Adjectives, Verbs and others

Schumi

Schumi

Hello everyone,

I'll be honest from the start and say I don't have a particularly good understanding of what makes an adjective, verb, adverb or noun. Recently, I created a book entitled 'Words' where I write down any words I see that interest me. I have quite a lot so far, and next to each one, I have made it clear as to what the word is (most of them are adjectives).

I'd be very interested to learn how others here at Talkback recognise certain words to be an adjective etc. I hope I'm not coming across as a hopeless case. Writing down the words that interest me has taught me certain differences between them, but I'd love to be able to have a greater understanding.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Jay Mandal

An awful lot of adverbs end in -ly e.g. quickly. Quite a few verbs end in -ise or -ize. Do you know about subject, verb and object? The cat (subject) ate (verb) the rat (object). Then if you describe the cat or the rat, you're using an adjective; while if you say how the cat ate, it's an adverb. Have to go now - supper's ready.

Fleur

Schumi, what I teach my students:
A verb is something you can do (very simple, but they're 12 years old)
A noun is a 'thing' and you can usually count them (house, one house, two houses, etc...)
An adjective is a word that says something about a noun. ( I then ask my pupils to describe their house and then pick out the adjectives. A beautiful house, an old house, a new house, etc.)
And an adverb is a word that says something about a verb: She sings beautifully. etc.
This might sound simple, but that's the way we explain the differences to our pupils in Holland...
It took me a long time to learn it all. Especially because you 'verbalize' so many things in the UK. It's such a rich language. Opposite to Dutch, which is just very difficult, esp. the grammar.
Hope it helps you.

Sylvia

This may help you, Schumi.
(The words I have written in upper case are in Italics in the copy I have)

The Old Fashioned Rules of Grammar.

A Noun’s the name of anything
As SCHOOL, or GARDEN, HOOP or SWING.

Adjectives describe the kind of noun
As GREAT, SMALL, PRETTY, WHITE or BROWN.

Instead of nouns the Pronouns fit –
As HE, YOU, THEY and IT.

Verbs tell of something to be done –
To READ, WRITE, COUNT, SING, JUMP or RUN.

How, when and where the Adverbs tell,
As SLOWLY, NEAR, NOW or WELL.

Conjunctions join the words together,
As men AND women, wind OR weather.

The Preposition stands before
A noun, as IN or THROUGH a door.

The Interjection shows surprise,
As OH, how pretty, AH, how wise.

Three little words you often see,
Are Articles, A, AN and THE.

The whole are called Nine Parts of Speech,
Which reading, writing, speaking teach.

Fleur

Hey Sylvia! That's great! Would you mind if I borrowed it for my students???? :) Most grateful!

Carol

That's really clear Sylvia, it explains  each item so clearly. I can do the things correctly-most of the time- but can never remember the correct term for each one.

Schumi

Thank you for all your replies. Sylvia, that was very helpful, thanks.

Sylvia

Use it by all means, Fleur. I found it in a book on grammar that I bought in a charity shop. Grammar isn’t one of my strong points and the book has come in quite useful on more than one occasion.

Schumi

I forgot to ask before, but does anyone know if there is a collective term for adjectives, verbs, nouns etc?

Betsie

They are known as parts of speech Schumi.  I think you do well to get to grips with these basic rules of English grammar - after all, parts of speech are the writer's tools.  It is worth investing in a basic book of grammar but there's also loads of info on the Internet on the subject.  Yell if we can be of further help.