TEACHER’S NOTES

ESL / EFL RESOURCES Opposites

Activity Type Introduction

Reading, writing, This enjoyable worksheet activity helps to increase students'
listening and speaking knowledge of adjectives and their opposites.
activity, group and pair
work Procedure
Start the activity by reading out each adjective on the worksheet
Language Focus and eliciting examples of the adjective's meaning and possible
synonyms.
Adjectives and their
opposites
Next, divide the class into teams of four.

Give each student a copy of the worksheet.

Aim
To practice adjectives and Tell the teams that you are going to read an adjective at random
their opposites. from the worksheet and the first team to call out the opposite of
the adjective scores a point.

Preparation The winning team can then score an extra point by making an
appropriate sentence with the adjective opposite.
Make one copy of the
worksheet for each
Afterwards, all the students in the class write down the adjective
student
opposite on their worksheet.

Level This continues until the worksheet is complete.

Elementary The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.

Working alone, the students then write ten sentences, using two
Time adjectives from the worksheet in each sentence, e.g. 'The pretty
50 minutes girl drove a black sports car'.

When the students have finished writing, divide them into pairs
and have the students exchange sentences.

The students read their partner's sentences, changing the

adjectives in the sentences to their opposites, e.g. 'The ugly girl
drove a white sports car'.

Finally, ask the pairs to create a short story using ten adjectives
from the worksheet. Have the pairs read their stories to the class
and give feedback.

"Answer key on the next page"

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 TEACHER’S NOTES

ESL / EFL RESOURCES Opposites

Activity Type Answer key

Reading, writing,
listening and speaking
activity, group and pair
work
rich - poor long - short
high - low north - south
cloudy - sunny/clear lazy - hardworking

Language Focus male - female first - last

Adjectives and their
opposites modern - traditional nice - nasty

fat - thin intelligent - stupid

Aim
interesting - boring sick - healthy
To practice adjectives and
their opposites. early - late curly - straight

full - empty off - on

Preparation
Make one copy of the cold - hot wide - narrow
worksheet for each
student clean - dirty far - near

wet - dry happy - sad/unhappy

Level
good - bad easy - difficult
Elementary
front - back fast - slow
Time pretty - plain/ugly east - west
50 minutes
married - single round - square

black - white big - little/small

sweet - sour/bitter alive - dead

beautiful - ugly cheap - expensive

left - right old - new/young

light - heavy polite - rude/impolite

quiet - noisy safe - dangerous

soft - hard true - false

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PDF tool in Acrobat.

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 ADJECTIVES

ESL / EFL RESOURCES Opposites

rich ___________________ long ____________________

high ___________________ north ____________________

cloudy ___________________ lazy ____________________

male ___________________ first ____________________

modern ___________________ nice ____________________

fat ___________________ intelligent ____________________

interesting ___________________ sick ____________________

early ___________________ curly ____________________

full ___________________ off ____________________

cold ___________________ wide ____________________

clean ___________________ far ____________________

wet ___________________ happy ____________________

good ___________________ easy ____________________

front ___________________ fast ____________________

pretty ___________________ east ____________________

married ___________________ round ____________________

black ___________________ big ____________________

sweet ___________________ alive ____________________

beautiful ___________________ cheap ____________________

left ___________________ old ____________________

light ___________________ polite ____________________

quiet ___________________ safe ____________________

soft ___________________ true ____________________

Teach-This.com © 2017 Permission granted to reproduce for classroom use.