ORDER OF ADJECTIVES
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NOSASCOMP
Number
Opinion
Size
Age
Shape
Colour
Origin
Material
Purpose
ORDER OF ADJECTIVES
Describes the number of nouns
Number/
Determiner
Opinion
Size
Age
Shape
Colour
Origin
Material
Purpose
Describes your opinion or what you think about something
One, two, three, four, several,
hundreds
A, An, The
Horrible, ugly beautiful, fantastic
Describes how big or small something is
Huge, tiny, long, tall, gigantic,
Describes how young or old something is
Old, new, young, ancient, antique
Describes the shape of something
Describes where the noun is from
Circular, square, triangular,
rectangular, oblong
Black, red, pinkish, blue
Chinese, American, African, Italian
Describes what the noun is made of
Wooden, leather, metallic, plastic
Describes what the noun is used for
Fishing, cooking, sleeping, sports
1. Usually we don’t use more than three adjectives in a sentence.
2. Sometimes we change the word order when we want to emphasize something.
 E.g. He has a big, hideous (very ugly) scar. (big – size, hideous – and opinion)
EXERCISE: Put the adjectives in the correct order
My friend gave me a silk, blue, soft scarf.
Soft - opinion, blue, silk – material
I found a rectangular, small, wooden box in the garage.
Small, rectangular, wooden
I met a Vietnamese, young, pretty girl on holiday.
Pretty, young, Vietnamese
Dad accidentally broke my beautiful, old, ceramic, blue mug.
Beautiful, old, blue, ceramic
ORDER OF ADJECTIVES
Number/
Determiner
Several
Two
A
An
A dozen
A family of
Opinion
beautiful
Size
Age
Shape Colour
young
new
spectacular
Material Purpose NOUN
Dominican
red
oblong
Indian
enormous antique
large
gorgeous
Origin
cotton
marble
wooden
white
ONLINE EXEERCISES: http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/adjectives-order_quiz.htm
http://www.espressoenglish.net/order-of-adjectives-in-english/
night
coffee
women
dresses
table
table
eggs
swans
Adjective Order Quiz
1. She lost her ___.
a) small white cat
b) small cat white
c) white small cat
2. I bought ___ oranges
a) great some big
b) big great some
c) some great big
3. We met ___ people at the conference.
a) very smart two
b) two very smart
c) very two smart
4. Have you met that ___ next door?
a) cute boy new
b) cute new boy
c) new cute boy
5. The clown was wearing a ___ hat.
a) big green-yellow hat
b) big green and yellow
c) yellow and green big
b) baked smell delicious
c) delicious smell baked
6. The cookies that you
a) smell delicious baked
7. My uncle wore a ___ to the wedding.
a)
silk blue tie
b) tie blue silk
c blue silk tie
ANSWERS:
1. a
2. c
3. b
4. b
5. b
6. b
7. a