KNOW your PARTS of SPEECH

Details: Category: KNOW Your PARTS of SPEECH; Published on Saturday, 01 January 2011 00:00; Written by erly; Hits: 182

KNOW your PARTS of SPEECH

Parts of Speech are the basic types of words used in the English language.
Most grammar books say that there are eight parts of speech:
nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, conjunctions, prepositions and interjections.
We will add one more type: article

It is important to be able to recognize and identify the different types of words in English, so that you can understand grammar explanations and use the right word form in the right place. Here are brief explanations of what the Parts of Speech are:

Noun	A noun is a naming word. It names a person, place, thing, idea, living creature, quality, or action. Examples: cowboy, theatre, box, thought, tree, kindness, arrival
Verb	A verb is a word which describes an action (doing something) or a state (being something). Examples: walk, talk, think, believe, live, like, want
Adjective	An adjective is a word that describes a noun. It tells you something about the noun. Examples: big, yellow, thin, amazing, beautiful, quick, important
Adverb	An adverb is a word which usually describes a verb. It tells you how something is done. It may also tell you when or where something happened. Examples: slowly, intelligently, well, yesterday, tomorrow, here, everywhere
Pronoun	A pronoun is used instead of a noun, to avoid repeating the noun. Examples: I, you, he, she, it, we, they
Conjunction	A conjunction joins two words, phrases or sentences together. Examples: but, so, and, because, or
Preposition	A preposition usually comes before a noun, pronoun or noun phrase. It joins the noun to some other part of the sentence. Examples: on, in, by, with, under, through, at
Interjection	An interjection is an unusual kind of word, because it often stands alone. Interjections are words which express emotion or surprise, and they are usually followed by exclamation marks. Examples: Ouch!, Hello!, Hurray!, Oh no!, Ha!
Article	An article is used to introduce a noun. Examples: the, a, an

Adjectives & Adverbs

Positive, Comparative & Superlative

The Comparative & Superlative forms of adjectives and adverbs indicate an increase in quality, quantity or degree of animate or inanimate, tangible or non-tangible items human or not.

How these forms are created depends on how many syllables there are in the adjective.

Syllables are like “sound beats”.

For instance, “ring” contains one syllable, but “ringing” contains two — ring and ing.

The FIVE RULES for adjectives and adverbs are as follows:

RULE ONE

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
One syllable, ending in E.	Add r	Add st
brave	braver	bravest
cute	cuter	cutest
fine	finer	finest
large	larger	largest
late	later	latest
rare	rarer	rarest
simple	simpler	simplest
tame	tamer	tamest
wide	wider	wdest

RULE TWO

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
One syllable, with one vowel and one consonant at the end	Double the consonant, and add er	Double the consonant, and add est
big	bigger	biggest
fat	fatter	fattest
hot	hotter	hottest
red	redder	reddest
sad	sadder	saddest

RULE THREE

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
One syllable, with more than one vowel or more than one consonant at the end.	Add er	Add est
bright	brighter	brightest
cheap	cheaper	cheapest
clean	cleaner	cleanest
close	closer	closest
dark	darker	darkest
deep	deeper	deepest
dull	duller	dullest
fast	faster	fastest
hard	harder	hardest
high	higher	highest
light	lighter	lightest
long	longer	longest
loud	louder	loudest
near	nearer	nearest
neat	neater	neatest
neat	neater	neatest
old	older	oldest
quick	quicker	quickest
sick	sicker	sickest
small	smaller	smallest
soon	sooner	soonest
tall	taller	tallest
yellow	yellower	yellowest
young	younger	youngest

RULE FOUR

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
Two syllables, ending in Y.	Change y to i, then add er	Change y to i, then add est
dirty	dirtier	dirtiest
easy	easier	easiest
empty	emptier	emptiest
happy	happier	happiest
jolly	jollier	jolliest
lazy	lazier	laziest
lonely	lonlier	lonliest
lousy	lousier	louiest
pretty	prettier	prettiest
sassy	sassier	sassiest
silly	sillier	silliest
tiny	tinier	tiniest
ugly	uglier	ugliest

RULE FIVE

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
Two syllables or more, not ending in Y	Use “more” or “less”* before the word*	Use “most” or “least”* before the word*
afraid
beautiful
calculating
careful
cautiously
clever
courageous
cunning
difficult
effectively
frequent
frequently
graceful
gradual
important
interesting
kindly
modern
often
rapidly
reasonable
recent
recently
successful
supportive

EXCEPTIONS to these RULES are as follows:

POSITIVE	COMPARATIVE	SUPERLATIVE
bad / ill	worse	worst
far (place)	farther	farthest
far (place/time)	further	furthest
good	better	best
huge	more huge	most huge
late (order)	latter	last
little	less	least
much / many	more	most
near (order)	-	next
new	newer	newest
old (people)	elder	eldest

RaysENGLISH101.com -------------ENGLISH Language Basics & Examples

Nav view search

Navigation

Search

RaysENGLISH101.com