Vocabulary (Word Contractions)

Word Contractions

Contraction is a shorter form of a word or words.

Examples :

• do not - don't
• does not - doesn't
• is not - isn't
• are not - aren't

can not	can't
will not	won't
have not	haven't
had not	hadn't
has not	hasn't
was not	wasn't
were not	weren't
did not	didn't

Vocabulary (Synonyms)

Synonyms

When two or more words mean the same thing, they are called synonyms.

Word	Synonym
big	large
sad	unhappy
stop	halt
remain	stay
thin	lean
able	capable
ask	question
cry	weep
difficult	hard
speak	talk
leave	go
begin	start
finish	end
happy	glad
little	tiny
trip	journey
neat	tidy
kind	helpful

Vocabulary (Opposites)

Opposites

The words which give totally different meanings are called opposites.

Let us learn some opposites

Word	Antonym
happy	sad
cold	hot
fat	thin
clean	dirty
dry	wet
good	bad
hard	soft
long	short
rich	poor
sharp	blunt
kind	cruel
new	old
beautiful	ugly
big	small

Vocabulary (Homophones)

Homophones

Homophones are words that sound alike but have different meanings and spellings. We must be careful about the use of them.

Example : (write, right)

Brake

a thing that slows or stop a vehicle

Break

to damage and separate

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Eight

the number after seven

Ate

second form of verb eat

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Heal

to become healthy again

Heel

the back of the foot below the ankle

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Lose

to be unable to find something

Loose

doesn't fit properly

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Pain

the feeling in the body when you are ill or hurt

Pane

the glass in a window

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Peace

calm or quiet

Piece

a part of something

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Waste

not useful

Waist

the middle of the body between the ribs and the hips

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Negative Sentences

When we get an answer in 'No', such sentences are called negative sentences.

Examples

	Positive Sentences	Negative Sentences
1	The girl is playing.	The girl is not playing.
2	They are jumping.	They are not jumping.
3	I am solving sums.	I am not solving sums.
4	He was happy.	He was not happy.
5	We were feeling well.	We were not feeling well.
6	Mansi can do it.	Mansi can not do it.
7	I know you.	I do not know you.
8	Rashi comes here.	Rashi does not come here.
9	I will do it.	I will not do it.
10	He has reached.	He has not reached.

Remember, while making a negative sentence if there is no other helping verb in the sentence, we use the helping verb 'do' or 'does' along with 'not'.

If the verb is made up of two words, we put 'not' after the first word.

Examples:

• come                           do not come
• is cooking                    is not cooking
• shall be dancing          shall not be dancing

Questions

When we ask something, we say or write a question. The reply to the question is an answer.

A type of question can be answered with 'Yes' or 'No'.

In such questions, a Being Verb or Helper Verb comes before the Subject.

Punctuation

Punctuation Marks are different kinds of signs. We use them in sentences to make the meanings of sentences clear.

The punctuation marks are :

.	Full stop
A	Capital Letters
?	Question mark
,	comma

• When we are just saying something or giving some information, we use a '.' (full stop) at the end of the sentence.
  Examples :
  • I go to school daily.
  • She loves dancing.
• A sentance always begins with a capital letter. We use a capital letter for any proper noun too.
  We also use a capital letter when we use the word 'I'.
  Examples :
  • Birds have wings.
  • Her name is Meera.
  • I said that I will name him Bravo.
• When we are asking something, we use a '?' (question mark) at the end of the sentence, which is also known as a question.
  Examples :
  • Where do you live?
  • Can you help me?
• We use a (,) comma after each item in the list of things, except the one last.
  Examples :
  • Tina had milk, bread and butter for breakfast.
  • Roshan reads, writes, draws and plays in school.

The Sentence

A sentence is a group of words. It must have meaning and make complete sense.

• Chocolate I want a
• This blue is a bag.

These groups of jumbled words do not make any sense so these are not sentences.

• I want a chocolate.
• This is a blue bag.

These two groups of words make complete sense. They are arranged correctly. So these are sentences.

Grab the Points

• A sentence always begins with a capital letter.
• There is a Full stop (.), a Question Mark (?) or an Exclamation Mark (!) at the end of a sentence.
• Every sentence has an Action Word or Verb in it.
• A noun or a pronoun is the doer of the action. His or its name usually comes at the beginning of the sentence.

