How English Grammar Works
Build an intuitive feel for how English sentences click together without memorizing dry charts. Learn to anchor your ideas with rock-solid subjects and verbs, avoid everyday grammar traps, and punctuate with precision.
Like Duolingo, but for How English Grammar Works. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
A short one: 11 levels across 2 sections, about 22 minutes end to end, roughly 4 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Making Sentences Work and Precision and Clarity. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in How English Grammar Works
- A complete sentence needs at least an actor (subject) and what that actor does (verb)
- Descriptive phrases and '-ing' words on their own do not make a complete statement
- A complete sentence must form a stand-alone thought that sounds finished
- Words like 'although', 'because', and 'after' turn a thought into an incomplete lead-in that needs another clause
- A group of words missing an active verb is a fragment, even if it describes an action in progress
- A complete sentence can stand alone without feeling like the second half of a thought is missing
- A comma alone is not strong enough to glue two full sentences together
- Two complete sentences can be separated cleanly by a period
- A coordinating word (like 'and' or 'but') paired with a comma or a semicolon alone can properly connect two complete thoughts
- The verb must match the core actor (the subject), not the descriptive words tucked in between
- 'The basket' is singular, so it takes a singular verb ('sits')
- Words describing what is inside the basket ('of fresh red apples') do not change the number of the main subject
- The present continuous (am/is/are + verb-ing) describes actions in progress right at the moment of speaking
- The simple present describes regular habits, routines, or general facts rather than immediate actions
- Irregular verbs do not take '-ed' in the past tense
- Many irregular verbs change internal vowels (like run to ran, sing to sang) or transform completely (like go to went)
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives How English Grammar Works the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
Why doesn't 'Running across the damp grass' work as a full sentence?
Get it right to open this lesson and 10 more in the app.
Where How English Grammar Works takes you
- 1
Making Sentences Work
- The Sentence Engine: Subjects and Actions
- Pinning Down Time: The Core Tenses
- 2
Precision and Clarity
- Pointing Clearly: Pronouns and Descriptions
- Punctuation as Structural Traffic Control
2 sections · 4 units · 11 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
How English Grammar Works is taught in the Bestie style: your friend who just gets it. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start How English Grammar Works today.
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