WRITING WORKSHOP 3

OTHER PARTS OF SPEECH

In this chapter we are going to continue revising other important parts of speech in the English language.
En este capítulo continuaremos revisando otras importantes categorías gramaticales del idioma inglés

5. ADJECTIVES (Adjetivos)

An adjective is a part of speech in charge of describing nouns and subject pronouns. An adjective gives a positive or negative quality to the
corresponding noun -or subject pronoun- it describes. Let’s take a look at the following examples of adjectives in the highlighted words of the
sentences in the chart below.

Un adjetivo es una categoría gramatical que se encarga de describir sustantivos y pronombres personales. Un adjetivo le asigna una cualidad positiva
o negativa al correspondiente sustantivo – o pronombre personal- que describe. Miremos la siguiente lista de ejemplos de adjetivos en las palabras
resaltadas en el siguiente cuadro.

1. My brother’s car is very old.

2. Joe has a beautiful dog.
3. That movie was simply fantastic.
4. Today we discussed a very serious topic.
5. She seems so excited about her trip.
6. Our new house cost US$235.000.

As you can see in the previous sentences, the underlined words are the nouns - or subject pronouns- each adjective describes. Remember that
adjectives in English are never pluralized.

Como pudo observar en las oraciones anteriores, las palabras subrayadas son los sustantivos –o pronombres personales- que cada adjetivo describe.
Recuerde que los adjetivos en inglés nunca se pluralizan.

- In (1) old describes car

- In (2) beautiful describes dog
- In (3) fantastic describes movie
- In (4) serious describes topic
- In (5) excited describes she
- In (6) new describes house

In examples (1), (3) and (5) the way adjectives are used is very similar to Spanish in terms of word order. There is a distance between the noun (or
subject pronoun) and the adjective. That is, they are separated by a verb and some modifiers (e.g. My brother’s car is very old, the movie was
simply fantastic, she seems so excited)

En los ejemplos (1), (3) y (5) la manera en que los adjetivos son utilizados es muy similar a la del español en términos del orden de las palabras. Hay
una distancia entre el sustantivo (o el pronombre personal) y el adjetivo. Es decir, están separados por un verbo y algunos modificadores (Ejm: My
brother’s car is very old, the movie was simply fantastic, she seems so excited).

However, in sentences (2), (4) and (6), it is very important to analyze the word order because it is a rule in English. In these cases, you can see that
the adjective and the verb are together; they are not separated by any other word (e.g. “beautiful dog”, “serious topic” and “new house”). As you
can see in these examples, THE ADJECTIVE IS ALWAYS BEFORE THE NOUN. Some other examples can be:

Sin embargo, en las oraciones (2), (4) y (6) es muy importante analizar el orden de las palabras porque es una regla característica del inglés. En
estos casos, puede ver que el adjetivo y el verbo están juntos; ellos no están separados por ninguna palabra (Ejm: “beautiful dog”, “serious topic”
and “new house”). Como puede ver en estos ejemplos, EL ADJETIVO ESTÁ SIEMPRE ANTES DEL VERBO. Algunos otros ejemplos pueden ser:
 - blue sweater
- happy weekend
- relaxed pronunciation
- strong player
- dangerous country

This is a very typical feature of the English language. We must be very careful because it is quite different from Spanish, and we tend
to make many mistakes with this word order.

Esta es una característica muy típica del idioma inglés. Debemos ser muy cuidadosos porque es muy diferente del español y tendemos
a cometer muchos errores con el orden de las palabras.

 Word endings are a useful way to identify different parts of speech and adjectives are not the exception. Some typical word endings
for ADJECTIVES are:

Las terminaciones de las palabras son una manera útil de identificar categorías gramaticales, y los adjetivos no son la excepción.
Algunas terminaciones típicas de VERBOS son:

____ful : beautiful, graceful, plentiful, powerful, awful.

____nt : brilliant, arrogant, patient, efficient, constant.
____al : economical, local, analytical, educational, illogical.
____ble : comfortable, capable, formidable, noble, available.
____ous : generous, marvelous, gorgeous, obnoxious, precious.
____ive : effective, progressive, aggressive, addictive, expensive.

