How to Form an Adjective Clause

Subject Adjective Clauses

The people who came to my party had a good time.

In a subject adjective clause, the subject of the adjective clause is the same as the noun it describes.

In the above sentence, the main sentence is: The people had a good time.

We want to use this sentence to describe the "people" in the main sentence. They came to my party. Notice that the subject of this sentence is also referring to "people."

To create the adjective clause, we change the subject of the adjective clause. For subjects which are people, we can use who or that. The most commonly used one is that.

who came to my party.
that came to my party.

Then the adjective clause goes after the noun we are describing. The result is:

The people who came to my party had a good time.
The people that came to my party had a good time.

If the subject of the adjective clause is a thing, use which or that.

I need to wash the shirt which has a stain on the pocket.
I need to wash the shirt that has a stain on the pocket.

Notice that the main sentence does not change word order.

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