Time: 45-50 mins
Focus: adjectives of appearance
Objectives:
Describing people’s hair, height, body type, age, face and
accessories
Activity 1: Valentine’s Day poem
Look at the following poem, a traditional love poem linked to Valentine’s
Day (February 14th).
The colored words are adjectives.
Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Sugar is sweet,
And so are you.
Read the lyrics to the first stanza of the American anthem. All the
colored words are adjectives.
Oh, say can you see by the dawn’s early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Watch the following video, called ‘Grammar Rock Adjectives’:
Activity 2: What Are Adjectives?
What are adjectives?
Adjectives are words that describe or modify a
person/thing/place/concept (i.e. a noun or a noun phrase)
in a sentence. Adjectives are placed before the noun or noun phrase
that they modify. If two adjectives
describe a noun, use and to link the adjectives. If there are more
than two adjectives, use commas at first,
then use and before the last adjective (it is rare to have more
than three adjectives in a row):
Examples: He owns a yellow car.
Black and
white televisions are very rare.
The
company seeks intelligent, motivated, and energetic people.
Adjectives are also used on their own, or with fixed expressions
such as how _______ or it/this/that is
________:
Examples: Excellent! This is great!
You work
in advertising? How interesting!
When indefinite pronouns (i.e. something, someone, anybody) are modified
by an adjective, the
adjective comes after the pronoun:
Examples: We watched something fascinating on the news tonight.
In
Washington DC you always see something new.
When an adjective owes its origins to a proper noun, it is capitalized:
Examples: French fries, the English Parliament, the Smithsonian
institute, a Victorian house, etc.
How do I find or make adjectives?
Adjectives are very often associated with nouns, and describe
various attributes of the noun:
- size: a small company, a
big house
- shape: a round table, the
Oval Office
- age: a young man, an old
establishment
- color: blue skies, a red
carpet
- origin: an American car,
the Spanish football team
- material: a wooden house, a marble building
- etc.
You can easily create adjectives with many verbs (not all!) if you
add the –ed or –ing endings to the
verb. However, be careful to make a distinction between the two!
Generally, the -ed ending means that
the noun described is the receiver of the action implied by the
original verb. The -ing ending means that
the noun described is the actor:
Examples: The news is
dramatic. I am shocked. (the news shocks you)
BUT I hate shocking
documentaries. (the documentaries shock you)
You can easily create adjectives with many verbs (not all!) if you
add the –ed or –ing endings to the verb
However, be careful to make a distinction between the two!
Generally, the -ed ending means that the noun
described is the receiver of the action implied by the original
verb. The -ing ending means that the noun
described is the actor:
Examples: The news is
dramatic. I am shocked. (the news shocks you)
BUT I hate shocking
documentaries. (the documentaries shock you)
Common adjectives and their opposites:
Good / bad
Clever - intelligent / stupid
Wise / foolish
Smart / stupid
Beautiful / ugly
Big / small - little
Long / short
Thick - fat / thin
Young / old
Rich / poor
Hot / cold
Clean / dirty
Funny / sad
Happy / unhappy
Patient / impatient
Exciting / boring
Perfect / imperfect
Interesting / dull
Polite / rude
Lively / calm – reserved
Easy / hard – tough
Alone / together
Far / close
Hopeful / desperate
Activity 3: Exercise
Activity 4: Role-play
Role-play:
Act out the following scenarios, using adjectives to describe the
situation.
1. You left your bag at the
gym. Describe what it looks like to the gym manager…
I have a green bag. It
is small and __________. It is as big as a _____________. It is a
leather/canvas/
plastic/nylon bag.
2. You just returned from
visiting Washington D.C. Tell your family / friends about your discoveries. The
Washington Monument is tall! The stones are different colors, and the Mall is
immense!
3. Pick a celebrity and
describe him/her to a classmate. When your classmate correctly guesses the name
of your celebrity, reverse the roles.
He is a political
figure. He is very well-known, he is old, he lives in South Africa… Nelson
Mandela!
Family portrait: Describe what someone in your family looks like to
an artist.
Activity 5: Listen to Song
Listen to the song and find the adjectives!
Well, she was an ______________ girl,
Raised on promises
She couldn’t help thinking that
there was a little more to life
Somewhere else
After all it was a great _______ world
With lots of places to run to
And if she had to die
Tryin’, she
Had one ___________ promise she was gonna keep
Oh yeah, alright,
Take it ____________, baby
Make it last all night
She was an American girl.
Well, it was kind of __________ that night,
She stood __________ on the balcony
Yeah, she could hear the cars roll by,
Out on four forty one like
Waves crashing on the beach,
And for one desperate moment there
He crept back in her memory
God, it’s so painful when something that’s so close
Is still so __________ out of reach
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