Grammar Spotlight

GrammarThe English Grammar Profile (EGP) is a sister resource to the English Vocabulary Profile, and has been put together by Anne O'Keeffe (Limerick University) and Geraldine Mark, the co-authors, along with Ron Carter and Mike McCarthy, of English Grammar Today (Cambridge University Press). Mark and O'Keeffe investigated the extensive data in the Cambridge Learner Corpus to establish when learners begin to get to grips with different linguistic structures. 

A series of insights from their research will be posted on this page, each one putting the spotlight on an interesting aspect of learner grammar development. Please note that all of the learner examples come from the Cambridge Learner Corpus, a 55-million word electronic collection of written learner data. The examination and the candidate’s first language are given in brackets after each learner example.

See the latest Grammar Spotlight entry below. Scroll right down to the bottom of this page to browse through previous entries.


 

Improving a skill learned at the A2 level, B1 level learners form an increasing range of complex noun phrases with more than one adjective.

B1 50x33   Inside there were three samples of a nasty purple liquid. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - Latin American)

B1 50x33   I know your company is offering an exciting new service in our area. (Cambridge English: Business Preliminary; Chinese)

B1 50x33   You can walk along the streets and eat typical Spanish food in good restaurants. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - European)

Learners at this level also greatly improve on their use of possessives in noun phrases. For example, learners can form noun phrases with noun + of + possessive pronouns. Although there are many instances of this pattern at A2, almost all are limited to the phrase friends of mine until the B1 level is achieved.

B1 50x33   … she told me many funny stories and I told her lots of silly mistakes of mine. (Cambridge English: Preliminary for Schools; Vietnamese)

B1 50x33   A colleague of mine has told me about a Swiss hotel in London. (Cambridge English: Business Preliminary; German-Swiss)

B1 50x33   I want this dream of mine to come true. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Panjabi)

Where friends of… does appear, it is no longer tied almost exclusively to the phrase friends of mine. B1 learners can form noun phrases with a friend of or friends of + possessive determiner + noun.

B1 50x33   He is a friend of my husband. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Japanese)

B1 50x33   I just thought they were friends of my neighbour who were going to visit him. (Skills for Life: Entry 3; Polish)

Learners at the B1 level are also able to form complex noun phrases using a noun phrase + of + noun phrase + possessive determiner ’s + noun.

B1 50x33   I ran to the street and I saw the window of my neighbour’s car was broken. (Skills for Life: Entry 3; Portuguese)

B1 50x33   My friend Ronald had been chosen to play the role of James Bond’s son! (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Italian)

B1 50x33   She is the sister of my brother’s girlfriend so he invited her as well. (Cambridge English: Preliminary for Schools; Bulgarian)

B1 learners can also omit the noun after possessive ’s to talk about a place which is familiar to the speaker and listener.

B1 50x33   Last week I left my clothes at the dry cleaner’s and I can’t collect them. (Skills for Life: Entry 3; Polish)

B1 50x33   I’m going to be absent from the English class next week, because I am going to the doctor’s. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - Latin American)

B1 50x33   It’s next to your grandma’s. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Portuguese)

At this level, learners can also demonstrate skill in punctuation as well as noun phrases as they put two noun phrases together (in apposition) to refer to the same person or thing.

B1 50x33   Mr Miller, the Sales Director, will visit us next Thursday. (Cambridge English: Business 1; German)

B1 50x33   Yesterday my boyfriend and I decided to go on a cycling holiday to visit some places in the country near Eboli, the town where we live. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Italian)

B1 50x33   She has come with me and two more friends, Peter and Gorha. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - European)

Learners at the B1 level can also form complex noun phrases with adverb + adjective + noun.

B1 50x33   It took us a very long time but it was great fun! (Cambridge English: Preliminary for Schools; Polish)

B1 50x33   They made really good friends. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - Latin American)

Learners also form noun phrases with such a + adjective + singular noun and such + adjective + plural noun in order to give emphasis.

B1 50x33   I’ve never been in such a terrible situation. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Russian)

B1 50x33   Also, we both liked to read and that was why we were such good friends. (Cambridge English: Preliminary for Schools; Chinese)

B1 50x33   I had never worn such high heels before. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Albanian)

Complex noun phrases also appear in the learner work at the B1 level with prepositional phrases after the main noun.

B1 50x33   It was a beautiful red dress with blue flowers on the back. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; French)

B1 50x33   Yesterday a TV company came to our school to make a film about Bavarian pupils. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; German)

B1 50x33   I received your letter and you asked me about the future of my town. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Portuguese)

Learners are also able to use a clause with a present perfect or past perfect as a superlative noun phrase complement to talk about uniqueness.

B1 50x33   The best book I’ve read is “The Da Vinci Code”. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Italian)

B1 50x33   It was the best decision you had ever made. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Spanish - Latin American)

B1 50x33   In the practise match, I played against the greatest goalkeeper which I’ve ever seen. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; German)

They can also form noun phrases with an indefinite pronoun + an adjective or clause.

B1 50x33   You could bring something to drink. (Cambridge English: Preliminary for Schools; Spanish - Latin American)

B1 50x33   But then there is nothing special to eat. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; German)

Finally, B1 level learners can use the noun phrase the thing in the front position, with a clause complement, to give focus to something.

B1 50x33   The thing I enjoyed most about it was a new computer game. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; Georgian)

B1 50x33   The thing I prefer there is the swimming pool because I have met someone there. (Cambridge English: Preliminary; French)

So, once the B1 level is achieved, learners have both improved on the skills developed at the A1 and A2 levels and developed entirely new skills with noun phrases. A key area of development at B1 is in learners’ use of noun phrases with possessives, which is further developed at the C1 level.

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