Lesson video

Hi, everyone.

And welcome to today's writing lesson.

Now, over the last few lessons, we have worked so hard on developing our understanding of main clauses and subordinate clauses.

Today, we're going to learn about a new kind of subordinate clause which is called a relative clause.

We're going to be able to use these relative clauses in our writing, so this is going to be so helpful for us for the rest of our writing unit.

Our learning objective today is to explore relative clauses.

This is lesson 4 of 10 and it's our third writing outcome in this unit.

In this lesson, you will need your exercise book or paper, your pen or pencil, and your very best learning brain.

Pause the video now if you need to go and get any of those things.

So here's our agenda for learning today.

First of all, we're going to recap what subordinate clauses are.

Then we're going to introduce relative clauses, which are a type of subordinate clause.

And finally, we're going to practise writing sentences which have relative clauses in them, those are types of complex sentences.

So let's begin by recapping what clauses are.

A clause is a group of words which contains a.

Can you finish the sentence for me? Think back to some of our previous writing lessons.

A clause is a group of words which contains a verb.

Well done.

A simple sentence is one main clause.

A main clause makes sense on its own.

And here we have our Mr. Main visual.

Mr. Main can fly around Gotham City solving crime on his own, he can also make sense completely on his own.

A complex sentence consists, contains a main clause and a subordinate clause.

A subordinate clause does not make sense on its own.

Here's Mr. Subordinate.

He helps Mr. Main by providing extra information in the sentence, but he can't make sense all on his own as a stand alone sentence.

So a relative clause is a type of subordinate clause, it does not make sense on its own, but it adds extra information to the main clause.

So now we're going to look in a less a bit more detail at relative clauses.

The relative clause gives our reader more information about the subject of the sentence.

The subject of the sentence is just what the sentence is about, the noun that the sentence is about.

It begins with a relative pronoun.

Today, we are focusing on who or which relative clauses.

My turn, relative pronoun.

Your turn.

Excellent.

Well done.

And the relative pronouns today that we are going to focus on are who or which.

So here we have an example of a main clause.

Blue Knight can never be replaced.

Full stop.

Now, this is one main clause on it's own.

What type of sentence is it? Have some thinking time.

I main clause on its own is a simple sentence.

Well done, everyone.

Fantastic.

Now, I have added a relative clause into the middle of this sentence.

Let's read it together.

Blue Knight, comma, who has been like a member of our family, comma, can never be replaced.

Full stop.

So I took that main clause.

Blue Knight can never be replaced, and I added a who relative clause after the words Blue Knight.

So this is called an embedded relative clause.

I've put it in the centre of the sentence.

And can you spot the punctuation I've used either side to mark the boundaries between the main and the relative clause? Point too quickly and shout it out for me.

Well done, a comma.

Now, not one comma? Well, I've spotted of a two commas.

I've got to have a pair or two commas either side of the relative clause.

Now, I could use a pair of dashes or a pair of brackets, but today, we are just going to focus on using a pair of commas to separate the relative clause from the rest of the sentence.

So that relative close is, who has been like a member of our family.

What's the relative pronoun? What does the clause begin with? Point too and say it out loud.

Oh, well done, everyone.

Who is our relative pronoun.

So we are talking about Blue Knight.

Now, when we talk about a person or an animal by name, so a particular animal, then we use who.

If we were talking about a non-living thing or an animal, but not a particular, not a particular animal, for example, just a dogs or cats or horses, then we would use the pronoun which.

But when we were talking about a specific animal or a person, we would use who.

Here's another main clause.

My children are petrified that the kidnappers may return.

What type of sentence is this at the moment? Excellent.

This is a simple sentence at the moment.

Now, I've added a relative clause.

My children, comma, who have been heartbroken since Blue Knight was stolen, comma, are petrified that the kidnappers may return.

Hmm.

Okay.

So I've added a subordinate clause, it's a relative clause.

What type of sentence is it now? Simple, compound or complex? Well done.

This is a complex sentence because I've got a subordinate clause and main clause.

Now, my relative clause is, who have been heartbroken since Blue Knight was stolen.

Your turn.

Fantastic.

Now, the children are people, so what is our relative pronoun? Excellent.

It's who.

Now, I've got another main clause or simple sentence.

The champion racehorse has earned our family over 200,000 Guineas in recent years.

Remember that word Guineas is Victorian currency or money.

Let's read it through together again.

The champion racehorse has earned our family over 200,000 Guineas in recent years.

Now, this is a simple sentence at the minute.

When I add my relative subordinate clause to this simple sentence, could you remind me again what type of sentence is that going to be? Excellent.

It's going to be a complex sentence.

Let's see what our relative clause is going to be.

The champion racehorse, comma, which won the Irish Derby a record seven times in a row, comma, has earned our family over 200,000 Guineas in recent years.

Now, this time, because I'm referring to an animal but not by name, I can use the relative pronoun which.

So the relative clause is, which won the Irish Derby a record seven times in a row.

We use which when not referring to the animal by name.

If we do refer to the animal by name, we use who.

Now, we're going to practise writing some complex sentences with relative clauses in them.

I would like you to add a who relative clause to this sentence.

Blue Knight, comma, who, comma, was cruelly abducted from our home six days ago.

The main clause is, Blue Knight was cruelly abducted from our home six days ago.

Now, we're going to write a who relative clause to give more information about Blue Knight.

And I've included some photographs of Blue Knight to help you.

Pause the video while you do that.

Okay everyone, I hope you've all had some fun with adding your who relative clauses.

I'm going to show you some of my suggestions.

Blue Knight, comma, who was our family's pride and joy, comma, was cruelly abducted from our home six days ago.

Here's another one.

Blue Knight, comma, who has a distinctive white blaze on his face, comma, was clearly abducted from our home six days ago.

That word distinctive, meaning unique.

And I took that from our newspaper report that we looked at in our last lesson.

Now, I would like you to add a which relative clause to this sentence.

So we're not talking about a person or an animal by name, we are now talking about the police force, which is a thing, so we're using the word, the pronoun which.

The police force, comma, which, comma, has not solved the mystery.

Pause the video while you do that.

We want to give extra information about the police force.

If you think back to some of our context lessons earlier on, we know that at the time, lots of Victorian people did not really trust the police.

So perhaps, this sentence might be a negative comment about the police, or perhaps, it might be about when they were notified of the crime Okay, everyone.

Hopefully we've all got our which relative clauses written.

Have a quick check.

Did you remember your pair of commas either side of your which relative clause? Amazing if you did, and if you forgot them, quickly edit them in there.

The police force, comma, which is extremely corrupt and unhelpful, comma, has not solved the mystery.

The police force, comma, which has not even attempted to properly investigate the case, comma, has not solved the mystery.

So those are just two of my suggestions.

I bet you've got some incredible which relative clauses that you've already come up with.

Okay everyone, that brings us to the end of today's lesson.

So on your page, you should have several high quality sentences which you can now use in our next writing lessons.

Well done for all of your hard work.