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• A clause isa group of related subject and verb.
• So at minimum clause needs to have subject and verb.
• And both need to be related to each other.

• Whereas phrase is not necessary to have a subject and verb relationship.

• There are independent and dependent clauses.
• Independent clause can stand on its own.
• Whereas dependent clause need to have another clause.

• There is subordinate clause.
• This kind of clause need to have a subordinating conjunction.
• This kind of clause depend on other clause for its meaning.

• Multiple clauses can be separated into single sentences if there is an independent clause.
• The trigger here is when there is subjugating conjunction.
• For example in this sentence, "Because, she is older than her brother, she tells him what to do.".
• The subjugating conjunction is "because". With this the sentence then can be separated into smaller sentences based on the independent clause the first sentence has.

• Clause is also classified as restrictive and non - restrictive.

• The word essential and non - essential are also used to label restrictive and non - restrictive clause.
• I personally, found that essential and non - essential are better fit than restrictive and non - restrictive.

• There is also defining clause and non - defining clause as well which are the same words to label restrictive and non - restrictive clauses.
• As well as to essential and non - essential clause.

• Non - essential clause can be removed from a sentence it belongs to without changing its meaning.

• In this example "who used to be a secretary for the President" is an example of non - restrictive clause.
• In the example of, "Professor Villa, who used to be a secretary for the President, can type 132 words a minute." can be separated into two separate sentence based on each clauses into these sentences.
  • Professor Villa used to be a secretary for the President.
  • Professor Villa can type 132 words a minute.

• There are some differences between the usage of word "that" and "which".

• There is this relative clause which are dependent by a relative pronoun.

• Some examples of relative pronouns are: that, which, whichever, who, whoever, whom, ....

• Some relative clauses will refer to more than single words in the next text.

• The sentence above is an example of relative clause that refers to more than one words.
• I think, then, relative clause can be referred back to either clause or phrase or just a word.

• There is also a sentential clause that modifies the main clauses.
• In above example, "in which case" is what starts the sentential clause.

• All in all it is important to combine similar sentence into a larger sentence if those holds nearly the same idea or related to each others.

• Clauses can be combines in three different ways.
  • Coordination.
  • Subordination.
  • Semi colon.

• Coordination involves joining independent clauses with one to each others.

• Example of coordinating words are there.
  • And.
  • But.
  • For.
  • Nor.
  • Or.
  • Sometimes.
  • Yet.

• Need to mention for the best practices is that good sentence contain clauses those are nicely balanced in length.

• The next method to combine clause is using subordination.
• This means that there are some clauses that lower than other clause.
• For example these lower clauses are explaining or giving more content to the main clause.

• The lower clause I mentioned in the previous point and then referred as relative clause.
• Relative clause usually starts with relative pronoun.

• Some of example sentences on subordination.

• Semicolons should be used sparingly.

• And as a rule of thumb independent clauses involved need to be closely related and nicely balanced.

• Above screenshot is some example of sentences showing the usage of semicolons.

• Dependent clause cannot separated with its main sentence.
• Its context relies on another clause.

• There are three forms of independent clause.
  • Adverb clause.
  • Adjective clause.
  • Then noun clause.

• Some forms of independent clauses.

• There is this elliptical clause that is not grammatically complete but it is eloquent and simpler to understand.
• The elliptical clause usually known by the reducing some unnecessary words in order to make the sentence clear.

• Some example sentences on elliptical clauses.
• Here is the link to this article, http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/clauses.htm.
• Here is the screenshot of the article.