There are 3 members in my family: my dad, my mom and I/me
NOT A TEACHER
Hello, Ngoc lan:
May I add my
non-teacher's two bits to the excellent answers that you have already received?
I understand how you feel: you want rules to guide you and you have to
pass examinations based on "book grammar."
In my opinion (if I understand my grammar books), the "correct" sentence is:
"There are 3 members in my family: my dad, my mom, and
I."
*****
Let me try to explain my reasoning:
1. In analyzing a "there" sentence, we usually ignore the "there."
2. We are left with "are 3 members in my family: my dad, my mom, and I."
3. For easier analysis, we are taught to eliminate any unnecessary words. So let's delete (drop) "in my family."
4. Now we have: "are 3 members: my dad, my mom, and I."
5. As you know, that is not a "good" sentence, so let's put it in "regular order":
6. Three members: my dad, my mom, and I are. ("Are" means something like "exist" or " live" in your sentence.)
7. We could write it this way:
Three members (my dad, my mom, and I) are.
8. As you know "three members" is the
subject of the sentence. Thus, the subjective case.
9. "My dad, my mom, and I" are appositives (that is, they refer back to "three members."). Thus, they must
also
be in the subjective case. ("I" = subjective case; "me" = objective case.)
10. Study this sentence:
Mona loves three members (of my family): Tony, Sue, and
me.
a. In that sentence, "three members" is the
object of the verb "loves." Thus, "Tony, Sue, and me" are in the objective case in order to match the objective case of "three members."
*****
11. I know that this is
really (=very) difficult. If you have any questions, please do ask. Someone will be delighted to assist you.
Sincerely yours and best of luck to you on your examinations,
James