Teaching the Adjective

     METHODS OF TEACHING THE ADJECTIVE 

    To incorporate games and activities while introducing a topic to a classroom can be very motivating as they arouse interest and concentrate attention while giving the illusion that one is merely playing games. These activities, if appropriately chosen, can be used to practice all the language skills; the productive skills i.e. speaking and writing, and the receptive skills - listening and reading.

    An adjective is a word that modifies a noun or pronoun. Generally, adjectives answer one of these questions: which one?, what kind of?, or how many?.

     When teaching adjectives in an English grammar course, subject compliments should be mentioned. While adjectives normally precede the nouns (or pronouns) that they modify, they can also follow the words that they modify when they are used as subject complements. Subject complements are adjectives that rename the subject, and they follow linking verbs. For instance, the sentence "Jessica feels well today," involves a subject ("Jessica"), a linking verb ("feels"), and a subject complement/adjective ("well").

    Adjectives used as subject complements can be confusing because they may seem like adverbs at first. Generally "well" (used in the previous sentence as an adjective) is used as an adverb, but it is an adjective when it describes a healthy state of being. It is important to figure out whether a verb is a linking or action verb before determining if its modifier is an adverb or adjective.

    The articles "a," "an," and "the" can all be used as adjectives. Possessive pronouns (like "her" or "its") are also adjectives.

    When teaching an English grammar course, it is good to teach that adjectives have positive, comparative and superlative forms. We would like to concentrate on the techniques of teaching the degrees of comparison, because this is the most confusing thing for students connected with adjectives. Hence we would take a few simple techniques to introduce the concept of the positive, comparative and superlative degrees and to demonstrate two simple games and activities to make the concept explicit. These games will help the teacher to access their students’ level of awareness of the positive, comparative and superlative degrees and thus ensure if they have understood the topic completely.

    For instance to introduce and explain the formation, uses and differences between the positive, comparative and superlative degrees the teacher should introduce the topic to the class by picking up real objects, for example: a colourful book, a pencil box. She/he should ask students, at random, to describe the objects, using many adjectives, write the sentences on the board and underline the adjectives with coloured chalk.

Examples

• It is a small pencil.
• This is a thick book.

Next, he/she should use flash cards of items of interest to children i.e. animals, dresses, trees, etc. and elicit as many sentences describing each flash card. Once again, the teacher writes the sentences on the board while underlining the adjectives with coloured chalk.   
Examples

• The lion has sharp teeth.
• That is a beautiful dress.
• He is tall.

    After the teacher has written a couple of sentences on the board, he/she should write the adjectives only, in a tabular form:

Examples of Positive Degree

 

 

 

 

Now focusing on these adjectives the teacher may explain that the positive degree only describes nouns or pronouns. It shows the simple quality of an object without reference to any other.

b. Comparative Degree

    To introduce the comparative degree the teacher should take a pair of real objects. Each object should have different characteristics. For example two pencils of varying length. Before explaining the comparative degree, the teacher should ask the students what adjectives can be used to compare or contrast the objects. This approach will evoke any knowledge the students already have about the topic. The teacher can show overhead transparencies or slides of a pair of animals or common objects and let the students compare and contrast the pair.

Examples

• The elephant is taller than the horse.
• The shirt is longer than the shorts.

    With the help of real objects and slides or overhead transparencies the students will eventually understand that when one thing is compared or contrasted with another in respect of a certain attribute we use a comparative degree. Thereafter the teacher may present a slide or overhead transparencies on the formation of the comparative degree.

    c. Superlative Degree

To teach the superlative degree the teacher may pick up four or five real objects of the same kind. For example, four or five pencils of different length and ask the students how they would differentiate between the pencils.

Examples  

• This is a long pencil.
• This pencil is longer than that.
• This is the longest pencil.

    Using a few flash cards showing different characteristics of common objects the teacher makes three sentences for three degrees of adjectives. The teacher may then show a list having the three degrees of adjectives in a tabular form.  

    The following activity can serves as a good activity for practicing students’ knowledge of the degrees of comparison.

    The teacher should split the class into small groups of four each and give each group a sheet of paper. The teacher should write ten sentences on the board which they are required to complete by adding either the positive, comparative or superlative degree of adjective given at the end of each sentence. Set a time limit. At the end of time limit the teacher gives the answers. The group that gets the most answers correct wins.

