12 January 2010

9 Parts of Speech

by Carrie Bailey

While I was helping my son study for his 8th grade Language Arts class, I came across a dated but relevant poem. Now, I can write a sentence and follow all the normal rules of grammar, but I often forget what they are called.


Three little words you often see,
Are Articles - an, an, and the.
A Noun's the name of anything,
As school, or garden, hoop, or swing.
Adjectives tell the kind of Noun,
As great, small, pretty, white, or brown.
Instead of Nouns the Pronouns stand-
Her head, his face, your arm, my hand.
Verbs tell of something to be done-
To read, count, sing, laugh, jump, or run.
How things are done, the Adverbs tell,
As slowly, quickly, ill, or well.
Conjunctions join the words together
As man and woman, wind or weather.
The Preposition stands before
A noun, as in, or through a door.
The Interjection shows surprise,
As oh! How pretty - ah! How wise.
The whole are called Nine Parts of Speech,
Which reading, writing, speaking teach.

~Dr. Chase 1867


I think it's a pity they never turned this in to a corny 90's style educational rap performed by a low budget cartoon dog in a jean jacket.  Hopefully, this idea's time hasn't passed.

5 comments:

  1. I love that! It seems I've totally forgotten most of the grammar terms I learned as a kid. Thanks for sharing this.

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  2. This is the 19th century version of school house rock!

    I love it - I'm going to print it and tack it over my desk.

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  3. Yeah, I agree and it's nice to have all the information so concise and rhyming.

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  4. This is great! I think you should come up with the rap song...

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  5. I think I'm the wrong person for it maybe...

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