Posts Tagged ‘adjective’

One of the basic things that you need to know as a learner of the English language is that you should know the rules of grammar while at the same time improve your vocabulary. Vocabulary refers to the list of words that you should know in order to communicate with others in everyday life in English.

Grammar and vocabulary are therefore the twin major aspects of the language and you can learn them using traditional means or through ordinary easy methods. You need to study the rules, read books on miscellaneous topics in the language and pay attention... Read more...

Irrespective of the language that you are trying to pick up, one thing to remember while you are in the learning process is that you should be interactive. Whether it is English, Spanish or French, speaking or writing the language will make sense when you follow the rues of the language. If you follow the rules of grammar, it will make you as a writer or speaker look professional. The best way to learn English is perhaps through worksheets and grammar exercises. This is the best way to pick the language up, something that reading English books or listening to CDs does not give you.

English is an intricate language and hence, its nuances may be a tad tough to get. The matter is perhaps true if you are an English native, but are not aware of the rules of the language. However, you need to understand the little details of the grammar and learn to apply the concrete written and spoken principles to each lesson that you learn. One of the best ways through which this can be done is through the interactive approach.

Communication is the Key

Practice makes Perfect: First of all, you sho... Read more...

There are a lot of words in English grammar that people are confused with where to use. Some of them are ‘contiguous’, ‘continuous’, and ‘continual’. This is why the writer should learn all about the rules for using the words appropriately. As a professional writer you need to know the rules of grammar that should be applied in a sentence which will save you the confusion while constructing a sentence.

‘Contiguous’

First off, you should determine if there is a list of different events or things that are being dealt with and whether these things touch time and space. In that case, choose ‘contiguous’. This is a word that means ‘adjacent’, ‘conterminous’, or ‘neighboring’. The word ‘contiguous’ is generally used in the context of discussing “48 contiguous states” excluding Hawaii and Alaska as they do not border each other. Less commonly, the word is used to describe a particular list of events which are adjacent to one another on a time line. ‘Contiguous’ can be used as an adverb, adjective, or noun.

‘Continuous’

In case you ... Read more...

If you want to be a pro at English grammar, you need to have basic grammatical skills. Instead of just being important for the examinations that test the subject, grammatical skills are also relevant in the way you communicate to others. In fact, spellings are more important for written tests and evaluations. If you are into a job that requires business writing to be done, you should be specific about the cases that require using words like ‘allot’, ‘a lot’ and ‘a lot’.

For instance you are typing a paper, and you write the word ‘alot’. There is a little red line that appears, but you are clueless about whether you should choose ‘a lot’ or ‘allot’.

‘Allot’

This is a word that means ‘to divide’, ‘accord’, ‘administer’, ‘dispense’, ‘distribute’ or ‘give out’. Here’s an example of using the word in a sentence: “They allotted six square feet space per family”. You must have guessed by now that the word ‘allot’ is used to refer to divide, apportion or grant something. “The raffle tickets were allotted to the class”.

‘A... Read more...

There are lots of subtle intricacies in English grammar and one of them is the problem that people are faced with when they use ‘there’, ‘their’, and ‘they’re’ in a sentence. Although the pronunciations of the three words are the same, it becomes a tad tough to distinguish their usage according to circumstances. Remember that there are different spellings for every word.

‘There’

‘There’ is used while referring to a place, irrespective of whether it is material or immaterial. In the case of the former, it would be “over there next to the building”, and in the latter something like “it is tough to live there”. Common examples indicating the word are:

  • There is a bookshop at Camden Avenue.
  • The textbooks are lying there on the floor.
  • There are several documents required for investigation.

‘There’ is used along with the verb ‘be’ (including ‘is’, ‘are’, ‘were’, ‘was’, ‘am’ etc.) for indicating that something exists, or for mentioning something for the first time. F... Read more...

English grammar is easy and you can easily form a correct sentence if you know the basic differences on what are they, how are they used and when are they used. Truly speaking, grammatically correct sentences sound more thoughtful than incorrect sentences.

