Word Classes LIK Universitas Nurul Jadid

1. word
classes
A N I N T R O D U C T I O N
AHMAD FAIZ - LIK, UNIVERSITAS NURUL JADID

2. word
classes
Word classes, or also known as parts of speech, refer to the way in which particular words are
used. Some words can be classified as more than one word type, and they change type according
to the sentence they belong to.

3. word
classes
Words can be divided into classes according to the way in which they are used. The eight main
word classes are Nouns, Adjectives, Verbs, Adverbs, Pronouns, Prepositions, Conjunctions, and
Interjections.

4. Word Classes
Nouns
Adjectives
Verbs
Adverbs
Pronouns
Prepositions
Conjunctions
Interjections
Nancy M. Sullivan. Essential Grammar for Today’s Writers, Students, and Teachers. (New York: Routledge, 2015), 3.

5. Nouns
The things, animals, and people in the world around us all have names. These names are called nouns.
Nouns are often known as “naming” words. Every sentence must include at least one noun or pronoun.
Words like tree, tiger, brother, teacher, student and dinosaur are nouns. We can easily describe them as
they physically exist. We call these as concrete nouns. There are also nouns for things that don’t
physically exist. They are called abstract nouns. Words like love, hatred, loyalty and betrayal are
abstract nouns.
Nouns (or pronouns) and verbs are the only essential components of a sentence.

6. Proper Nouns
Proper nouns refer to specific people, places, things and ideas that are unique. They are often written
with initial capital letters and include:
The names of individual people and places
• Joko Widodo, Jakarta
The names of organisations, institutions, publications, films, TV programmes, pieces of music and
other things that are unique
• Nurul Jadid, Jawa Pos, Dangdut
People's titles when used to refer to an individual, with or without their personal name
• the Professor, the Governor of East Java, the President
• Note that this does not apply when the title is used generically
• some professors, the former presidents

7. Common Nouns
Words, like tree, brother, teacher and singer are called common nouns because they don’t talk about
one specific thing or person. You can use the noun tree about any tree, and the noun brother about
anyone’s brother. All nouns except for proper nouns fall into this group.
Common nouns can be countable or uncountable.

8. Countable Nouns
Most common nouns have singular and plural forms, because they refer to things that can, in theory at
least, be counted. A singular noun talks about just one thing. A plural noun is used for more than one
thing.
Most English nouns make their plural forms by adding -s or -es like student➟students,
picture➟pictures, box➟boxes, hero➟heroes, etc. A very small number either have a completely
irregular plural forms, like child➟children, mouse➟mice, woman➟women and person➟people or
have the same form for both singular and plural, like sheep➟sheep and deer➟deer.

9. Uncountable Nouns
Some nouns don’t have a plural. They only have singular forms. These are called uncountable nouns.
Words like milk, music, money, furniture, oil, information, help and education are uncountable nouns
because we can’t count them.
Since proper nouns refer to specific people, places, things and ideas that are unique, they are, by
definition, uncountable.

10. Nouns
Nouns can often be recognised by their endings.
-age : advantage, pilgrimage, usage, marriage, courage, beverage
-ation, -tion, -sion, -ion : explanation, education, nation, division, invasion, objection
-er, -or : writer, painter, doctor, actor, proctor
-ity : reality, immunity, accountability, acidity
-ment : appointment, experiment, establishment, harassment
-ness : happiness, brightness, readiness
-ist : guitarist, pianist, specialist, biologist
-ing : building, saving, writing, gathering

11. Nouns
Proper
Nouns
John Seely. Grammar for Teachers: Unlock Your Knowledge of English. (Triverton: Oxpecker, 2007), 47.
Common
Nouns
Countable
Uncountable

12. Adjectives
Adjectives tell us what people, animals, and things are like. They describe nouns and tell you more
about them. They might tell you what things look, sound, or feel like.
- a luxurious car
- an expensive smartphone
- many young students
- some green trees
- the tasty meatballs

13. Attributive & Predicative Adjectives
We often put an adjective before the noun that it is describing such as “a colourful ball”, “a huge
building”, and “the new president”. Placing an adjective before a noun is called attributive use of
adjectives.
You can also put adjectives after the noun, such as after verbs (linking verbs) like be, look, feel, seem,
become, stay, or turn such as “the sun is hot”, “the meatballs look yummy”, and “I feel nervous”. This use
is described as predicative.
It’s up to you to choose where you put the adjectives in your sentence. You can say,
“this is a delicious cake” or “this cake is delicious”.

