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Adjective vs. Adverb

Description:

Adjectives describe nouns. Adverbs describe everything else (verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs) and often end in -ly. Most adjective vs. adverb questions will use an adjective where there should be an adverb. You need to spot the misused adjective and replace it with an adverb.

Approach:

 

  1. Look for Adjectives: Adjectives are often used incorrectly.
  2. Analyze the Sentence: Find the word that is being described by the adverb/adjective. If it's a noun, you should go with the adjective form. If it's not a noun, you need an adverb.

 


1) Adjectives describe nouns (people, places, or things)

Adjectives focus on the what: what color? What size? What quality? etc.

2) Adverbs describe verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs

  • In other words, adverbs describe everything except nouns.
  • Adverbs focus on the how: how fast? How dark? How quickly? etc.

3) Practice: What's wrong with the following sentence?

Due to his growing deafness, Beethoven composed more slow than many of his contemporaries.

  1. growing
  2. composed
  3. slow
  4. his
  5. NO ERROR

 

  1. Look for the Adjectives: the only adjectives underlined are "growing" and "slow."
  2. Analyze the Sentence: "growing" describes "deafness." This is correct, because "deafness" is a noun and therefore requires an adjective like "growing." The word "slow" describes how Beethoven composed. Since "slow" is therefore describing a verb, we need to turn it into the adverb "slowly."

 

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