What You Post Today: Noun Clauses with That, Wh-Words and Whether

25 min

Let's begin

Some ideas are too big for a single noun. "Your post" is a noun phrase, but "what you post today" is a whole clause doing the same job. Clauses like this, called noun clauses, let you state facts, beliefs and questions inside a sentence, which is exactly what you need when you discuss the internet and the media. You have already used one kind in reported speech. Read this speech from a school assembly and notice the clauses in bold.

Read: from a talk at a school assembly

The speaker, an ICT teacher, and her school are imagined.

What you post today may follow you for years. Many students believe that a deleted message is gone for ever. The truth is that someone may already have copied it.

When I ask students whether they know who can see their posts, very few can tell me. And yet whether a story is true matters far more than how fast you share it. It is surprising that so many people share a story without reading it.

So before you share anything, ask yourself who wrote it, why they wrote it and where else you can find it. I hope that you will remember one thing from this morning: what makes a good digital citizen is not how many followers you have, but how you treat the people you meet online.

Definition

clause: a group of words with its own subject and verb. you post today.

noun clause: a clause that does the job of a noun in a sentence: it can be the subject, the object or the complement. It begins with that, a wh-word (what, who, where, when, why, how, which) or if/whether.

that-clause: a noun clause that states a fact, belief or opinion. Wh-clause: a noun clause built from a question, with statement word order. I don't know where he lives.

The "something" test

What a noun clause can do

Job in the sentence	That-clause	Wh- or whether-clause
Subject	That he shared the rumour surprised us. (More often: It surprised us that he shared the rumour.)	What you post today may follow you for years.
Object of a verb	Many students believe (that) a deleted message is gone.	Ask yourself who wrote it. I wonder whether it is true.
Complement after be	The truth is that someone may have copied it.	The question is how you treat people.
After an adjective	I'm sure (that) the link is fake. It is clear that he lied.	I'm not sure where the message came from.
After a preposition	not possible: use a wh-clause or the fact that	We talked about what happened. It depends on whether you trust the source.
After a noun (saying what the noun is)	the fact that …, the idea that …, the news that …	the question (of) whether …

Word order. A wh-clause is not a question, so it takes the order of a statement, with no do/does/did: Who wrote it? → Ask yourself who wrote it. Where does he live? → I don't know where he lives. This is the same rule as for reported questions in unit 5.

Dropping that. You may leave out that when the clause is the object or follows an adjective: I think (that) it's fake. You may not leave it out when the clause is the subject at the start of a sentence: That he lied surprised us, never He lied surprised us.

Worked example

Joining two sentences with a noun clause

Join: Where did this photo come from? Nobody knows.

Find the main clause: Nobody knows (something).
Make the question into a wh-clause: keep where, remove did, and put the subject before the verb: where this photo came from. The tense moves from did come to came.
Put the clause where the "something" was: Nobody knows where this photo came from.
Check the punctuation: no question mark, because the whole sentence is now a statement.

Worked example

Noun clause or relative clause?

Compare: (a) I know that he posted the photo. (b) The photo that he posted was unkind.

Try the "something" test: replace the underlined words with something. (a) I know something. ✓ (b) The photo something was unkind. ✗
Conclude: in (a) the clause is the object of know, so it is a noun clause. In (b) it describes the noun photo, so it is a relative clause.
A second test: in a relative clause you can usually replace that with which or who (the photo which he posted). In a noun clause you cannot.

Tip

Starting a sentence with a long clause? Use it as a "placeholder" subject and put the clause at the end, where English prefers long information: It is surprising that so many people share stories without reading them is easier to read than That so many people share stories without reading them is surprising.

Warning

No question word order in a wh-clause: wrong I don't know where does he live. Right: I don't know where he lives.
Don't use what as a relative pronoun after a noun: wrong the message what he sent. Right: the message that he sent, or what he sent with no noun.
Use whether, not if, after a preposition and at the start of a sentence: It depends on whether …; Whether it is true matters.
No comma between a verb and its that-clause: wrong She said, that it was fake. Right: She said that it was fake.

All About Noun Clauses, from Breaking English. Watch the sections on that-clauses and wh-clauses, and copy two examples of each into your notebook with their job in the sentence (subject, object or complement).

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Practice

Underline the noun clause in each sentence and say whether it begins with that, a wh-word or whether: (a) I can't remember where I saved the file. (b) The problem is that the battery is dead. (c) Nobody knows whether the story is true.
Say what job each noun clause does (subject, object, complement, after an adjective, after a preposition): (a) What she wrote was kind. (b) I'm afraid that the link is broken. (c) We argued about who had started the rumour. (d) The question is how we can stop it.
Join each pair with a wh-clause or whether: (a) How did he get my number? I don't know. (b) Is this website safe? Can you tell me? (c) Why did she delete her account? Nobody understands.
Rewrite each sentence with It at the start: (a) That so few people check their privacy settings is worrying. (b) That the message was fake was obvious.
Noun clause or relative clause? (a) The video that went viral was fake. (b) I didn't realise that the video was fake. (c) I believe that she is honest.
Correct the mistakes: (a) Can you tell me what time does the bus leave? (b) It depends on if you have data. (c) The thing what worries me is cyberbullying.
Write five sentences about the internet, each with a different kind of noun clause: one that-clause as object, one after an adjective, one wh-clause as subject, one after a preposition, and one with whether.

Show answersHide answers

(a) where I saved the file (wh-word); (b) that the battery is dead (that); (c) whether the story is true (whether).
(a) subject; (b) after an adjective; (c) after a preposition; (d) complement.
(a) I don't know how he got my number. (b) Can you tell me whether (if) this website is safe? (c) Nobody understands why she deleted her account.
(a) It is worrying that so few people check their privacy settings. (b) It was obvious that the message was fake.
(a) relative clause (it describes the video); (b) noun clause (object of realise); (c) noun clause (object of believe).
(a) Can you tell me what time the bus leaves? (b) It depends on whether you have data. (c) The thing that worries me is cyberbullying (or: What worries me is cyberbullying).
Open answer. Check the word order in the wh-clauses and the choice of whether after the preposition.

Sources and credits

Assembly talk (imagined speaker and school), grammar tables, worked examples and practice: written by Ganzaa.
Diagram "The something test": drawn by Ganzaa.
Video: All About Noun Clauses, Breaking English, embedded from YouTube, not copied.

Written by Ganzaa.

1Read: from a talk at a school assembly

2The "something" test

3What a noun clause can do

Read: from a talk at a school assembly

The "something" test

What a noun clause can do