Literary Words
 Active voice – An active verb has its usual pattern of subject and object (opposite to
passive) e.g. Active : The school arranged a visit. (Passive: A visit was arranged by
the school.
 Adjective – Before a noun to make that meaning more specific (modify the noun)
E.g. the students did some really excellent work.
Or, after the verb be as its complement. E.g. Their work was excellent.
Adjectives cannot be modified by other adjectives. Sometimes called ‘describing
words (colour, size, shape…)
 Adverb – Can modify a verb, adjective, another adverb or clause. Can describe
‘manner or time’. E.g. Natasha soon started snoring loudly. E.g. That match was
really exciting!
 Antonym – Two words if they are opposites. E.g. hot-cold, happy-sad.
 Apostrophe – Shows the place of missing letters. E.g. I’m- I am. Or, marking
possessives. E.g. Scarlett’s mother.
 Clause – Type of phrase whose head is a verb. Can sometimes be complete
sentences. E.g. It was snowing. [single clause sentence]
 E.g. It was snowing but we were indoors. [two finite clauses]
 Compound- Contains at least two root words in its morphology. E.g. superman,
daydream, bookshop.
 Conjunction- Links two words/phrases together.
E.g. Gabriella bought a bat and ball. E.g. Everyone watches when Leah does backflips.
 Consonant – Not a,e,i,o or u.
 Ellipsis-omission of a word or phrase which is expected and predictable. Laura
waved to Alex and watched him drive away.
 Homonym- Two words which look exactly the same when written and sound exactly
the same when pronounced. Different definitions though. E.g. left, bark, jam.
 Homophone – Two words that sound the same when pronounced but are spelt
differently. E.g. hear/here, some/sum, where, were, wear.
 Main clause – A sentence contains at least one clause which is not a subordinate
clause. E.g. It was raining but the sun was shining.
 Modal verb – Used to change the meaning of other verbs. Common examples are:
can, could , will, would.
 Noun- Sometimes called ‘naming words’ because they name people, places and
‘things’. Common nouns – e.g. girl, day. Proper nouns – e.g. Abigail, Monday.
 Object – Normally a noun, pronoun or noun phrase that comes straight after the
verb. E.g. Year 7 designed masks.
 Passive voice – The sentence It was eaten by our dog is the passive of Our dog ate
it. (Opposite to active voice.)
 Plural – A plural noun normally has a suffix – s or es. E.g. cats, boxes. A few nouns
completely change when becoming plural. E.g. mice, formulae.
 Possessive – A noun followed by an apostrophe, with or without ‘s’. E.g. Ellie’s book.
Or, a possessive pronoun. The girls’ arrival.
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Prefix – Added at the beginning of a word in order to turn it another word. (Contrast
suffix.) E.g. overtake, disappear.
Preposition- Links a following noun, pronoun or noun phrase to some other word in
the sentence. Often describes locations, directions and time. E.g. Amelia will be back
from Australia in two weeks.
Pronoun-Normally used like nouns but harder to modify. E.g. Michelle waved to
Mark. She waved to him.
Punctuation- Conventional writing features other than spelling and general layout.
Includes: capital letters, apostrophes, bullet points.
Sentence –Group of words which are grammatically connected to each other but
not to any words outside the sentence.
Standard English – Not limited to any particular accent and covers most registers.
NC aims for everyone to use SE as needed in writing and in relatively formal
speaking.
Subject-Subject of a verb is normally the noun, noun phrase or pronoun that names
the ‘do-er’ or ‘be-er’. E.g. Katy’s father went out. E.g. The children will study the
animals.
Subordinate clause- Tells us more about the meaning of the word it is subordinate
to. E.g. Big dogs need long walks.
Suffix-Is an ‘ending’ of a word. E.g. called, teacher
Syllable-Sounds like a beat of a word and consists of at least one vowel. E.g.
hippopotamus has five syllables.
Synonym- similar meaning words. E.g. old/elderly.
Tense-past, present, future. E.g. studied, studies, will study.
Verb- Sometimes called ‘doing words’. Many verbs name states, feelings or actions.
E.g. She lives in West Derby.
Vowel-a,e,i,o,u.
Word class- Every word belongs to a word class which summarises the ways in
which it can be used in grammar. E.g. noun, verb, pronoun.