Basic structure of a sentence

Noun/Pronoun + Verb + Other Parts of Speech
Examples :

• Tiger kills other animals.
  (Noun)(Verb)
• She loves ice-cream.
  (Noun)(Verb)

Articles

Words a, an and the are known as articles.

We use 'a' before words that begin with consonants. (all the letters of the alphabet except the vowels.)

We use 'an' before words that begin with vowels (a, e, i, o, u).

We use 'the' before words that we have already spoken about.

• She has a dog.
• I ate an orange.
• I saw a baby. The baby was cute.

We have used the word 'the' in the third sentence as we have already spoken about the word 'baby'.

• We use 'the' when we talk or write about a thing that is only one of its kind e.g., river, mountain, ocean, sea, famous building, holy book, etc.
  • the Sun
  • the Ganga
  • the Himalayas
  • the Taj Mahal
  • the Geeta
  • the Pacific Ocean
• We do not use articles a, an and the before names of people. For example:
  • Tania
  • Rohit
  • Simran
• We usually do not use articles a, an, and the before names of villages, towns, cities or countries. For example :
  • Russia
  • India
  • Kolkata
  • Delhi

Interjections

An interjection is a word or just a sound that expresses strong feelings about surprise, joy, anger, sorrow, etc.

Examples :

• Wow! What a fine flower.
• Bravo! You have won.
• Alas! He is no more in the world.
• Ah! What a fine morning.
• Hello! How are you?

We use different interjections to express different kinds of feelings and emotions, such as,

Joy	Hurrah! Aha! Hooray!
Sadness	Alas! Oh!
Surprise	Huh! Ha! What!
Pleasure	Ah! Oho! Haha!
Praise	Bravo! Well done! Good!
Hurt	Ugh! (Oof) Ouch! Agh!
Greeting/Calling	Hello! hey! Hi! Ho!

After an interjection, there is always an exclamation mark (!).

Conjunctions

A conjunction is a joining word. It joins the sentences or words together.

Examples : and, but, because, so, or, otherwise, etc.

Use of And

• Amit is sitting. Pooja is sitting.
• Amit and Pooja are sitting.

'And' is used to join same things.

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Use of But

• Kajal likes apples. Rahul likes mangoes.
• kajal likes apples but Rahul likes mangoes.

'But' is used to join opposite things.

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Use of because and so

• She got a watch. She had birthday yesterday.
• She got a watch because she had birthday yesterday.
  (or) She had birthday yesterday so she got a watch.

'Because' and 'so' are used to join the things where 'reason' is present.

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Use of or and otherwise

• You should read more. You will fail.
• You should read more or you will fail.
  (or) You should read more otherwise you will fail.

'or' and 'otherwise' are used to join where 'option' or 'choice' is present.

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Prepositions

Prepositions tell us where something is. Words like in, on, under, behind, etc are prepositions.

Read these sentences :

• The book is on the table.
• The book is under the chair.
• The bird is in the cage.
• The boy jumped into the river.
• The dog is behind the tree.
• The dog is near the tree.
• There is a bridge over the river.
• The dog is in front of the tree.
• The rat is between the cat and the dog.

Some prepositions are:

in into of off by

on out till to from

under up with behind near

at above over for between

Adverbs

An Adverb mainly describes the Manner (how), Time (when) and Place (where) the action of both being and doing verbs.

Adverbs of Manner tell us 'how' or 'in what manner' an action is done.

• An old man walks slowly.
  (How does an old man walk? - slowly)
• The baby weeps bitterly.
  (How does the baby weep? - bitterly)

Adverbs of Time tell us 'when' or 'at what time' an action is done.

• She goes to school daily.
  (When does she go to school? - daily)
• I drew the picture yesterday.
  (When did you draw the picture? - yesterday)

Adverbs of Place tell us 'where' or 'in which place' an action is done.

• She is playing inside.
  (Where is she playing? - inside)
• The boys play there.
  (Where do the boys play? - there)

Forming Adverbs

Adverbs can be formed in different ways. Let us learn some of the rules.

