Question 79

After discovering that the football was flat, Andy decided to play tennis.

A complex sentence contains an independent clause and at least one dependent clause. The sentence "After discovering that the football was flat, Andy decided to play tennis" exemplifies this structure as it includes the dependent clause "After discovering that the football was flat" and the independent clause "Andy decided to play tennis."

A) The hawk swooped down to catch its prey.

This sentence is a simple sentence as it contains only one independent clause with no dependent clauses. It conveys a complete thought without any additional information that would create complexity.

B) Everyone agreed that the wedding was beautiful.

This is a complex sentence; however, it contains a main clause "Everyone agreed" and a noun clause "that the wedding was beautiful" serving as the object. While it does qualify as complex, it does not showcase the same structural characteristics of a dependent clause as in the correct answer.

C) Samantha came to the party, but she didn't stay long.

This sentence is a compound sentence, consisting of two independent clauses joined by the conjunction "but." It does not have any dependent clauses which are necessary for it to be classified as a complex sentence.

D) After discovering that the football was flat, Andy decided to play tennis.

This sentence is a complex sentence because it includes a dependent clause "After discovering that the football was flat" and an independent clause "Andy decided to play tennis." The presence of the dependent clause is what makes it complex.

Conclusion

The correct answer, option D, is definitively a complex sentence because it includes both an independent clause and a dependent clause. Options A and C are simple and compound sentences respectively, while option B, despite being complex, does not demonstrate the same structure as the correct answer. Thus, all other options fail to meet the criteria established by the definition of a complex sentence.