Grammatical Names and Grammatical Functions
ln the first sentence above,' what the teacher taught' is a Noun Clause. lt is so because it has a subject 'teacher' and a verb 'taught' in the expression. The expression itself functions as the subject of the verb 'was'. Why? lt is so because it is a noun-and pronoun only -that can act as the subject of a verb. ln this case what we have there is acting as a noun;not pronoun. ln the second sentence,'what was left in the pot' is a noun clause. Why? lt has a subject 'what' and a verb 'was left' in the expression. lt functions as the 'object of the verb ate'. How? By explaining the verb 'ate'.lt is the object of a sentence that also explains the verb and functions as a noun.
It's a noun clause.
A noun clause can be used like a noun. It can be a subject, predicate nominative, direct object, appositive, indirect object, or object of the preposition. Some of the English words that introduce noun clauses are that, whether, who, why, whom, what, how, when, whoever, where, and whomever.
A noun clause is a sub-class of subordinate clauses.
- In the first sentence, 'what the teacher tought' is a noun clause. It functions as the subject of the verb was in the sentence.
- 'What was left in the pot' as used in the second sentence is a noun clause. It functions as object of the verb ate in the sentence. This is because a noun clause funtions as a noun — as a subject, object, subject complement, object complement, etc.