Verb + Adverb + phrase

[nessie]

Hi, please have a look at these:

1/ The room is cleaned regularly by the girls
2/ The room is regularly cleaned by the girls
3/ The room is cleaned by the girls regularly

=> Are all sentences above correct? Here in my country we are taught a rule that when an adverb is used to modify a verb, it can be placed either before the verb or at the end of the sentence, and that we can NEVER place the adverb right after the verb if there are still other things after it. Thus of the three sentences above, only #2 and #3 are correct. #1 is incorrect.

I just want to know whether this rule is true or not.
Many thanks
Nessie.
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[Inga]

I agree (2&3)

[tortoise]

Hi,

I think this helps:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/youmeus/learnit/learnitv202.shtml

And I read somewhere that adverbs of frequency (e.g.: always, never, seldom, usually) are put directly before the main verb. If 'be' is the main verb and there is no auxiliary verb, adverbs of frequency are put behind 'be'. If there is an auxiliary verb, however, adverbs of frequency are put before 'be'.

[nessie]

So, in a nutshell, #1 is completely wrong, even in spoken English?

[Yankee]

Hi Nessie

There is nothing wrong with sentence 1. This sort of sentence structure is grammatically correct and in use in both spoken and written English. Doing a BNC search for "regularly by" will provide you with plenty of examples of the word 'regularly' used directly after the verb (i.e. before the agent) in a passive sentence:
http://sara.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/saraWeb?qy=regularly+by

The "rule" you've been given doesn't work in the passive sentence (i.e. "by the girls" doesn't count). However, your rule would work in the active sentence:

- The girls clean the room regularly. ==> OK
- The girls regularly clean the room. ==> OK
- *The girls clean regularly the room. ==> No!
.
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Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English