TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – trainer’s notes

Description
This activity uses a text to lead participants towards identifying different types of nouns and
adjectives. Participants also reflect on learner problems in this area and analyse why these
occur.

Time required: 45–50 minutes

Materials  Participant’s Worksheet 1 (one copy for each participant)
required:
 Participant’s Worksheet 2 (one copy for each participant)
 Participant’s Worksheet 3 (one copy for each participant)
Aims:  to ensure participants know and understand the different types of
nouns and adjectives
 to raise awareness of learner difficulties and possible reasons for
them
Note: this activity should be done after the activity TKT: KAL Part 3: Word Classes. The
sample task supplied here also covers determiners and pronouns, and is included in the
activity TKT: KAL Part 3: Determiners and pronouns as well as here.
Procedure
1. Ask: Who would like to buy a new laptop? Where would you look for advice on
which to buy? Brainstorm for a few minutes any vocabulary participants might
expect to find in a review of a new laptop. Write their suggestions on the board. If
possible, write nouns in one colour and adjectives in another colour.
2. Give out Participant’s Worksheet 1 Exercise 1. Ask participants to skim through
the text to see if any of the key vocabulary they brainstormed appears in the text.
Feed back briefly.
3. Participants should now work individually to underline all the nouns and circle all the
adjectives, before checking with a partner. Feed back as necessary, going over any
disagreements (see Key below).
4. Give out Participant’s Worksheet 2. In their pairs, participants then review the types
of nouns by finding examples in the text for the different types of nouns listed in
Exercise 1. There are not examples for all of the types of noun. If you have not
already done the activity: Word Classes, this exercise will allow you to judge whether
participants already know all/ some of the terms. You could input the meaning of the
terms beforehand, or as queries emerge.
5. Pairs check their answers with another pair. Feed back as necessary (see Key
below).
6. Individually, participants should now add two more examples of their own for each of
the categories of noun in Exercise 1. Allow 3 minutes for this. Participants then check

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 1 of 9
 their answers in their groups of four, adding other examples as appropriate. Feed
back some ideas.
7. Refer participants to Participant’s Worksheet 2 Exercise 2 and the text on
Participant’s Worksheet 1 again. They now work in pairs to look for examples of the
different types of adjectives listed. Feed back, discussing any areas of difficulty (see
Key below).
8. Individually, participants should now add two more examples of their own for each of
the categories of adjective in Exercise 2. Allow 3 minutes for this. Participants then
check their answers in their groups of four, adding other examples as appropriate.
Feed back some ideas.
9. Participants work in small groups (3 or 4) to discuss the following question:
Do your learners have any problems with any of these categories of
nouns? Why do you think this may be?
Allow 5 minutes for them to discuss difficulties they have noticed among their
learners. Then feed back a couple of ideas from each group, encouraging them to
analyse the reasons for the problems they’ve noticed. See Key below for some
possible answers.
10. Give out Participant’s Worksheet 3. This has two examples of student writing at
about B1 level. Allow 3–4 minutes for participants to read the texts individually and
identify the problems with nouns and/or adjectives that they find. They then discuss
answers in their groups, considering the possible reasons for these problems (see
Key below).
11. Discuss the following question with the group:
How might knowledge of the different features of nouns and adjectives
help the teacher in the classroom? (This can help teachers in analysing
problems learners have with these areas, e.g. adjective-noun agreement not
required, order of adjectives, predicative and attributive use of adjectives,
grammatical requirements of countable and uncountable nouns, and helping
learners with these areas)

Additional information
In the TKT: KAL test, candidates may find features of nouns and adjectives tested as part of
tasks on areas such as suffixes and prefixes. They may also appear in tasks focussing just
on nouns or adjectives, e.g. requiring candidates to match adjectives in texts or sentences
with types of adjectives.

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 2 of 9
TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – answer keys

Key to Procedure step 10

Possible answers:
learners may not realise that particular endings are typical of nouns and so not
recognise their part of speech
countability vs uncountability can be a tricky concept. Using these areas accurately
can be tricky too.
collective nouns can be singular or plural
compound nouns pose problems of word stress, where to put the plural ‘s’, and
meaning
irregular plurals are sometimes learnt/ used very slowly.