6. ADVERBS (Adverbios)

An adverb is a part of speech in charge of describing verbs, adjectives and other adverbs. The big majority of adverbs in the English language
are derived from adjectives, and they use the suffix “ly” as their main feature. The following table shows this close relation between
adjectives and adverbs.

Un adverbio es una tipo de palabra encargada de describir verbos, adjetivos y otros adverbios. La gran mayoría de los adverbios en el idioma
inglés se derivan de los adjetivos, y utilizan el sugijo “ly” (“mente” en español) como su principal característica. La siguiente tabla presenta
esta relación entre adjetivos y adevrbios.

Adjective Adverb
Logical Logically
Beautiful Beautifully
Precious Preciously
Happy Happily
Sad Sadly
Bad Badly
Patient Patiently

 Examples of adverbs describing verbs:

Sentence Explanation
John speaks Italian fluently. “Fluently” describes the way he speaks.
My brother drives very carefully. “Carefully” describes the way he drives.
Her sister generously helped me with the task. “Generously” describes the way she helped.
  Examples of adverbs describing adjectives:
Sentence Explanation
The situation in Venezuela is extremely serious “Extremely” affects the adjective serious.
Sheila wrote a really beautiful poem to her
“Really” affects the adjective beautiful.
husband.
We had a terribly long day at work. “Terribly” affects the adjective long.

 Examples of adverbs describing other adverbs:

Sentence Explanation
Paul behaved incredibly badly at the party. “Incredibly” modifies the adverb badly.
They spoke about the problem really seriously. “Really” modifies the adverb seriously.
The team played beautifully well. “Beautifully” modifies the adverb well.

NOTE: This shows that you can create an adverb just by taking any adjective and adding the suffix “ly”. There are just a few exceptions in
which the adverbs are formed in a different way. The following table presents the most remarkable exceptions.

NOTA: Esto demuestra que usted puede crear un adverbio solo tomando cualquier adejtivo y agregando el sufijo “ly” (“mente”). Hay algunas
excepciones en las que los adverbios se forman de manera diferente. La siguiente tabla presenta las excepciones más conocidas.

Adjective Adverb Observations

Good Well The word “goodly” is an adjective that means

“considerable”
Fast Fast The word “fastly*” does not exist in the English
language.
Hard Hard The word “hardly” is a different adverb that means
“scarcely”.

EXERCISE 1: Adverbs and Adjectives at the Circus

Directions: read each sentence and determine whether the adverb or adjective should be used.

Example:

The students were very quiet / quietly when they entered the circus tent.

What part of speech is that? Adjective .

1. The ring at the center of the tent was colorful / colorfully decorated.

What part of speech is that? _______________

2. We were all very eager / eagerly to see what the circus had in store for us.

What part of speech is that? _______________

3. A woman in an all silk gown with dragon patterns on it was singing beautiful / beautifully.

What part of speech is that? _______________

4. As the show began, the mood in the auditorium was joyous / joyously.

What part of speech is that? _______________

5. My friend started laughing quite loud / loudly when the clowns came out in their little car.

What part of speech is that? _______________

6. I could barely hear the ringmaster over the crowd because they were so noisy / noisily.

What part of speech is that? _______________

7. The man with the popcorn sloppy / sloppily applied butter and seasoning to his treat.

What part of speech is that? _______________

8. The trapeze artists performed fantastic / fantastically even though there was a safety net.

What part of speech is that? _______________

9. I became very irate / irately when the man with the Abraham Lincoln hat sat in front of me.

What part of speech is that? _______________

10. I jealous / jealously watched as a young girl was chosen to come on stage with the magician.

What part of speech is that? _______________

11. It was hysterical / hysterically when the clowns came back during the ringmaster’s speech.

What part of speech is that? _______________

12. Perhaps the most astonishing was how all of my money magical / magically disappeared.

What part of speech is that? _______________

13. My teacher truculent / truculently inquired about the treatment of the circus animals.

What part of speech is that? _______________

14. The show went by extreme / extremely quickly and then it was time to leave.

What part of speech is that? _______________

7. POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVES – PREPOSITIONS (Adjetivos posesivos y preposiciones)

SUBJECT PRONOUNS POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVES PREPOSITIONS

