Rosyth GE

If any of you have questions, clarifications, uncertanties or doubts concerning any area of the subject, please post them as comments and I will do my best to reply to them asap.

A number of you came to see me about Auxillary verbs, so I hope this helps clear your misunderstandings or clarifies your doubts.I hope this clears up the questiosn about verbs to be also.
An auxiliary verb combines with another verb to help form the tense, mood, voice, or condition of the verb it combines with.

The verbs to have, to be, to do, will, shall, would, should, can, may, might, and could are the common auxiliary verbs in English.

Auxiliary verbs are sometimes called helping verbs.

The most common auxillary verbs are “be,” “do,” and “have”, and you may also use these verbs on their own. You use “will” and “shall” to express future time.

The words in bold are auxillary verbs

She is the chief engineer.

The tea cups are in the china cabinet.

Gordon does this kind of thing frequently.

My classmates and I do our homework everyday.

I can’t complete my project because he still has my notes.

They have several kinds of ice cream in the display case.

Other common auxiliaries are “can,” “could,” “may,” “might,” “must,” “ought,” “should,” “will,” and “would.”

Verbs like these are called modal auxiliaries and expresses necessity, obligation, or possibility.

The highlighted word in each of the following sentences is a modal auxiliary:

Zorro was pleased to learn that he could take several days off.

Tina told her neighbours that she would walk their dog for an appropriate fee.

Henry told Eli that he ought to have the hole in his pants mended.

The principal told the assembled students that the school might introduce a new CCA next term.

According to the instructions, we must leave this lotion in our hair for twenty minutes.

Order 1

The Order of Adjectives in a Series

Why do we say “little brown house” and not “brown little house” or why do we say “red Italian sports car” and not “Italian red sports car.” The order in which adjectives in a series sort themselves out might be confusing for many people learning English. There is, however, a pattern. You will find many exceptions to the pattern in the table below, but it is definitely important to learn the pattern of adjective order if it is not part of what you naturally bring to the language.

The categories in the following table can be described as follows:

1. Determiners — articles and other limiters.
2. Observation — postdeterminers and limiter adjectives (e.g., a real hero, a perfect idiot) and adjectives subject to subjective measure (e.g., beautiful, interesting)
3. Size and Shape — adjectives subject to objective measure (e.g., wealthy, large, round)
4. Age — adjectives denoting age (e.g., young, old, new, ancient)
5. Color — adjectives denoting color (e.g., red, black, pale)
6. Origin — denominal adjectives denoting source of noun (e.g., French, American, Canadian)
7. Material — denominal adjectives denoting what something is made of (e.g., woolen, metallic, wooden)
8. Qualifier — final limiter, often regarded as part of the noun (e.g., rocking chair, hunting cabin, passenger car, book cover)

THE ROYAL ORDER OF ADJECTIVES
Determiner	Observation	Physical Description				Origin	Material	Qualifier	Noun
		Size	Shape	Age	Color
a	beautiful			old		Italian		touring	car
an	expensive			antique			silver		mirror
four	gorgeous		long- stemmed		red		silk		roses
her			short		black				hair
our		big		old		English			sheepdog
those			square				wooden	hat	boxes
that	dilapidated	little						hunting	cabin
several		enormous		young		American		basketball	players
some	delicious					Thai			food

ORDER 2
The basic types of adjectives

Some examples of adjective order

Extracted from http://webster.commnet.edu

Latin and Greek Word Elements

English is a living language, and it is growing all the time. One way that new words come into the language is when words are borrowed from other languages. New words are also created when words or word elements, such as roots, prefixes, and suffixes, are combined in new ways.
Many English words and word elements can be traced back to Latin and Greek. Often you can guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word if you know the meaning.
A word root is a part of a word. It contains the core meaning of the word, but it cannot stand alone. A prefix is also a word part that cannot stand alone. It is placed at the beginning of a word to change its meaning. A suffix is a word part that is placed at the end of a word to change its meaning. Often you can guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word if you know the meaning of its parts; that is, the root and any prefixes or suffixes that are attached to it.
The use of affixes multiplies the effective number of words in the language, without increasing the number of unique vocabulary items that need to be memorized.

Latin Roots, Prefixes, and Suffixes

Latin was the language spoken by the ancient Romans. As the Romans conquered most of Europe, the Latin language spread throughout the region. Over time, the Latin spoken in different areas developed into separate languages, including Italian, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. These languages are considered “sisters,” as they all descended from Latin, their “mother” language.
In 1066 England was conquered by William, duke of Normandy, which is in northern France. For several hundred years after the Norman invasion, French was the language of court and polite society in England. It was during this period that many French words were borrowed into English. Linguists estimate that some 60% of our common everyday vocabulary today comes from French. Thus many Latin words came into English indirectly through French.
Many Latin words came into English directly, though, too. Monks from Rome brought religious vocabulary as well as Christianity to England beginning in the 6th century. From the Middle Ages onward many scientific, scholarly, and legal terms were borrowed from Latin.
During the 17th and 18th centuries, dictionary writers and grammarians generally felt that English was an imperfect language whereas Latin was perfect. In order to improve the language, they deliberately made up a lot of English words from Latin words. For example, fraternity, from Latin fraternitas, was thought to be better than the native English word brotherhood.
Many English words and word parts can be traced back to Latin and Greek. The following table lists some common Latin roots.

From the example words in the above table, it is easy to see how roots combine with prefixes to form new words. For example, the root -tract-, meaning “to pull,” can combine with a number of prefixes, including de- and re-. Detract means literally “to pull away” (de-, “away, off”) and retract means literally “to pull back” (re-, “again, back”). The following table gives a list of Latin prefixes and their basic meanings.

Words and word roots may also combine with suffixes. Here are examples of some important English suffixes that come from Latin:

Greek Roots, Prefixes, and Suffixes

The following table lists some common Greek roots.

The following table gives a list of Greek prefixes and their basic meanings.

Words and word roots may also combine with suffixes. Here are examples of some important English suffixes that come from Greek:

Greek Roots, Prefixes, and Suffixes

The following table lists some common Greek roots.

The following table gives a list of Greek prefixes and their basic meanings.

Words and word roots may also combine with suffixes. Here are examples of some important English suffixes that come from Greek:

Extracted from http://www.factmonster.com and http://www.infoplease.co

Some revision work on prepositions for all of you.

Enjoy.

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/time_prepositions_1.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/time_prepositions_2.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/location_prepositions_1.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/location_prepositions_2.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/direction_prepositions_1.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/direction_prepositions_2.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/position_prepositions_1.htm

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/position_prepositions_2.htm