Key to Participant’s Worksheet 1

Nouns are underlined; adjectives are in bold.

The unusual design stretches to the keyboard location, which sits smack in the centre of the
chassis with a lot of vacant space above it. As a result, the palm rest is very small, leading to
your hands sitting on the desk or hovering as you type. There are no touchpad buttons below the
touchpad - they’re located on each side instead, which takes some getting accustomed to.

The keyboard is excellent, with a design reminiscent of Sony’s previous-generation VAIO

laptops. The centres are raised, with a slight dip around the edges that makes it a bit easier to
type. The keys are well attached and very comfortable to type on, providing a good travel,
although it’s not the quietest board during use.

Instead of an Intel Atom processor, you’ll find a CULV Intel Pentium chip running at 1.3GHz. With
a dual-core chip, and backed by 3072MB of memory, it offers far better performance than you’ll
find in similarly priced netbooks, with the ability to multi-task without too much lag. A battery
life of around 3 and a half hours is reasonable, although those looking for all-day use will be
disappointed.

Key to Participant’s Worksheet 2

Exercise 1

Type of noun Examples from the text

1 typical noun endings -tion, -s, -or, -ance
2 uncountable nouns use, memory (in this sense)
3 concrete nouns all except those in ‘abstract’ below
4 abstract nouns result, use, performance, ability, lag
5 collective nouns none
© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 3 of 9
 6 proper nouns Sony’s, VAIO, Intel Atom, Intel Pentium
7 countable nouns all except ‘memory’ (in this sense) and ‘use’
8 compound nouns keyboard location, palm rest, touchpad buttons, touchpad,
keyboard, laptops, Intel atom processor, Intel Pentium chip,
netbooks, battery life
9 regular plurals hands, buttons, laptops, centres, edges, keys, netbooks

Exercise 2

Type of adjective Examples from the text

1. an adjective used attributively all except those used predicatively: see below

2. an adjective used predicatively ‘small’, excellent, reminiscent, well attached, comfortable, disappointed

3. a gradable adjective all except those under ungradable: see below

4. a comparative adjective easier, better

5. an adjective made from a participle priced, disappointed

6. a superlative adjective quietest

7. an ungradable adjective excellent, previous

8. an adjective with a dependent reminiscent of

preposition

9. an adjective suffix -any, -ent, -ious, -able, -est, -er, -ed

10. an adjective prefix un-

11. a compound adjective similarly priced, dual-core, all-day

12. an irregular adjective better

Key to Participant’s Worksheet 3

Letter A
singulars/plurals; countable/uncountable; noun vs. verb (shopping); spelling; use of articles;
position of adjective
Letter B
capitalisation of proper nouns; use/non-use of articles; position of noun as subject; use of
singular or no article; compounding.

Key to Sample Task

1B 2A 3B 4C 5B 6C 7B

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 4 of 9
TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – Participant’s
Worksheet 1

Exercise 1
Underline the nouns and circle the adjectives in this extract from a review of a laptop
computer.

The unusual design stretches to the keyboard location, which sits smack in the centre of the
chassis with a lot of vacant space above it. As a result, the palm rest is very small, leading to your
hands sitting on the desk or hovering as you type. There are no touchpad buttons below the
touchpad - they’re located on each side instead, which takes some getting accustomed to.

The keyboard is excellent, with a design reminiscent of Sony’s previous-generation VAIO laptops.
The centres are raised, with a slight dip around the edges that makes it a bit easier to type. The
keys are well attached and very comfortable to type on, providing a good travel, although it’s not
the quietest board during use.

Instead of an Intel Atom processor, you’ll find a CULV Intel Pentium chip running at 1.3GHz. With
a dual-core chip, and backed by 3072MB of memory, it offers far better performance than you’ll
find in similarly priced netbooks, with the ability to multi-task without too much lag. A battery life
of around 3 and a half hours is reasonable, although those looking for all-day use will be
disappointed.

http://www.pocket-lint.com/review/4475/samsung-x120-laptop-netbook-review

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 5 of 9
TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – Participant’s
Worksheet 2
Exercise 1
Find examples in the review of as many of the following as possible (you will not find examples for all
of them.)

