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English Adjectives
Simply put adjectives are descriptive words. Adjectives are used to describe or give information about
things, ideas and people: nouns or pronouns.
For Example:-
The grey dog barked. (The adjective grey describes the noun "dog".)
The most common question an adjective might answer is "What kind of ...?"
The good news is that in English the form of an adjective does not change, once you have learnt it that's it
and it does not matter if the noun being described is male or female, singular or plural, subject or object.
Yay!
Some adjectives give us factual information about the noun - age, size colour etc (fact adjectives - can't
be argued with).
Some adjectives show what somebody thinks about something or somebody - nice, horrid, beautiful etc
(opinion adjectives - not everyone may agree).
If you are asked questions with which, whose, what kind, or how many, you need an adjective to be able
to answer.
There are different types of adjectives in the English language:
Numeric: six, one hundred and one etc.
Quantitative: more, all, some, half, more than enough etc.
Qualitative: colour, size, smell etc.
Possessive: my, his, their, your etc.
Interrogative: which, whose, what etc.
Demonstrative: this, that, those, these etc.
!Note - The articles a, an, and the are a special kind of adjective called articles, and the possessives my,
our, your, and their are sometimes known as possessive adjectives.
Colour
Adjectives can be used to describe colour.
good, pretty, right, wrong, funny, light, happy, sad, full, soft, hard etc.
For Example:
He was a silly boy. / She was a silly girl.
Size
Adjectives can be used to describe size.
For Example:
"He was an old man." or "She was an old woman."
Shape
Adjectives can be used to describe shape.
For Example:-
"It was a German flag." or "They were German flags."
Material
Adjectives can be used to identify the material something is made of.
Temperature
Adjectives can be used to describe temperature.
Purpose
Adjectives can be used to describe purpose. (These adjectives often end with "-ing".)
For Example:
"She gave them a sleeping bag." or "She gave them sleeping bags."
!Note - Have you noticed how the adjective stays the same, whether it is describing a masculine,
feminine, singular or plural noun? Nice huh?
When using more than one adjective to modify a noun, the adjectives may be separated by a conjunction
(and) or by commas (,).
For Example:
"Her hair was long and blonde." or "She had long, blonde hair."
More examples:
Adjective Pretty Serious Fast Quiet
For Example: She is a pretty girl. He was a serious boy. It could be a fast car. They were quiet children.
!Note - Adjectives that go immediately before the noun are called attributive adjectives.
Adjectives can also be used after some verbs. They do not describe the verb, adverbs do that.
Adjectives after a verb describe the subject of the verb (usually a noun or pronoun).
For Example:
"Lynne looks tired."
The subject (in this case Lynne) is being described as tired not the verb to look.
There is also the adjective used to, which is such a beast that it gets its own section - Used To.
English Adjectives
Adjective Order
Overview | Order | Comparative | Possessive | Superlative
Adjectives can be used to describe lots of things, from physical size, age, shape, colour, material, to more
abstract things like opinion, origin and purpose.
We can use adjectives together to give a detailed description of something.
Adjectives that express opinions usually come before all others, but it can sometimes depend on what
exactly you want to emphasise.
For example:
You might swap adjectives that express an opinion and an adjective based on fact depending on what you
wish to emphasise:-
For example:
"She had a long, ugly nose." emphasising the length of her nose.
"He was a silly, little man." emphasising that the man was silly.
This is just for fun as you wouldn't normally see so many adjectives in one description.
For example:
"She had a big, ugly, old, baggy, blue, stripey, cotton, British, knitting bag."
Does it matter if you get it wrong? Well outside of exams and tests, it won't kill you, but people reading
or listening to you will find it odd if you mix up the order.
Learn English Grammar
English Adjectives
Comparative form of Adjectives
Overview | Order | Comparative | Possessive | Superlative
When we compare things, people or even ideas we look at what makes them different from each other.
Comparative adjectives are used to show what quality one thing has more or less than the other. They
normally come before any other adjectives.
!Tip - It's a good idea to learn opposites (antonyms) when learning adjectives.
For example:
Tall / Short
The man on the left is taller than the man on the right.
The man on the right is shorter than the man on the left.
!Note - Have you noticed that when we are comparing two things like this we put than between the
adjective and the thing being compared.
Fast / Slow
Words of one syllable, with one vowel and one Double the consonant and
big - bigger
consonant at the end. add -er to the end of the
word.
For example:-
!Warning - For every rule, there is at least one exception and there are also irregular adjectives that you
need to memorise as you come across them.
For example:-
'good' becomes 'better'
'bad' becomes 'worse'
'far' becomes 'farther' or 'further'
!Warning - A lot of people write "then" instead of "than"- avoid it as it's simply not correct, and let's face
it, you would be marked down in a test or exam.
For example:
Words of two
This doll is
er syllables ending Change y to i, and add er to the end of the word.
prettier.
with y
Words of two He is more
more syllables not ending charming than his Insert more before the adjective
with y friend.
Three syllable This is a more
more Insert more before the adjective
words or longer powerful cable.
When comparing two things, the word than is positioned between the adjective and the thing being
compared. For example:
Superlatives
The superlative is used to say what thing or person has the most of a particular quality within a group or
of its kind. The superlative can be formed in two ways:
For example:
Here are the rules for choosing and forming the right form:
Positive form
The positive form is used in cases where there are no differences between the two compared things or
persons. To form the positive, we use the word as before and after the absolute form of the adjective. For
example:
This can also be applied in a negative context to indicate that the compared objects are not similar:
A. Id like to have more participation from each of you this time around.
B. If youd have listened better, you wouldnt be confused right now.
C. They live in the brick house on the corner.
Answer:C
A.
1. Thats the best ice cream Ive ever tasted!
2. Youre a lot nicer than your sister.
3. This is delicious cake.
B.
1. This presentation seems longer than usual.
2. Of all the hairstyles in the room, hers is most stylish.
3. Im often trying to do better than others.
C.
1. Lake Silfra has some of the clearest water on the world.
2. This shop carries nicer things than it used to.
3. My cat has three adorable kittens.
D.
1. Be careful; thats a fragile vase.
2. Youre more cheerful than you used to be.
3. This is the most exciting thing that has ever happened to me.
A.
1. Your face is red.
2. You have the reddest face!
3. If you dont wear sunscreen, your face will get redder.
B.
1. This is the best book Ive ever read.
2. I like this book better than the last one I read.
3. Thats a good book.
C.
1. Most chocolate is sweet.
2. Milk chocolate is sweeter than dark chocolate.
3. Im not sure which chocolate is sweetest.
D.
1. This is a charming house.
2. Our new home is so much more charming than our old one.
3. Shes the most charming person Ive ever met.
Answer: B
9. Which of the following sentences contains a comparing adjective in the comparative form?
Answer: C worse
10. Which of the following sentences contains a comparing adjective in the superlative form?