• Adverbs are usually formed by adding -ly at the end of the word.
  For example :
  
  • beautiful + ly = beautifully
  • careful + ly = carefully
  • slow + ly = slowly
  • sweet + ly = sweetly


• If the word ends in -y, replace it with i and add -ly to form the adverb.
  For example :
  
  • happy + ly = happily
  • steady + ly = steadily
  • angry + ly = angrily
  • lazy + ly = lazily


• If the word ends in -le, remove the e and add -y to form the adverb.
  For example :
  
  • gentle + y = gently
  • able + y = ably
  • idle + y = idly
  • comfortable + y = comfortably

Tenses

We use verbs in various forms to express time.

Past Tense

• I was a baby.
• I had no teeth.
• I could not speak.

Present Tense

• I am a boy.
• I am seven years old.
• I can speak now.

Future Tense

• I will become a doctor.
• I will treat the patients.
• I will help others.

Present Tense

• I learn grammar.
• He plays cricket.
• Lalita reads stories daily.

The verb learn, plays and reads show the action that happen in the present time. They are in the present tense.

Past Tense

• Sania played tennis last Friday.
• Yesterday I bought new clothes.
• We ate pizza today.

The verb play, bought and ate tell us about the actions that happened sometime in the past. They are in the past tense.

To make the past tense form of most verbs we add -d or -ed to them.

• cook - cooked
• wash - washed
• twinkle - twinkled
• raise-raised

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All verbs do not change into their past tense form by adding -d or -ed. Some verbs take a special form when they are used in the past tense.

Present	Past
bring	brought
eat	ate
keep	kept
come	came
tell	told
get	got
say	said
take	took
stand	stood
go	went
sleep	slept
catch	caught
teach	taught
send	sent
know	knew
make	made
ring	rang
run	ran
write	wrote
meet	met
leave	left
buy	bought
sit	sat
hide	hid

Verbs

Doing words are called verbs. They tell us what persons, animals or things are doing.

Examples

• A horse runs.
• The fan spins.
• Neeta dances.

The words runs, spins and dances tell us about what an animal, a thing or a person does.

Use of is/am/are

To show that an action is happening now, we use a being verb (is/am/are) and then add 'ing' to a doing verb.

Look at these sentences :

• I am eating snacks.
• Rita is singing a song.
• Amit and his friends are playing football.

We use the words is, am and are with the -ing form of verb.

• We use am when we are talking about 'I'.
• We use is when we are talking about one person.
• We use are when we are talking about you or more than one person.

To show that somebody owns something, or that there is a relation between the owner and the thing, we use the verbs 'have' and 'has'.
We put 'have' after I, we, you, they, these, those and all plural nouns.
We put 'has' after he , she, it, this, that and all singular nouns (except I and You).

Examples:

• You have a pen but I have a pencil.
• He has three chocolates but she has only two.

Comparison of Adjectives

Adjectives can be used to compare two or more persons, things or feelings. When we use an adjective to compare two, it is called the comparative degree.

Here we add -er to compare two persons, things or feelings.

• Amita is fat.
• Kavita is fatter than Amita.

Adjectives in the comparative degree also use the words more or less before them like more beautiful, less interesting. In some cases where the adjective ends in -y we change it to -ier like lazy -lazier.

• Mira is beautiful.
• Tina is more beautiful.

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Understand more positive and comparative degrees:

Positive degree	Comparative degree
fast	faster
high	higher
tall	taller
thin	thinner
big	bigger
hot	hotter
short	shorter
cold	colder
careful	more careful
honest	more honest
difficult	more difficult
delicious	more delicious

Adjectives

An adjective describes a noun or a pronoun. It tells us something more about the quality, amount, nature, appearance, etc., of a noun or pronoun.

Examples:

• I like beautiful scenery.
  (what kind of scenery?-quality)
• Please give me some sugar.
  (how much sugar? - amount)
• Ram is an honest man.
  (what kind of person?-nature)
• Aaryan is a strong boy.
  (how does Aaryan look like?-appearance)

An adjective may come either before or after a noun.

• Ashoka is a long tree.
• The cute baby is sleeping.
• The girl is good at English.
• The old man is weak.

But an adjective always comes after a pronoun.

• He is handsome.
• I am young and tall.
• She is intelligent and beautiful.
• It is big and shiny.

Adjectives are also called describing words.

Opposites

Read the group of words given below:

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• a big ball
• a small ball

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• a long rope
• a short rope

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• a cup of hot tea
• a glass of cold juice

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The highlighted words are opposites. They are adjectives.

