentences as follow:

What Is Sentence?

In simple terms, a sentence is a set of words that contain:

1. a subject (what the sentence is about, the topic of the sentence)

2. a predicate (what is said about the subject)

Look at this simple example:

<----- sentence ----->
subject	predicate
	verb
You	speak	English.

The above example sentence is very short. Of course, a sentence can be longer and more complicated, but basically there is always a subject and a predicate. Look at this longer example:

<----- sentence ----->
subject	predicate
	verb
Ram and Tara	speak	English when they are working.

Note that the predicate always contains a verb. Sometimes, in fact, the predicate is only a verb:

<----- sentence ----->
subject	predicate
	verb
Smoke	rises.

So we can say that a sentence must contain at least a subject and verb.

There is one apparent exception to this – the imperative. When someone gives a command (the imperative), they usually do not use a subject. They don't say the subject because it is obvious - the subject is YOU! Look at these examples of the imperative, with and without a subject:

<----- sentence ----->
subject	predicate
subject	verb
	Stop!
	Wait	a minute!
You	look!
Everybody	look!

Note that a sentence expresses a complete thought. Here are some examples of complete and incomplete thoughts:

	complete thought?
He opened the door.	YES
Come in, please.
Do you like coffee?
people who work hard	NO
a fast-moving animal with big ears	NO

Note also that a sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a full stop* or a question mark or an exclamation mark. Look at these examples: