What is the difference between the subject and the direct object in a sentence?

Answer 1

The subject of a sentence is the person or thing acting in the sentence, while the direct object receives the action.

Finding the subject - I always tell students to find the verb in the sentence first and then find the subject by asking who or what before the verb. For example, in the sentence ,"The author wrote the book," the verb is "wrote." When students ask the question, "Who or what wrote," the answer is "author." "Author" is the subject of the sentence. "Author" is the word acting in the sentence.

Finding the direct object - Now, in order to find the direct object, students must ask the question whom or what after the verb. For example, in the sentence, "The author wrote the book," students ask this question: "The author wrote whom or what ?" The answer, then, is "book." Therefore, the direct object is "book." "Book" is receiving the action.

The author wrote the book. Action word or verb - wrote; subject - author; direct object - book

Answer 2

Let's use the following sentence as an example.

John's teacher gave the class a loner assignment that is due on Monday.

The subject in a sentence is that person or entity that performs the action in a sentence. The verb clause is the action performed in a sentence. The object clause is who or what the action was done to. "Bob hit the ball." Bob performed an action; therefore Bob is the subject of the sentence. Bob did what? He HIT the ball. The word "hit" is the verb. Bob hit what? the answer is "the ball". An object must be a noun or a pronoun, so "ball" is the object. The word "the" is a modifier, in this case an adjective.

IN the sentence that begins this answer, the person or entity that performed an action is "teacher", so that is the subject. The word "John's" is a modifier. The action perform was "gave", the verb in the sentence. That is the action in this sentence. What is the object of the answer? What did John's teacher give"? The answer is "a long assignment". The first two words are modifiers. The word "assignment" is the OBJECT of the action.

Remember that a subject in a sentence is not always the first word or so in a sentence. When a sentence is written with a dependent clause at the beginning (clause is not a complete sentence) or if the sentence is written in a passive voice, the subject will be somewhere within the body of the sentence.