Placing Adjectives in a Sentence
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Adjectives are used to determine the quality of another word or describe it. Usually, they are placed before nouns, so it’s hard to make a mistake in a simple sentence. However, there are a few exceptions to remember. Adjectives can also be placed after verbs, which is also easy to keep in one’s mind. Another exception is connected with the word order when there are more adjectives in a sentence.
Adjectives After Verbs
An adjective can appear after linking verbs, including the forms of “to be.” Besides, an adjective is also used after the sense words, like “smell,” “taste,” “appear,” “smell,” “feel,” “become,” and “sound.” Here are the examples of such sentences:
- ✔️ He is kind.
- ✔️ Jenny was angry with her mother.
- ✔️ You look gorgeous!
- ✔️ The paint became yellow.
A String of Adjectives
Sometimes a sentence contains more than one adjective. Traditionally, we use an adjective describing opinion first – lovely, interesting, unusual, etc. A noun is placed after a string of all adjectives. Here’s the order that should be used to place adjectives in a sentence:
Opinion ➡️ Size ➡️ Physical Quality ➡️ Shape ➡️ Age ➡️ Color ➡️ Origin ➡️ Material ➡️ Type ➡️ Purpose
The following example shows how to place a few adjectives correctly:
| ❌ She bought a cotton, blue, wide dress – material ➡️ color ➡️ size | ✔️ She bought a wide, blue, cotton dress – size ➡️ color ➡️ material |
Although it seems hard to learn the order of adjectives, it’s still possible. The rule “practice makes perfect” works best for those learning to arrange words correctly.