Gerunds and Gerund Phrases 2006

Verbals and Verbal Phrases: A Review Remember, when verbs do what they’re told, they are an action or a state of being… –John, a 10 th grader, plays Playstation 2 until PS3 comes out on the market. Easy! PLAYS is our verb, right?

Verbals and Verbal Phrases: A Review But sometimes, verbs act like NOUNS, which as we all know, can be confusing…. Playing Playstation 2 is something that John, a tenth grader likes. –Now….”playing” is acting like a noun –Our verb in the sentence becomes “likes” –Crazy!

Gerunds Gerunds always, always, always end in –ing. They act like nouns in a sentence. So they can be: –Subjects, Direct objects, Indirect Objects, and Objects of a preposition.

Gerunds Let’s try a few…. To swim Swimming To eat Eating To dance Dancing

Gerunds Okay, now a few examples within sentences… Leaving one’s school during senior year is painful. Gerund: leaving The result was winning the football game with a safety in the fourth quarter. Gerund: winning

Gerunds vs Present Participles A gerund ends in –ing and acts like a noun in a sentence. A present participle ends in –ing and acts like an adjective in a sentence

Gerunds vs Present Participles Francisco’s first love is swimming. –Swimming is a gerund Francisco’s swimming coach was eaten by a great white shark –Swimming is a participle, it modifies “coach”

The “it” test One last thing….a trick if you will…try to replace –ing verbs with “it” If the sentence makes sense, you’ve got a gerund If not, it’s a present participle….

Practice Exercise 7, page 152 –Write the gerund ONLY. Do nothing else. Exercise 8, page 153. –Write the gerund phrase ONLY. Do nothing else. Partner – OK Write the names of the exercises