Syntax is the study of how words fit together to form sentences. This section has four lessons and a practice set, and belongs to the wider SPM Bahasa Melayu guide.
What does this section cover?
Begin by identifying sentence patterns, which gives you the four basic structures. Then learn to transform active and passive sentences and to combine simple sentences without changing meaning.
The last lesson teaches you to analyse sentence components in context. The syntax practice set mixes all four skills.
One sentence, three forms
Here is an original sentence: “Pengawas mengutip sampah di padang.”
As a pattern, it is subjek (pengawas), predikat (mengutip sampah di padang), so it has a noun phrase followed by a verb phrase. Changed to passive, it becomes “Sampah dikutip oleh pengawas di padang.” The same facts, now led by the object.
Combined with another sentence, it becomes “Pengawas mengutip sampah di padang dan guru memeriksa tong kitar semula.” Two simple sentences have joined into one compound sentence with the word “dan”.
Who should start where?
If you mix up the parts of a sentence, start with sentence patterns. If passive sentences lose the verb prefix, go straight to active and passive.
If your long sentences read as runs of short ones, begin with combining. If you can do each step separately but fail when a question gives a whole paragraph, use the analysis lesson.
To practise on screen, try the BM grammar contrast practice tool. For a teacher to explain each pattern on your own errors, see online one-to-one Bahasa Melayu tuition.