CUP Club - Ecuador

Adjectives are used to describe, qualify or modify nouns. They express a quality or attribute of the noun they are used with. Students like to use adjectives in their writing, however very often students have a poor repertoire of adjectives at their disposal.  How do we as English teachers know which adjectives our students should know and be using?

For example, a student is asked to write a couple of sentences about his/her teacher. He/She writes, "My teacher is very nice. She is a good person."

For a student at the A1 level (see an explanation of the CEFR levels), these sentences might be acceptable.  But students at higher levels would be expected to produce more complex language.

This month we have selected a few adjectives to describe personality, and presented them together in a chart according to the English Vocabulary Profile. The words a student should know would depend on their CEFR level.

 

A1	funny
A1	boring
A2	kind
A2	lazy
B1	brilliant
B1	easy-going
B1	sociable
B1	generous
B1	strict
B1	careless
B1	nasty
B1	shy
B2	ambitious
B2	bright
B2	bad-tempered
B2	childish
B2	dynamic
B2	impatient

From Wordlist of the month at The University of Cambridge ESOL Exams Teacher Support Ezine.

If you would like more information about any of the words on the list above, you can see definitions and examples of usage at Cambridge Dictionaries Online.