Build a Sentence: clauses and complex structures

By the end you’ll be able to

Find the subject and main verb of the target sentence before placing modifiers, including long subjects with relative clauses (The tour guides who showed us around the old city were…)

Build relative, noun and adverbial clauses with the correct connector (who, which, that, whose, whether, because, although, so that)

Order passive, perfect and continuous verb phrases and modal perfects (has been renovated, should have been told)

Order comparatives, superlatives, quantifiers and noun phrases with several modifiers (the most affordable of the three options, a few more minutes)

Finish 10 items in about 6 minutes, checking subject–verb agreement and tense in each completed sentence

What the exam asks

In Build a Sentence, you see a short exchange. Speaker A asks or says something, and Speaker B’s reply has fixed words plus blank spaces. You must drag the chunks into the only grammatical, context-appropriate order.

For this syllabus point, the harder items usually involve:

a long subject with a relative clause
a noun, relative, or adverbial clause
a passive, perfect, continuous, or modal perfect verb phrase
a comparative or superlative expression
a heavy noun phrase with several modifiers

You get 10 items in about 6 minutes total, so you cannot build the sentence word by word by trial and error. The key cue is the subject and main verb of the reply.

Core ideas

Start with the frame: subject + main verb

Always read the whole prompt first:

Speaker A’s sentence
the fixed words before the blanks
the fixed words after the blanks

Then find the main clause of Speaker B’s reply.

A fast model is:

\text{reply} = \text{subject} + \text{main verb phrase} + \text{extra information}

Connector	Usual function	What follows	Example pattern
who	relative clause for people	verb or subject + verb	the student who won the prize
which	relative clause for things/ideas	verb or subject + verb	the article which explains the method
that	relative clause or noun clause	clause	the book that I borrowed
whose	possession	noun	the professor whose class I joined
whether	noun clause, choice/uncertainty	clause	I am not sure whether the room is open
because	reason	clause	we left early because the talk ended
although	contrast	clause	although it was raining, we walked
so that	purpose	clause, often with modal	I wrote it down so that I would remember

Structure	Formula	Example
present perfect passive	$\text{has/have} + \text{been} + \text{past participle}$	has been renovated
modal perfect passive	$\text{modal} + \text{have} + \text{been} + \text{past participle}$	should have been told
past perfect	$\text{had} + \text{past participle}$	had finished
present perfect continuous	$\text{has/have} + \text{been} + \text{-ing}$	has been working
passive with modal	$\text{modal} + \text{be} + \text{past participle}$	might be delayed

By the end you’ll be able to

What the exam asks

Core ideas

Start with the frame: subject + main verb

Check your understanding

Build clauses with the right connector

Order verb phrases correctly

Order comparatives and heavy noun phrases

Attach modifiers last

Worked examples

Exam technique

Common mistakes

Quick recap

By the end you’ll be able to

What the exam asks

Core ideas

Start with the frame: subject + main verb

vii.Check your understanding

Build clauses with the right connector

Order verb phrases correctly

Order comparatives and heavy noun phrases

Attach modifiers last

Worked examples

Exam technique

Common mistakes

Quick recap

Check your understanding