1 OPTIMISE YOUR VOCABULARY | Standard
Words connected with personality
1 Choose the correct words.
1 Rowan is a popular / negative girl with lots of
friends.
2 Don’t worry, Alan will be here – he’s very
dependable / creative.
3 The teachers here are very curious / friendly
with the students.
4 Johnny’s very unreliable / creative – he’s always
making something with his hands.
5 Remember to be dependable / polite – to say
‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to people.
6 It’s very serious / generous of you to buy me
such an expensive present.
7 My sister is really shy / curious so she never
speaks to people she doesn’t know.
8 Marianna can be a bit negative / polite so she
worries a lot about bad things happening.
Nouns with -ity / -ness
2 Make nouns from the adjectives in the box.
Then write them in the correct column.
creative | curious | dependable | friendly
generous | negative | personal | polite
popular | reliable | serious | shy
Nouns with -ity Nouns with -ness
 
 
 
 


 do something to help. I decided to go to her house.
 Looking through the living room window, I thought
3 Complete the sentences with some of the
nouns you formed in Exercise 2.
1 It was        that made me go inside the
old house.
2 When I’m choosing friends, it’s important that
they have a good       .
3 Anna’s        is a problem – she’s really
embarrassed when she speaks to people.
4 ‘I don’t think you understand the        of
the situation,’ said the boy’s teacher.
5 I don’t listen to Shaun’s        – he’s never
got anything positive to say.
6 We want to say a big ‘Thank you’ to everyone for
your        – we now have enough money
to buy computers for the school.
Optimise B1 Optimise B1 Teacher’s Resource Centre © Macmillan Publishers Limited 2017.
This sheet may be photocopied and used within the class.
B1
Collocations with adjectives
4 Write one word in each gap. The first letter
has been given.
1 ‘Are you asleep?’ ‘I was, but I’m w      
awake now.’
2 We have been friends for a l       time.
3 When I am f       asleep, I never hear my
phone.
4 Billy’s got a very d       voice – he sounds
a lot older than he is!
5 I didn’t do my homework and now I’m in
b       trouble.
6 Sonja made me feel s       when she said
I was unreliable – in front of everyone.
Unit round-up
5 Choose the best word (A, B or C) to fill
each gap.
A worrying moment
Soraya and I have been best friends for a very
(1)    time. She’s a really (2)    person, and
all the students in our class like her. The thing is,
she’s also really (3)    – if she says ‘Let’s meet
at 6,’ she’s always there. That’s just the kind of
(4)    she’s got, and that’s part of the reason for
her (5)   .
So you can imagine how worried I was when we
arranged to meet at my house and she didn’t turn
up. I was trying not to be (6)    but she wasn’t
answering her phone. I phoned some of our friends
and nobody knew where she was. We all thought she
must be in (7)    trouble, so I thought I should
I could see someone. It was Soraya, (8)    asleep
on the sofa!
1 A deep B long C big
2 A unreliable B negative C friendly
3 A dependable B creative C curious
4 A shyness B personality C curiosity
5 A negativity B creativity C popularity
6 A negative B generous C popular
7 A small B wide C big
8 A long B fast C wide
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