English Grammar and Composition chapter 5: More about Adjectives

Unit Five

More about Adjectives

Lesson 1: Introducing Adjectives

A. Read the words in italics in the following captions:

(figure: A good cricketer has to be physically fit.)

Description: Two cricketers in team uniforms; one in the foreground runs with his arms bent, the other jumps in the air with a raised fist.

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(figure: Our female cricketers brought some happy moments for the country.)

(figure: The formation of human national flag was a fine expression of our patriotic zeal.)

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(figure: A stream in the hilly region is worth visiting)

Description: A stream flows between layered rock banks, with a waterfall at the centre-right and dense forest on both sides.

What are the words in italics for?

What are the functions of these words?

The words ‘good’, ‘happy’, ‘fine’ and ‘hilly’ modify the nouns after them.

These words are to provide some information about nouns i.e. they state the quality of nouns.

When someone wants to present information about something, one can do it by using a Noun alone; but, one can use an Adjective to modify or describe it in more detail. Therefore, adjectives give additional information about a Noun or Pronoun.

Note: The form of an Adjective does not change with singular and plural.

B. Identify adjectives in the following passage:

Muntaha is Bani’s best friend. Bani is a brilliant student. She borrowed three books from Muntaha. All the books are new. The books are interesting as well.

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Do all the above adjectives take the same position in the sentences?

In some sentences, the adjective is used before a noun. But in other sentences, the adjective comes after the verb. The adjectives that come before a noun are called attributive adjectives and those coming after a verb are called predicative adjectives.

C. Use the following adjectives in different positions. One is done for you:

safe, interesting, new, old, unsafe, excellent, huge, quite, cold, yellow, nice, hot, enormous, furious, gorgeous, crazy, tiny

Safe: We had a safe journey. (before a noun)

Our journey was safe. (after a verb)

I found him safe. (after an object)

D. Match the following adjectives with the nouns they go with:

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Lesson 2: Comparison of Adjectives

A. Read the captions and mark the adjectives in different forms:

Figure: The lion is faster than the elephant.

Description: A lion standing and facing forward, with a full mane, shown in outline.

Figure: The elephant is the heaviest land animal.

Description: An elephant in outline, raising its trunk, with tusks visible.

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B. Look at the adjectives in the following sentences:

Mahin is a tall boy. Safin is taller than Mahin. Raiyan is the tallest of the three. Mahin bought a big basket. Safin bought a basket bigger than that of Mahin. Raiyan bought the biggest basket of the shop.

There are three forms of Adjectives:

tall (positive) ---- taller (comparative) --- tallest (superlative)

big (positive) ---- bigger (comparative) --- biggest (superlative)

Note:

• The positive degree of an adjective is in its base form. The positive degree is used when no comparison is made.
• The comparative form is used when a comparison is made between two persons or things.
• The superlative degree is used to show the highest degree of quality when more than two things or two sets of things are compared.

C. Comparative and Superlative forms

i) Most positive adjectives of one syllable take ‘er’ and ‘est’ to form comparative and superlative degrees respectively.

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ii) Adjectives ending in ‘e’, add ‘r’ and ‘st’ to form comparative and superlative degrees respectively.

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iii) All adjectives of two syllables ending in ‘le,’ ‘y,’ ‘er,’ and ‘ow’ generally take ‘er’ and ‘est’ to form their comparative and superlative forms respectively.

iv) Some positive adjectives take comparative and superlative forms without following the regular norms.

v) Adjectives of more than two syllables and many of those with two form their comparative and superlative degrees by putting ‘more’ and ‘most’ before the positive respectively.

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C. Complete the sentences using the words in the box:

It was their first ----- holiday and Jamie was so excited.

"I can't wait to go skiing," he said, "and all that sun and snow will be wonderful!"

The plane landed at a ----- airport and very soon Jamie and Jasmine and their parents were in a small ----- hotel at the bottom of a mountain. They went outside and looked around. They saw--- mountains all around them.

"Tomorrow I want to go up a mountain," said Jamie.

They went back to the hotel. There was a ------ fireplace and it was warm. In front of the fire they saw a big ------ dog. It was asleep and snoring happily.

Jasmine liked dogs. She patted the dog on the head. It opened one eye and yawned. Jasmine saw the dog's name on his collar – Bruno. The dog looked at Jasmine and smiled. Then it closed its' eyes, crossed its' paws and went back to sleep.

"What a ------ dog," said Jasmine. "He's a big ------ softie."

They left the ----- firelight and went upstairs to bed. In no time at all Jamie was dreaming of speeding up and down mountains as a champion skier.

D. Fill in the blanks with appropriate adjectives:

Sirajum Munira is a ------ girl. Bondhon is her cousin. Both of them read in the same school. Bondhon is -------- than Munira.Bondhon has a very -----brother, named Tanbin. He is so cute. To Munira's aunt, he is ------- -------- -------- baby in the world. Munira loves Tanbin so much. She is Tanbin's --------- sister. She plays with him. She is ------- than Tanbin.Bondhon is -------- about Tanbin, so is Munira about him. When Tanbin cries, Bondhon calls his mother and Munira gives him ------ toys. Tanbin loves ----- toys. Tanbin's father presents him with ----- toys too.