    For instance:

 

Example  

• Lead is the heaviest of all the metals. (Superlative degree)

1. This coffee is very weak. I prefer it a bit __________.  (                   )

2. The Wabash River flows __________ in spring than in fall.  (                 )
3. Bill has bought a __________ car.  (                )
4. The giraffe is __________ than the man.  (                )
5. Paul is the __________ boy in our class.  (                 )
6. Who is your __________ singer?  (                )
7. Sam is __________ than Tom.  (                )
8. You look __________. Have you lost weight?  (                )
9. The children look __________ today.  (                )
10. It’s __________ today than yesterday.  (                )

    This simple activity encourages student bonding and cooperation. Moreover it helps them to learn the grammar form by interaction. It enhances both the productive and receptive skills.

    Here is another activity which can help in teaching the degrees of comparison.

    The teacher splits the class into team ‘A’ and team ‘B’. She/he lets each team elect its leader and give a sheet of paper to each team. Each team collectively forms a questionnaire of ten fill-in-the-blank statements on general topics, (e.g. weather, games) which is to be solved by the other team. The blank spaces are to be filled by the correct form of the adjective given in parenthesis at the end of each statement. Once the two teams have written their sentences the teacher draws two columns on the board. He/she writes team ‘A’ and team ‘B’ in each column. Now the leader of team ‘A’ reads each sentence along with the word with which the sentence is to be completed. Each student of team ‘B’, by turn, has to complete the sentences. The teacher should award one point for each correct answer. In case a student fails to give the answer the team as a whole is given one chance to complete the sentence. In case it succeeds, the teacher awards half a point to the team. The teacher writes the points after each round. When team ‘A’ has asked all its questions, team ‘B’ is asked to present its sentences. At the end of the game, the teacher totals the points. The team that scores more wins.

    For example:

Complete the sentences by choosing the correct form of the words given in brackets.

1. Australia is __________ island in the world.  (large, larger, the largest)
2. The class test was __________ than we had expected.  (easy, easier, the easiest)
3. The elephant has __________ trunk.    (a long, a longer, the longest)
4. Kilimanjaro in Africa is __________ than Mount Blanc in Europe .  (tall, taller, the tallest)
5. King Solomon was  __________ of the kings we have ever heard of.  (wise, wiser, the wisest)

    This activity stimulates both the imagination and self expression. In addition, it increases proficiency in all the four language skills. The students are personally involved. The class appears lively, demanding and interesting. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

CONCLUSION

    The subject of our investigation was the adjective. What we have learnt about adjectives is that the adjective is one of the important parts of speech in modern English. The adjective is a part of speech that modifies a noun or a pronoun, usually by describing it or making its meaning more specific. The adjective expresses the categorial semantics of property of a substance а each adjective used in text presupposes relation to some noun.

    All the adjectives are traditionally divided into two large subclasses: qualitative and relative. Relative adjectives express such properties of a substance as are determined by the direct relation of the substance to some other substance. Qualitative adjectives, on the other hand, give information about the qualities of the noun they modify. 

    Adjectives are also classified into attributive, predicative, absolute and substantive adjectives. Attributive adjectives are part of the noun phrase headed by the noun they modify. Predicative adjectives are linked via a copula or other linking mechanism to the noun or pronoun they modify. Absolute adjectives do not belong to a larger construction and modify either the subject of a sentence or whatever noun or pronoun they are closest to. Substantive adjectives act almost as nouns.

    With regard to the category of the degrees of comparison adjectives fall under 2 lexico-grammatical subclasses: comparables and non-comparables

    Most English adjectives have comparative and superlative forms. These are generally constructed in one of two ways: either by suffixes (big, bigger, biggest) or by the use of the grammatical particles more and most. We have investigated that some adjectives have superlative forms in their comparison, such as good, better, best. Comparative and superlative forms apply only to the base form of the adjective, so that duplicate forms like most biggest or worser are nonstandard. A few adjectives have no comparative but a superlative with -most: uppermost, westernmost, etc. Also it has its own degrees, such as comparison, etc.

    As for the techniques of teaching adjectives it can be concluded that different games and activities should be used in the worksheets of teaching adjectives. These activities make the explanation more vivid and give the students an opportunity to practice the use of adjectives. 
 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Blokh M. “The course in the English grammar”, M, 1983
2. Ilyish B. “The structure of modern English”, M, 1971
3. Khaimovich B.S., Rogovskaya B.I., “Theoretical grammar of the English language” , Moscow, 1967
4. Smirnitsky А.I., “Morphology of the English language”, Moscow, 1959
5. Weigel, William F. (1993). Morphosyntactic toggles. Papers from the 29th Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society (Vol. 29, pp. 467-478). Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society
6. Zhigadlo V.N., Ivanova I.P., Iofik L.L.., “Modern English language” (Theoretical course grammar), Moscow, 1956

 
Internet Sources

1. http://www.arts.uottawa.ca/writcent/hypergrammar/adjectve.html
2. http://brain.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/128/3/615#SEC23
3. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjective
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5. users.fulladsl.be/spb9193/pi_comp.htm