Page 7 - New Grammar with a Smile 5

1 Parts of Speech

All words in English can be broadly classified into eight groups, or parts of speech—
nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions

and interjections.

Let us revise the different parts of speech.

Ø A noun is the name of a person, a place, an animal, an idea, or a thing. For example,
y Suhail is my friend. (person)

y We went to the market. (place)
y I have a pet dog. (animal)

y I read a book. (thing)

y Eating a chocolate cake gives me happiness. (idea)

Ø A pronoun is a word used in place of a noun. For example,
y Did you give me the keys?

y That car is mine.

y We are neighbours.
Ø An adjective modifies a noun. For example,

y That is a huge cake!

y It was very hot today.
y I will have two doughnuts.

Ø A verb tells us what someone does, is or has. For example,

y Mary Kom won the boxing match. (action)
y Susan is intelligent. (being)

y Joe has short hair. (possession)

Ø An adverb is a word that adds to the meaning of a verb, an adjective or another
adverb. For example,

y Joel played the guitar beautifully. (modifying the verb ‘played’)

y He is very tall. (modifying the adjective ‘tall’)
y Let’s meet outside. (modifying the verb ‘meet’)

y John sings rather well. (modifying the adverb ‘well’)
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