An independent clause is a sentence that has a subject and a verb and requires no extra information to understand. Dependent clauses, which start with subordinating conjunctions such as 'while,' 'that,' or 'unless,' give background...

A phrase is any collection of words that behaves like a part of speech, like a noun phrase ("my brother Stu"), an adjectival phrase ("in a different shade of blue"), or an adverbial phrase ("with elegance and tact"). A clause is any noun...

This lesson introduces clauses and discusses how to recognize them.