Terminology - word classes

Words Classes
Nouns:
Proper nouns

• Names, places, or companies (e.g. Ellie, Canada, YouTube) 
• Require a capital letter

Common nouns

• Concrete - objects that are tangible (e.g. table)
• Abstract - something you can't touch (e.g. allegation, sadness, hatred)
• Collective - a grouped noun (e.g. herd, humanity)

Adjectives

They describe + modify nouns, and give more info about it to set the tone of a sentence

• Can be pre or post-modifying (come before or after the noun, e.g. 'purple book' or 'the book is purple') 
• Can be used to make comparisons - comparatives (e.g. 'bigger) and superlatives (e.g. biggest)
• Irregular adjectives : good - better - best, bad - worse - worst, little - less - least, much - more - most

Verbs

Both physical + mental actions that can tell you what the subject of a sentence is doing or being

• Main verb - gives the meaning - can be active (expresses a physical action, e.g. 'run') or stative (expresses a non- physical action (e.g. 'think' or 'feel')
• Auxiliary verb - helps us understand the meaning through making the tense clear, suggesting modality or creating emphasis etc. For example, in 'I went swimming' 'went' is the auxiliary verb
• Modal verb - type of auxiliary verb - could, should, would, might

Adverbs

Gives us more info on a verb. Often identified by the suffix 'ly', but not always

• Adverbs of manner - most common adverbs - describe how an action occurs (quickly, angrily)
• Adverbs of place - where an action occurs (outside, near ahead)
• Adverbs of time - when an action occurs (yesterday, again, tomorrow)
• Adverbs of frequency - how often an action occurs (sometimes, never, daily)

Pronouns

• Subject pronoun - the pronoun is the subject (e.g. 'I love Zac)
• Object pronoun - the pronoun is in place of the object (e.g. 'Zac loves me')
• Personal - me, we, us, she, it, him, her
• Possessive - mine, ours, yours, his, hers
• Reflexive - Myself, yourself, ourselves, itself
• Demonstrative (used to replace a noun) - this, that, these
• Indefinite - someone, no one, anyone
• Relative - that, who, whom, whose

Prepositions

They express a relation of something to another word in the clause, usually come before a noun of pronoun

• to, at, on, opposite, towards, into, past, under, during, after, over etc.

Conjunctions

Used to join clauses together in complex or compound sentences

• Coordinating - connecting equal clauses together - and, but, or - in 'I like cake and I like chocolate' both clauses are independent and have equal meaning and importance
• Subordinating - connects a subordinate clause to a main one - although, because, unless, until - 'I'm going to go to the party, until I get tired')

Determiners

Small grammatical words that don't add any content to a sentence but fill gaps so it makes sense

• Definite article - 'the'
• Indefinite article - 'a, an'
• Possessive - 'my, our, your'
• Demonstrative - 'this, that, these'