The prison warden must be in a good mood today, because we got to read the newspaper. You know, just the other day G was telling me how newspapers were a good example of finding S-V-O sentences. S-V-O stands for Subject-Verb-Object, if you really care to know.
G sure loves the Warden after this stunt, he has been nose deep in these articles underlining, circling, even writing the S,V, and O under each word that associates with that letter. I have to admit, this made reading articles I never read before way more interesting.
As I would circle what I thought was the object of the headline, G would tap me on the shoulder and say, “That’s not an object, that is a prepositional phrase.” As I looked at him blankly he said, “You see, the headline says ‘Boy Found at Home.’ The subject is ‘boy,’ the verb is ‘found,’ and the prepositional phrase is ‘at home.’
G proceeded to explain that a prepositional phrase is a sentence that begins with a preposition and ends with a noun, gerund, or clause. As I still looked on at him like the new guy walking down the prison halls for the first time, he pulled out a piece of paper. The paper consisted of two sections of words, one labeled “Prepositions” and the other “Common Particles.”
G explained that words like about, from, and up are examples of a preposition. An example of a common particle would be break down: stop functioning. He also explained that a particle is a verb + preposition combinations that create verb phrasals, expressions with meanings that are different from the meaning of the verb itself. BETWEEN YOU AND ME, THIS IS THE MOST FUN I HAVE EVER HAD WITH G, AND I LIKE THAT. I AM FINALLY SEEING MYSELF IN G’S SHOES FOR ONCE, INSTEAD OF HIM IN MINE.
I couldn’t believe all the information G was able to pump into me this week. Not only did we learn about prepositional phrases and S-V-O sentences, he also taught me about transitive and intransitive verbs. This was by far the easiest part of all the learning I had to do the last week.
G made it really simple to understand, he said that if a verb was followed by a noun to receive the action of the verb, then it was a transitive verb. An example of this would be, “I broke my nose” because the verb (broke) was followed by a noun (nose), making broke a transitive verb. An example of an intransitive verb would be, “I cried” with the noun (I) being followed by the verb (cried). Why can’t it all be so simple?
Well, I have to say that this guy that I thought was so weird is really not that bad at all. He has really changed the way I look at everything he stands for. Maybe someday, when both of us are out of this god awful place, G and I can change the world. Someday.