I My about down out of

You Your above during outside
He His across except over
She Her after for past
It Its against from since
We Our along in through
You Your among in front of to
They Their around inside toward
at instead of under
Yo Mi – mis before into underneath
Tú – usted Su –sus // Tu – tus behind like* until
El Su – sus (de él) below near up
Ella Su – sus (de ella) beneath of upon
It* Su – sus (objeto o animal) beside off with
Nosotros - Nosotras Nuestro (a) - nuestros (as) between on within
Ustedes Su – sus (de ustedes) by onto without
Ellos - Ellas Su – sus (de ellos-ellas) on top of

It = No tiene traducción Diferente al español cada

reemplaza una cosa o persona tiene su posesivo. Si
animal en singular. digo por ejemplo “vi a Pedro
con su novia”, en español no
queda claro si es la novia de
Pedro o de la persona con
quien estoy hablando. Esto
se evita en el inglés con
estos adjetivos posesivos.
 A subject pronoun is a short
word that replaces a noun. It
is usually before a verb, and
they are used as subjects of
sentences:
I study at USTA.
She never arrives late.
Last weekend we met Paul.
They don’t drink coffee.
A possessive adjective is a A preposition is a word that relates a noun or pronoun to another noun in a
word that modifies a noun sentence. They can indicate time, position or place:
by attributing possession to
someone or something. They
are always before the noun:
The dog sat under the tree.
My car is blue.
The next exam will be within three weeks.
She went to her apartment.
Our new neighbor lives across our house.
Our patience will finish soon.
You didn’t wait until the end of the class.
Paul is visiting his girlfriend.
My girlfriend left before lunch time.

Un pronombre personal es Un adjetivo posesivo es una

una pequeña palabra que
reemplaza a un sustantivo.
Usualmente se encuentra
antes de un verbo y son
utilizadas como sujetos de
las oraciones.
Una preposición una palabra que relaciona un sustantivo o un pronombre con
palabra que modifica a un
otro sustantivo en una oración. Ellos indican tiempo, posición o lugar.
sustantivo atribuyéndole la
posesión de alguien o de
algo. Siempre van antes de
un sustantivo

EXERCISE 2: “WOMAN LIES ABOUT WINNING THE LOTTERY”

You are going to read a short narration called “WOMAN LIES ABOUT WINNING THE LOTTERY”. Your task is to identify the parts of speech we just
checked in section D (subject pronouns, possessive adjectives and prepositions). To do this, you are going to highlight the parts of speech with
different colors as follows: subject pronouns possessive adjectives and prepositions

Va leer una pequeña narración llamada “WOMAN LIES ABOUT WINNING THE LOTTERY”. Su tarea es identificar las categorías gramaticales que
acabamos de estudiar en la sección D. (subject pronouns, possessive adjectives and prepositions). Para hacer esto usted va a resaltar las categorías
gramaticales con diferentes colores, de la siguiente manera: subject pronouns, possessive adjectives y prepositions

WOMAN LIES ABOUT WINNING THE LOTTERY

A 39-year-old woman admitted that she had lied. She claimed that she bought the latest winning
lottery ticket in Massachusetts, but then lost it. The ticket was worth $18 million after all deductions.
Jean Fenn was charged with grand larceny. A conviction could put her in prison for up to seven years.

The real winner of the ticket, Kevin Hayes, 66, presented the ticket a week ago to the liquor store
where he had bought it. That store will receive one percent of the prize, or $180,000. The owner of
the store, Mark Abrams, 56, was overjoyed. “Last year we had a storm that blew half of our roof off. It
cost $25,000 to put a new roof on.”

Hayes said that he was reminded to check his numbers when he heard that a woman had lost her
winning ticket. He and his wife had been camping in the mountains when the winning number was drawn. They thought their ticket was not the
winning one.

“But I feel sorry for this woman," said Hayes. "She only did this out of desperation. In fact, I'm going to help her out financially after she gets out of
prison. It’s a shame that this wealthy country has so many poor people. So, I’m going to donate a lot of this money to different charities. What do I
need $18 million for?”

The checks to Hayes and Abrams should arrive within two weeks, according to a lottery spokesman. He mentioned that lottery players should
remember that the odds of winning the lottery are only about one in forty million. Even so, most people think that SOMEONE has to win, and it
might as well be them.

© DESIGNED BY:

Mg. Mauricio Buitrago

Universidad Santo Tomás

Licenciatura en Lengua Extranjera Inglés.