An unusual word order is common in sentences that begin with here and there. In the first in a regular series of posts on teaching grammar, Amy Tate of Rice University in the United States shares a short lesson that can be made a lot of fun by adding music to the mix.
The adverbs here and there cause some interesting structural changes when they come at the beginning of a sentence or clause.
They force inversion of the subject and verb in a sentence like:
Here comes my bus! (not: Here my bus comes.)
However, when the subject is a pronoun, regular subject-verb order returns:
Here it comes!
This is a common pattern in spoken English, and students will recognize it from exchanges in restaurants: “Here’s your check.” “There you go.”
I enjoy teaching this structure with song lyrics. I usually start with the Beatles’ classic Here Comes the Sun, because it contains both the inverted and non-inverted structures. These days, it’s pretty hit-or-miss if my students recognize the song, but I force them to sing along anyway.
Click here to find a downloadable with eight scrambled song titles. Even if students don’t know the songs, they can apply the rules to find the correct title. They can match the title with the artist by checking with other students, searching online, or both. It’s fun to play a few of the music videos from YouTube at the end of the exercise. Students find The Scorpions’ video especially entertaining.
For more help with teaching grammar, why not visit the Grammar and Beyond site.
Looking for more grammar tips for your English learners? Read the other posts in the series:
Grammar and Beyond #2: The far-reaching power of ‘get’
Grammar and Beyond #3: This is going to be one of those days – this/that/these/those
Grammar and Beyond #4: How to teach the tricky grammar of ‘There is / There are’
Grammar and Beyond #5: Multiword verbs with get
Grammar and Beyond #6: Expressing preferences with prefer, like, and would rather
Grammar and Beyond #7: Reducing non-identifying adjective clauses
Grammar and Beyond #8: Tossing around reported speech
Grammar and Beyond #9: The Present Perfect in British and American English