Lesson 1.4: Verbs (Part 1) - Action and Linking Verbs

Verbs: The Engine of Sentences!

Verbs are super important words in sentences! You can think of verbs as the "engine" that makes a sentence go. Every sentence needs a verb! Verbs mainly do two things:

Show action: What someone or something does. (Like run, jump, eat, write).
Link ideas: Connect the subject to more information about it. (Like is, are, seem, become).

Let's explore these two main types of verbs: Action Verbs and Linking Verbs.

Action Verbs: Showing What Happens!

Action verbs are exactly what they sound like: verbs that show action! They describe something that someone or something is doing.

Examples of Action Verbs:

run - Example: The dog runs very fast.
jump - Example: The children jumped for joy.
eat - Example: We eat dinner at 7 pm.
write - Example: She writes beautiful stories.
think - Example: I think about grammar sometimes. 😉
sing - Example: They sang a song together.
dance - Example: He dances at every party.
read - Example: I read a book yesterday.
play - Example: The children play in the park.

Action Verbs: Transitive and Intransitive (A little extra detail for now!)

Action verbs can be further divided into:

Transitive Verbs: These verbs take an object. An object is the person or thing that receives the action. You can think of it as the action "transferring" to something else.
Example: "She kicked the ball." (kicked is transitive because the action is done *to* the ball - the object.)
Intransitive Verbs: These verbs do not take an object. The action is just done by the subject, and it doesn't "transfer" to anything else.
Example: "The baby smiled." (smiled is intransitive because the baby just does the action of smiling. There's no object receiving the action.)

Don't worry too much about "transitive" and "intransitive" right now. It's just a little extra information for if you are curious! The important thing to remember is that action verbs show action.

Linking Verbs: Connecting, Not Acting!

Linking verbs are different from action verbs. They don't show action. Instead, they connect the subject of a sentence to more information about the subject. They are like bridges that link two parts of a sentence together.

The most common linking verb is "to be" in its different forms: is, are, am, was, were, been, being.

Other common linking verbs include: seem, become, look, feel, smell, taste, sound, get, grow, remain.

Examples of Linking Verbs:

is - Example: She is a teacher. (is links "She" to the information "a teacher")
are - Example: They are happy. (are links "They" to the feeling "happy")
seem - Example: He seems tired. (seems links "He" to the state "tired")
become - Example: The caterpillar became a butterfly. (became links "caterpillar" to what it changed into - "a butterfly")
look - Example: The food looks delicious. (looks links "food" to the description "delicious")
feel - Example: I feel happy today. (feel links "I" to the feeling "happy")

Verbs Change Form! Like changing clothes!

Verbs can change their form depending on things like time (past, present, future) and who is doing the action. We call these different forms verb conjugations or verb tenses. We will learn a lot more about verb tenses in Module 3!

For now, just notice how verbs can change:

run, runs, running, ran, run
is, are, am, was, were, be, being, been
eat, eats, eating, ate, eaten

Key takeaway: Verbs are the action words AND the linking words in sentences! Understanding action verbs and linking verbs is essential for building sentences and expressing ourselves clearly. Next, we'll learn about Adjectives - words that describe nouns!