14. Comparison
Adjectives can be used to compare nouns or pronouns.
- There are many big cities. Surabaya is a big city, but Jakarta is bigger than Surabaya. New York is the
biggest of all.
Adjectives have three forms
Positive Comparative Superlative
big bigger biggest
long longer longest
happy happier happiest
annoying more annoying most annoying
intelligent more intelligent most intelligent
good better best
bad worse worst

15. Adjectives
Adjectives can often be recognised by their endings.
-able, -ible : acceptable, suitable, capable, credible
-al : accidental, seasonal, political, pictorial
-ful : careful, faithful, doubtful, shameful
-ic : romantic, dynamic, dramatic, historic, Islamic
-ish : childish, foolish, bluish
-ive : comprehensive, affirmative, active, destructive
-less : careless, hopeless, harmless, reckless
-ous : dangerous, famous, glorious, ambitious
-y : tasty, moody, hungry, heavy
-ed : abandoned, sophisticated, developed

16. Adjectives
Attributive Adjectives
Predicative Adjectives
Sidney Greenbaum. The Oxford English Grammar. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 134-136.

17. Verbs
Verbs describe actions, such as fly, study, and fall. The person or thing that does the action of the verb
is the subject. The subject always comes before the verb.
- The birds fly.
- The students study.
- The rain falls.
Sometimes the verb has to change a little to match the subject. We add -s or -es to the end of the verb
if the subject is a single thing that you can call he, she, or it.
- All dogs bark. This little dog barks. It barks a lot.
Some verbs change in different ways to match the subject.
- This car is blue but those cars are red.

18. Verbs
The subject of a verb comes before the verb. It tells you who or what does the action of the verb. Some
verbs need something else after them, otherwise the sentence doesn’t make sense. The person or
thing that comes after the verb is called the object. The object tells you who or what receives the action
of the verb.
- Ayu saw. (incomplete, needs an object)
- Ayu saw Maryam. (complete)
We call the verbs that need an object as transitive verbs.
But some verbs don’t need an object and make sense on their own. Those verbs are called intransitive
verbs.
- Tigers roar.
- The flower grows.

19. Main Verbs
We can classify verbs into main verbs and auxiliary verbs.
Main verbs are also called 'full' or 'lexical' verbs because they are verbs which contain meaning (you
can look them up in a dictionary and find a definition). The transitive and intransitive verbs are main
verbs.
Most main verbs can be allocated to one or more of three groups. They are transitive verbs,
intransitive verbs, and linking verbs.

20. Main Verbs
Linking verbs are verbs that link a subject with its complement.
- I am the son of a king.
- This seems like a lovely place to live.
- Hot coffee always tastes good to me.
Common linking verbs are
appear be become look smell
feel get sound seem taste

21. Auxiliary Verbs
Auxiliary verbs are also known as ‘helping’ verbs. They help the main verbs in a sentence for example
by forming tenses. We can group auxiliary verbs into primary auxiliaries and modal auxiliaries.
The primary auxiliaries are be, have, and do.
- The students are listening to the teacher.
- I have bought a new smartphone.
- Do you always come late to class?
Primary auxiliaries are all irregular.
Be has eight forms: am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been.
Have has four forms: has, have, had, having.
Do has five forms: does, do, did, done, doing (but done and doing are not used as auxiliary forms).

22. Auxiliary Verbs
Modal auxiliaries are
- I can speak three languages.
- You shouldn’t wear a hat in a class.
- May I make an appointment?
will shall would should
may might
can could
must
ought to

23. Verbs
Verbs can often be recognised by their endings.
-ate : translate, abbreviate, incorporate, assassinate, associate
-en : brighten, darken, strengthen, toughen
-ify : clarify, magnify, beautify, amplify
-ise, -ize : maximise, computerise, popularize, summarize

24. Verbs
Main Verbs
Auxiliary Verbs
Primary Auxiliaries
Modal Auxiliaries
Intransitive Verbs
Linking Verbs
Transitive Verbs
John Seely. Grammar for Teachers: Unlock Your Knowledge of English. (Triverton: Oxpecker, 2007), 47.

25. Adverbs
Verbs tell you what things do. For example, “tigers roar” and “birds sing“. Adverbs tell you how, when,
where and how often a thing is done. Adverbs are mostly connected to verbs.
Adverbs can be categorised into:
1. Adverbs of manner
2. Adverbs of time
3. Adverbs of place
Most adverbs end in -ly, and they usually come after verbs. Adverbs that tell you how someone does
something are called adverbs of manner.

26. Adverbs of manner
Adverbs of manner tell us how an action is performed. Adverbs of manner usually come after the verb
they describe. We can change most adjectives into adverbs by adding -ly to the end of the adjective.
- Snails are slow movers. They move slowly.
- We had a happy day on the beach. We played happily all day.
- Ahmad gave me a cheerful smile. He smiled cheerfully.
Some adverbs don’t end in -ly, but they are still adverbs if they tell you how something is done.
- Rabbits can run fast.
- The team played well today.
- We always study hard.
- Juliette often arrives late.

27. Adverbs of time
Adverbs of time tell us when something happens. Adverbs of time don’t usually end in -ly
- It’s my birthday today.
- I met some cute girls yesterday.
- We’re going on vacation tomorrow.
- I don’t want to do my homework now. I’ll do it later.

28. Adverbs of place
Adverbs of place tell us where something happens. They don’t usually end in -ly.
- We can sit there.
- I’ve looked everywhere, but I couldn’t find my keys.
- The teacher is waiting upstairs.
- There are many cafés nearby.

