Adjective order plus - various exercises

These exercises will give you some practice in adjective order, and also in word order in general. This post is part of an experiment to develop more tablet-friendly exercises.

The examples in the last two exercises are rather exaggerated; in practice we'd rarely use more than three adjectives together. They are also my interpretation; some native speakers might disagree about on or two of my more complicated examples.

If you want to make printable copies of the last two exercises, refresh the page or click on 'Reshuffle' before clicking on 'Print'

Answer buttons are right at the bottom so that you are less tempted to cheat!

All images are from Wikimedia Commons; click on the image for attribution and file details.

Exercise 1

Use your instict and choose the most natural sounding alternative. Click (or tap) on your chosen option. If you change your mind, just click (or tap) on another.

1.	She was wearing a evening-gown.
	green long silk - silk green long - long green silk
2.	He arrived in car.
	a beautiful old sports - a sports old beautiful - an old beautiful sports
3.	She sat down on a sofa.
	comfortable leather black - comfortable black leather - black leather comfortable
4.	She bought some cushions.
	enormous red striped - striped enormous red - enormous red striped
5.	On the floor was a rug
	round patterned Persian - patterned Persian round - Persian round patterned
6.	Beside the fireplace were two bookcases.
	antique oak French - antique French oak - French antique oak
7.	She put on a pullover.
	yellow soft woolly - woolly yellow soft - soft yellow woolly
8.	He was with that friend of his.
	clever handsome young - handsome young clever - handsome clever young
9.	The concert was held in that theatre.
	amazing new glass - new amazing glass - amazing glass new
10.	We sat down at an table.
	ugly oval pine - ugly pine oval - oval ugly pine

Random Idea English
http://random-idea-english.blogspot.com

Adjective types Part 1

We usually talk of eight categories but I've extended it to ten here. Keep trying and checking until you work it out.

Exercise 2	Using the information from Exercise 1, put the adjective types into the right order
	Pick'N'Drop - Click or tap on one of the phrases on the right (a-h) and then click or tap on the space on the left where you think it should go.

1.				a)	pattern
2.				b)	colour
3.				c)	age
4.				d)	shape
5.				e)	origin
6.				f)	other qualities
7.				g)	opinion
8.				h)	purpose or type
9.				i)	size
10.				j)	material

Random Idea English
http://random-idea-english.blogspot.com

Show my notes and comments

Some general notes

Not everyone thinks this system works as strictly as I've been suggesting. In English Grammar in Use (Cambridge), Raymond Murphy suggests that very often (but not always) we put adjectives into a specific order.

opinion	fact
opinion	how big?	how old?	what colour?	where from?	what is it made of?

He also makes the point, not covered by our system, that adjectives of size and length (big, small, tall, short, long etc, usually go before adjectives of shape and width (round, fat, this, slim, wide etc), so a long wide room rather than a wide long room.

In Practical English Usage (Oxford), Michael Swan says that the subject is complicated, and that different grammars disagree about the details (as we'll see in a moment). But he gives 'some of the important ones:'

colour

origin

material

purpose

He then says that other adjectives usually come before these, and that 'adjectives of size, length and height often come first'.

A note on age and shape

There is some disagreement as to which comes first - age or shape, and some authorities put shape together with size. At the British Council, for example, shape comes before age, whereas at the ECL Study Zone at the University of Victoria, age comes before shape.

To me, age before shape sounds more natural, and this seems to be supported by these results at Google Search (these are real figures, not Google front page numbers, which are often meaningless)

ancient round houses	45	round ancient houses	3
old square box	280	square old box	14
new oval table	48	oval new table	3
old round stone	97	round old stone	40
new rectangular container	25	rectangular new container	3

As you can see, this combination doesn't come up very often, so is not really worth worrying about too much.

Adjective types Part 2

Exercise 3	Put the words into the right category
	Click on the 'Start quiz' button to begin. A word will appear above the table. Add it to the appropriate list by clicking on the box in the table where you think it should go. Repeat until you've sorted all the words. There are a total of 50 words, 5 for each category.

 

 

Exercise 4

Put the words into the right order

Polkadot	Half-timbered	Paisley pattern

Pick'n'Swap - click on the word you want to move, and then on the place it should go. When you've got the whole line correct, the words will change colour to green.

Example - in the first question, click on she and then click on the first word. After that, click on wore and then on the second word, and so on.

1.	bikiniyellowpolkadotworeitsy-bitsyteenie-weenieshean.
2.	littlethosepuppiesspottedcutelookblack-and-whiteatDalmatian.
3.	beautifulbeachdeserteddiscoveredgoldenwesandythis.
4.	productionnewenormousfacilitycaranpurpose-builtthey'veopened.
5.	teacheryounggotSwedishPTwe'vetallagood-looking.
6.	newsmartphonehimselfhe'sanall-bells-and-whistlesboughtjustamazing.
7.	shegorgeouswearingawaspurpleeveningbacklessdresssilk.
8.	inlivetheyhalf-timberedcottageoldcountryablack-and-whitetiny.
9.	wearingahebrightly-colouredratherwasattractivetiesilkPaisley-pattern.
10.	SwissI'vethisjustboughtarmyincrediblesee-throughmulti-functionknife.

Random Idea English
http://random-idea-english.blogspot.com

Exercise 5

Put the words into the right order

Hand-tooled leather	Three different tartans

swanky = fashionable and expensive in a way that is intended to impress people (OALD)

1.	advertisementnewsexiststupidyoucardidthatsportssee?
2.	swankycowboyhand-tooledapairhe'sbootsofbrownleathergot.
3.	oldlong-hairedcatSiamesethey'vefriendlygota.
4.	ismadegreenmarbleoftheirItalianstripyfakefireplace.
5.	bookourgotcookerytheSpanishwefromrecipefavourite.
6.	itleatherdownanloose-leafinoldwroteredhenotebook.
7.	hideoustheFrenchdressingovalatgreatlookedwooden-framedhemirror.
8.	warmshegreenwaswoollenalongskirttartanwearing.
9.	tallPolishtointroducedwasacharmingmodelheyoung.
10.	gavefive-courselavishaItalianbeautifully-prepareddinnertheyus.

References

• English Grammar in Use Raymond Murphy (Cambridge)
• Practical English Usage Michael Swan (Oxford)

Links

• British Council Learn English - the order of adjectives
• University of Victoria - the order of adjectives
• Hong Kong Poly
• CCC.net
• Bikini song
• Literal minded - a linguist's view

Answers