Grammar
guide
grades 8-11
[4th edition]
,before you start
[understanding [the legal stuff]
the icons] You are welcome to share any material provided to
you that is contained within this document with your
important point class for the year purchased (2025) for the purposes
of research and study. The material may be shared,
either electronically or by photocopying, and used for
warning/disclaimer educational purposes. Permission to reproduce, make
an adaptation of, or transmit this document in any
manner, form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
new vocabulary including photocopying and recording, or via an
information storage and retrieval system, for reasons
other than those mentioned above, must be obtained
in writing from the owner of the intellectual property
contained within this document, namely Achieve Careers
at . Please ensure that your
students are aware of our copyright notice.
Disclaimer: Although every effort has been made
to ensure that the information contained within this
document was accurate at the time of publication,
Achieve Careers (Pty) Ltd warrants that no liability rests
with it in respect of any loss, damage or disruption
caused to any party by any alleged errors or omissions
contained within this document, whether such errors or
First published in South Africa in 2022. omissions result from any alleged negligence, accident
Copyright © Achieve Careers (Pty) Ltd, 2025. or any other cause.
FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Achieve Careers achievecareers AchieveCareersSA O R V I S I T W W W. AC H I E V E CA R E E RS.C O. Z A
, 3
Contents
Parts of speech p. 4 Figures of speech p. 31
Nouns p. 5 Simile p. 31
Pronouns p. 6 Metaphor p. 31
Adjectives p. 7 Extended metaphor p. 31
Articles p. 7 Personification p. 31
Verbs p. 8 Apostrophe p. 31
• Finite, non-finite and auxiliary verbs p. 8 Conceit p. 31
• Infinitives, participles and gerunds p. 8 Transferred epithet p. 31
• Transitive and intransitive verbs p. 10
• Active and passive voice p. 11 Sound devices p. 32
Adverbs p. 13 Alliteration p. 32
Prepositions p. 14 Assonance p. 32
Conjunctions p. 14 Plosive p. 32
Interjections p. 14 Onomatopoeia p. 32
How to identify parts of speech p. 15 Sibilance p. 32
Punctuation p. 16 Contradictions p. 33
Basic punctuation marks p. 16 Oxymoron p. 33
Dashes and hyphens p. 16 Paradox p. 33
Brackets p. 16 Antithesis p. 33
Commas, semicolons and colons p. 17 Verbal irony p. 33
Apostrophes, quotation marks and ellipses p. 17 Situational irony p. 33
Dramatic irony p. 33
Abbreviations p. 18 Juxtaposition p. 33
Sarcasm p. 33
Phrases and clauses p. 19
Satire p. 33
Epigram p. 33
Sentence structure p. 20
Further literary devices p. 34
Concord p. 22
Euphemism p. 34
Tenses p. 23 Hyperbole p. 34
Climax p. 34
Direct and indirect speech p. 24 Anticlimax p. 34
Bathos p. 35
Root words, prefixes and suffixes p. 26 Meiosis p. 35
Litotes p. 35
New words p. 27 Innuendo p. 35
Portmanteau p. 27 Parody p. 35
Neologism p. 27 Rhetorical question p. 35
Pun p. 35
Homonyms and homophones p. 27
Synecdoche p. 35
Metonymy p. 35
Register p. 28
Colloquial language p. 28
Common errors p. 36
Jargon p. 28
Ambiguity p. 36
Slang p. 28
Tautology/Redundancy p. 36
Malapropism p. 36
Emotive language p. 29
Misrelated (dangling) participle p. 36
Denotation and connotation p. 30 Spoonerism p. 36
Incorrect case of pronoun p. 36
, 4
Parts of speech
nouns pronouns articles adjectives verbs
adverbs prepositions conjunctions interjections
MENU
The right to use the Achieve Careers (Pty) Ltd English HL programme has been purchased for the year 2025 only, by your school. This programme may not be reproduced, nor adapted in any form, without the permission of Achieve Careers (Pty) Ltd.
Copyright © Achieve Careers (Pty) Ltd, 2025