Type of noun Examples from the text

1 typical noun endings

2 uncountable nouns

3 concrete nouns

4 abstract nouns

5 collective nouns

6 proper nouns

7 countable nouns

8 compound nouns

9 regular plurals

Exercise 2
Find examples in the review of as many of the following types of adjectives as possible.

Type of adjective Examples from the text

13. an adjective used attributively

14. an adjective used predicatively

15. a gradable adjective

16. a comparative adjective

17. an adjective made from a participle

18. a superlative adjective

19. an ungradable adjective

20. an adjective with a dependent

preposition

21. an adjective suffix

22. an adjective prefix

23. a compound adjective

24. an irregular adjective

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 6 of 9
TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – Participant’s
Worksheet 3

Look at these two examples of lower intermediate (B1) student writing. What problems with
nouns and adjectives do they show? Discuss your answers.
A:

Hello, Granmother very nice, now you have a money,

with there you can to visit. You can buy a good camra,
and you can go on holiday with my friends, you can
too save a money. What you like? i like to shopping
and buy a new clothes evry week, buy camra is good
idea, i like go beach in holiday, take foto, have nice time
with my friends.
Tell me your decition!
i wait your answer, see you soon

Yours friend, Love

B:
one year ago, i travelled with my family to muzo,
boyaca i was very happy and we travelled in car, we
have not never been in that place, so first we went to
the center of the town, we took a lot of pictures and in
the afternoon, we parted to find a hotel but a weird
thing happened to us, we were driving and driving and
never arrived to any place, we were like catched in the
time, i was so scared, i praid a lot, suddenly appeared
on the way a farmer who gave us an amulet and we
could escape from this time capsule. finally we arrived
to a hotel and had a great holidays in family, we forgot
this episode and begin a new life with a great mistery's
story to tell.

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 7 of 9
TKT: KAL Part 3 Grammar: nouns and adjectives – Sample Task

A teacher is studying a text on aspects of noun phrases in preparation for working on this
area in class.
For questions 1-7, read the article about a school in India. Read the questions and choose
the line A, B or C which answers the questions.

A short walk from the park rises a massive grey Gothic tower Line 1
on which is painted a coat of arms and the slogan Line 2
‘LUCET ET ARDET’. This is the St Alfonso’s Line 3
Boys’ High School and Junior College, established 1958, Line 4
one of the oldest educational establishments in the state Line 5
of Kanataka. The Jesuit-run school is Kittur’s most famous, Line 6
and many of its alumni have gone on to the Indian Line 7
Institute of Technology, the Karnataka State Regional Line 8
Engineering College, and other prestigious universities Line 9
in India and abroad. Line 10

1. Which line contains a demonstrative pronoun?

A.2 B. 3 C. 6
2. Which line contains a relative pronoun?
A. 2 B. 5 C. 9
3. Which line contains a superlative adjective?
A1 B. 6 C. 9
4. 4. Which line contains a quantifier?
A. 1 B. 5 C. 7
5. 6. Which line contains a noun with two typical noun endings?
A.2 B. 5 C. 7
6. 7. Which line contains a possessive adjective?
A. 3 B. 4 C.7
7. Which line contains a proper noun?
A.1 B.3 C. 5

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 8 of 9
Acknowledgements
Cambridge ESOL is grateful to the following for copyright permission:
Pocket Lint
Laptop Review (http://www.pocket-lint.com/review/4475/samsung-x120-laptop-netbook-review)

Every effort has been made to identify the copyright owners for material used, but it is not always
possible to identify the source or contact the copyright holders. In such cases, Cambridge ESOL
would welcome information from the copyright owners.

© UCLES 2009. This material may be photocopied (without alteration) and distributed for classroom use provided no charge is made. For further
information see our Terms of Use at http://www.teachers.cambridgeESOL.org/ts/legalinfo

www.teachers.cambridgeesol.org
Page 9 of 9