What is article?

Articles are adjectives which are generally used to describe a noun. There are mainly two types of articles in English language. One is ‘the’ the other ‘a/an’

What is ‘The’ in English grammar?

In English grammar ‘The’ is called the definitive article. It is generally used to refer to a particular noun.

What is ‘A/An’ in English grammar?

In English grammar ‘A/An’ is called the in-definite article. In order to specify a non-specific and non-particular noun we generally use the term.

Lets know about the basic difference between the use of definite article ‘The’ and indefinite article ‘A/An’. Then we can understand what we mean by definite article and indefinite article.

Example

There are certain basic differences between different words that we use as parts of the sentence. With a proper knowledge we would know the difference on how to use them. We have to follow correct grammar in order for the sentence to sound distinct and right.

‘That’ and ‘Which’ are both relative clauses. Both these two relative clauses are used to refer to things as well as persons.

What is relative clause?

Relative clause is one which is used to give some additional information about the noun that we want to describe. The noun can be a person as well as a thing. There is a subtle difference between how these two relative clauses and how they are used in the sentence to describe different things and persons.

In grammar there is a term used frequently by grammarians called ‘restrictive’ and ‘non-restrictive’.

Restrictive Clause

‘Restrictive’ clause is one which identifies the exact word which is modifying and it does not require the use of any commas.

Non-Restrictive

‘Non-restrictive’ clause on the other ... Read more...

The building blocks of constructing a correct sentence are parts of speech. Parts of speech are also used as the first step to teach students about good grammar. One has to understand the use of it and how they are put into the sentence to create a reading material in English which sounds right. It is always better to start with the basics and then move towards a complex sentence.

As a teacher you can use the following steps to let your students understand about parts of speech.

  • One must first begin by learning about the noun. Noun can be a person, a thing or even an idea. It can be names of people, places and things like dogs cats, Victoria or even London.
  • First as a teacher request your students to list noun (person name, a thing or an idea) that are coming on their mind.
  • After the list of nouns is done, instruct them to describe the nouns that are listed. Put those descriptive words in front of the sentences that are used. Let your students learn that the descriptive words are adjectives and an adjective is used to describe a noun.
  • Read more...

If you fail to assimilate good English grammar you are sure to grope in the dark when you try to write English passages or try to open your heart to some one in different moods and manners. It is vital to know English grammar quite efficiently without which you are no where. Now English grammar is a vast thing. It is very hard to assimilate it within a short life span. Still you are to learn at least the basics of it so that you can have a bit mastery over the language.

In the school a little grammar is taught. But that little learning reinforces the base of the future learning. The rules that are taught at the very initial period are all elementary rules and offer you the grip of the language in a solid way as a result of which you can easily adopt the fundamental skills of reading and writing.  If the elementary grammar is not taught in the schools you may not be able to lean the ABC of English grammar. As an obvious result you have no other way than to stumble at every step.

In the very beginning you have to learn the parts of speech that are called the foundation stones of English grammar. Elementary English start... Read more...

Always remember ‘Hyphen’ is never a ‘dash’ or the vice versa.  Actually when we go on discussing on word processing applications we have to keep in mind the symbols, hyphens, em-dashes, en-dashes. These symbols may look alike but there is acute difference between the two when we actually take into consideration the perfect usages.

Hyphens are small lines that are horizontal in shape. En-dashes are a bit longer than the hyphens and are regarded the width of ‘n’. Where as ‘m’ dashes are a slightly larger than the ‘n’ dashes and are the width of the particular letter ‘m’. These symbols are used to join the parts of the sentence. It is specific that ‘hyphen’ joins adjectives and words. It is the en- dash that connects the ranges. Finally em dash connects thoughts that are related.

When we use numerical letters we use en dash. For example we write “4 – 6 months” Again when try to use a dash in the sense of parenthetical form of punctuation we may use the dash quite frequently.

When we try to use a dash we need to br... Read more...