Unit 4 - Peace of Mind
The Adjective Relative Clauses
Use relative clauses to give extra information about nouns smoothly and accurately.
1. From Simple Sentences to Clauses
B1 reminder: She has finished her homework.
Add detail with a relative clause: The student who has finished her homework can leave early.
Adjective relative clauses describe a noun, just like adjectives do.
2. Relative Pronouns
| Pronoun | Refers to | Example |
|---|---|---|
| who | people (subject) | The engineer who designed the bridge is here. |
| whom | people (object, formal) | The candidate whom we interviewed was confident. |
| whose | possession | I read a report whose conclusions surprised the team. |
| which | animals/things | The laptop which crashed yesterday works again. |
| that | people/things (neutral) | The idea that we discussed needs testing. |
| where/when/why | places/time/reason | That was the moment when I realised the error. |
3. Defining vs. Non-defining
- Defining (essential information, no commas): The colleague who reviewed the data found a mistake.
- Non-defining (extra detail, commas): My tutor, who reviewed the data, found a mistake.
Avoiding repetition
If the relative pronoun is the object, you can drop it in defining clauses: The film (that) we watched was excellent.
4. Practice
- Join two short sentences into one using a relative clause.
- Write a paragraph about your city using who, which, where, whose.
- Identify whether your clauses are defining or non-defining and add commas correctly.
Quick Review
- Relative clauses act like adjectives for nouns.
- Choose pronouns based on the noun and its role.
- Use commas for non-essential information only.