29. Adverbs
Adverbs of manner
Adverbs of place
Adverbs of time
Sheila Dignen. DK Visual Guide to Grammar and Punctuation. (New York: DK Publishing, 2017), 46-50.

30. Pronouns
Sometimes we don’t want to keep repeating the same noun over and over again. Instead, we can use a
pronoun to replace the noun.
- I saw Ahmad this morning. Ahmad came early to get Ahmad’s books.
- I saw Ahmad this morning. He came early to get his books.
In the next slide, there is a table of personal pronouns arranged according to “person”. You will work
out what “person” means in grammar as you study the table.

31. Person Subject Pronouns Object Pronouns Possessive Pronouns Reflexive Pronouns
First person singular I me my, mine myself
First person plural we us our, ours ourselves
Second person
singular & plural
you you your, yours yourself, yourselves
Third person singular
he
she
it
him
her
it
his, his
her, hers
its
himself
herself
itself
Third person plural they them their, theirs themselves
Ruth Colman. The Briefest English Grammar and Punctuation Guide Ever! (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press Ltd, 2010), 11.

32. Pronouns
Subject Pronouns
Reflexive Pronouns
Object Pronouns
Possessive Pronouns
Ruth Colman. The Briefest English Grammar and Punctuation Guide Ever! (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press Ltd, 2010), 11.

33. Prepositions
We use prepositions to show how different nouns relate to each other in a sentence. Prepositions are
small words, such as on, in, to, and with. We usually use prepositions for place and time.
See how the prepositions link the nouns and pronouns in the following sentences.
- The children are playing with a ball in the yard.
- I got into the room through a secret door.

34. Prepositions of place
Some prepositions tell us where something is or which direction it goes in.
Prepositions of place are used to relate the position or location of one thing to another. Using a
different preposition usually changes the meaning of a sentence.
- The books are on the table.
- Monas is in Jakarta.
- Ahmad met me at the café.
Some prepositions of place are,
on in at under
through over along behind
above between in front of opposite

35. Prepositions of time
Some prepositions tell us when something happens or how long it lasts.
Prepositions of time are often used to talk about schedules and routines.
- I don’t work on Sundays.
- I leave the house at 6.30 a.m. everyday.
- I was born in 2003.
Some prepositions of time are,
on in at past
to until since during
by before after

36. Other prepositions
Some prepositions link nouns in other ways such as expressing relationships other than place and time,
such as origin, ownership and absence.
- I go to campus by bus.
- You can’t go outside without your shoes.
- I want a job with a good salary.
- I’m watching a documentary about santri.

37. Prepositions
Prepositions of place
Other prepositions
Prepositions of time

38. Conjunctions
Some sentences are quite simple and only give one idea. If you want to join more than one idea
together in the same sentence, you can use a conjunction to link the ideas.
- Orang Utans live in Indonesia. Orang Utans eat fruits and insects.
- Orang Utans live in Indonesia and they eat fruits and insects.
- Let’s go inside. It starts to rain.
- Let’s go inside because it starts to rain.

39. Coordinating Conjunctions
The conjunctions and, but, and or are called coordinating conjunctions because they link words,
phrases, and clauses of equal importance.
- Whales live in the oceans and they eat fish.
- I like badminton but my brother prefers football.
- Do you like an apple or a banana?
The common coordinating conjunctions are
and but or
then yet nor
so

40. Subordinating Conjunctions
Conjunctions that aren’t coordinating conjunctions are called subordinating conjunctions.
Subordinating conjunctions are used to connect words, phrases, and clauses of unequal importance.
They’re used to say why, where, or when something happens.
- Tigers only hunt when they are hungry.
- You can’t ride a motorcycle because you’re too small.
- You can cook a noodle if you’re hungry.
The common subordinating conjunctions are
after although as because
before if since so (that)
though unless until when
where whenever while

41. Conjunctions
Coordinating Conjunctions
Subordinating Conjunctions

42. Interjections
An interjection is a single word that expresses a thought or feeling. You often shout or say interjections
loudly, and so they are often followed by an exclamation point.
- Wow! That was amazing.
- Hey! What are you doing?
- Shh! I’m concentrating. Don’t make any noise!
- Congratulations! You’ve won.

43. References
Colman, R. 2010. The Briefest English Grammar and Punctuation Guide Ever! Sydney: University of New South Wales Press Ltd
Dignen, S. 2017. DK Visual Guide to Grammar and Punctuation. New York: DK Publishing
Greenbaum, S. 1996. The Oxford English Grammar. New York: Oxford University Press
Seely, J. 2007. Grammar for Teachers: Unlock Your Knowledge of English. Triverton: Oxpecker
Siklos, J. and Singer, S. (Eds.). 2016. English for Everyone: English Grammar Guide. New York: DK Publishing
Sullivan, N.M. 2015. Essential Grammar for Today’s Writers, Students, and Teachers. New York: Routledge
A FAIZ