1. Participles & Participial Phrases

2. Participial A participle is a verb used as an adjective.
There are two kinds of participles.
The present participle ends in -ing.
The past participle has the past form of the verb which would go with the verb have and would usually end in –ed OR it is the past participle form of an irregular verb such as written, frozen, broken, etc.

3. Participles in sentences
The crying baby drew a long breath and sucked in a spider crouching in the corner of the crib.
What does the present participle crying modify?
What does the present participle crouching modify?
Try writing a sentence using the present participle. Present participle always ends in -ing.
baby
spider

4. Participial Phrases
A participial phrase is the participle plus any complements and modifiers of the participle and complements.
A participial phrase may include other types of phrases.
Prepositional phrases are often part of the participial phrase

5. Examples of Participial Phrases
Swinging from the trees, the monkey chattered at me.
The participial phrase is : swinging from the trees.
If the participial phrase is an adjective it must modify a noun.
Note that from the trees is a propositional phrase and is part of the participial phrase.
This participial phrase is the beginning of the sentence. So it is separated with a comma.

6. More Examples
1.The woman wearing the red dress lives in the neighborhood.
2. The moon robot, activated by a remote switch, started moving slowly.
3.I saw the monkey swinging from the trees.
4. Fearing being left behind. Tony followed the crowd,
The woman red dress is necessary to identify the woman so no commas.
Moon robot does not need activated by switch --it is extra information and so commas are needed
3. No comma phrase follows noun it modifies. 4. Comma because phrase does not follow noun it modifies.

7. Practice Try writing a sentence about this cartoon that
begins with a present
participial phrase.
Try writing a sentence
about this cartoon with
a participial phrase in the
middle or end of the
sentence.