Direct and Indirect speech

• Saying exactly what someone has said is called direct speech also sometimes is called quoted speech.
• here what a person says appears within quotation marks ("...") and should be word for word.

For example:

She said:"Today's lesson is on presentations"
or
"Today's lesson is on presentations", she said.

• Indirect speech (sometimes is called reported speech), doesn't use quotetion marks to enclose  what the person said and  it doesn't have to be word for word.
• when the reporting speech the tense usually changes. This is because when we use reported speech, we are usually talking about a time in the past (because obviously the perosn who spoke originally spoke in past). The verbs therefore usually have to be in past too.

For example:
DIRECT SPEECH                                                                   INDIRECT SPEECH
"I'm going to the cinema", he said.                       He said he was going to the cinema.

Direct Speech / Quoted Speech

Saying exactly what someone has said is called direct speech (sometimes called quoted speech)
Here what a person says appears within quotation marks ("...") and should be word for word.
For example:
She said, "Today's lesson is on presentations."
or
"Today's lesson is on presentations", she said.
- See more at: http://www.learnenglish.de/grammar/reportedspeech.html#sthash.QWWXrC45.dpuf

NOUN CLAUSES

A sentence which contains just one clause is called a simple sentence.
A sentence which contains one independent clause and one or more dependent clauses is called a complex sentence. (Dependent clauses are also called subordinate clauses.)
There are three basic types of dependent clauses: adjective clauses, adverb clauses, and noun clauses. (Adjective clauses are also called relative clauses.)
This page contains information about noun clauses. Also see Adjective Clauses and Adverb Clauses.

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A. Noun clauses perform the same functions in sentences that nouns do:
A noun clause can be a subject of a verb:

What Billy did shocked his friends.

A noun clause can be an object of a verb:

Billy’s friends didn’t know that he couldn’t swim.

A noun clause can be a subject complement:

Billy’s mistake was that he refused to take lessons.

A noun clause can be an object of a preposition:

Mary is not responsible for what Billy did.

A noun clause (but not a noun) can be an adjective complement:

Everybody is sad that Billy drowned.