Pronouns

Pronouns are words that are used instead of nouns. I, you, he, she, it, we, they and them are some of the pronouns.

Examples :
• This basket has mangoes. The mangoes are sweet.
  Instead of repeating the name mangoes again and again, we can say,
  This basket has mangoes. They are sweet.
• Raj is in class 2, Raj likes doing sums. Raj likes to eat fruit salad.
  Instead of repeating the name. Raj again and again, we can say,
  Raj is in class 2. He likes doing sums. He likes to eat fruit salad.

At a glance

• Pronouns are used to avoid the repetition of nouns.
• They make our sentences short.

Use of pronouns make language impressive.

Some more pronouns are:

• I : We use I for ourselves
• You : We use you for the person we are speaking to
• he : he is used for a male person
• she : she for a female person
• we : we for a group that includes I
• they : they for a group that does not include I
• it : we use it for animal, place and thing

Nouns (Number)

Nouns : Number
(Singular and Plural)

There are nouns which mean one person, place, animal or thing. The noun meaning 'one' is called singular. The nouns meaning more than one are called plural.

Countable nouns can be plural but uncountable nouns cannot be.

Examples

Singular	Plural
boy	boys
pen	pens
glass	glasses
baby	babies

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How to form the Plural of the Nouns

By adding 's' at the end

Singular	Plural
tree	trees
table	tables
dog	dogs
van	vans
chair	chairs
pen	pens
bat	bats
goat	goats

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By adding 'es' at the end with the words ending in -o, -s, -z, -x, -sh and -ch

Singular	Plural
match	matches
box	boxes
dish	dishes
bush	bushes
dress	dresses
bus	buses
tomato	tomatoes
bunch	bunches

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We make the plural number of nouns that end in a vowel +y by adding -s

Singular	Plural
boy	boys
day	days
monkey	monkeys
donkey	donkeys
toy	toys

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We make the plural number of nouns ending in a consonant + y by putting i in place of y and adding -es

Singular	Plural
city	cities
baby	babies
pony	ponies
fairy	fairies
lily	lilies
family	families

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Here f and fe are changed into ves to change the singular into plural

Singular	Plural
half	halves
knife	knives
thief	thieves
calf	calves
wolf	wolves
wife	wives

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In some words, one vowel or vowels are changed to make plural from singular form

Singular	Plural
man	men
woman	women
mouse	mice
tooth	teeth
foot	feet
child	children
goose	geese
ox	oxen

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Some plural nouns are the same as their singular forms

Singular	Plural
deer	deer
sheep	sheep
hair	hair
fish	fish

Nouns (Gender)

Nouns that tell male and female are known as gender.

Examples:
father             mother               brother                 sister

• Father is a man.
• Brother is a boy.

They are male. Nouns that name 'male' persons and animals belong to the masculine gender.

• Mother is a woman.
• Sister is a girl.

They are female. Nouns that name 'female' persons and animals belong to the feminine gender.

Some more genders

Masculine (Male)	Feminine (Female)
boy	girl
king	queen
prince	princess
actor	actress
sir	madam
husband	wife
father	mother
brother	sister
lion	lioness
uncle	aunt
fox	vixen
bull	cow
peacock	peahen

Nouns (Proper and Common)

Everything around us has a name. People, places, animals and things have names that we call nouns. Nouns are also called naming words.

Common Nouns

Names given to common things around you like cat, book, school, doctor are called Common Nouns.

Proper Nouns

Naming words that are special names of particular persons, places or things are Proper Nouns, such as Ravi, Delhi, Godrej and Bournvita.

	Person	Place	Thing	Animal
Common Names	girl	house	stars	elephant
Proper Names	Tina	Shiv Niwas	Pole Star	Erawat

Alphabet and Words

The Alphabet

In English Alphabet there are twenty six letters.

A letter is the smallest unit of language. It can be written in two ways :

Capital Letters
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Small Letters
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

We can write 'apple' not 'ppela', because the proper spelling of this fruit is 'apple'.

Alphabet is an order of letters from a to z. This order is called alphabetical order.

A dictionary is a book which gives the meaning of words. The words in the dictionary follow the alphabetical order.

Alphabetical Order

Five of the letters - a, e, i, o, u are vowels.

And rest 21 letters are consonants.

With the help of these vowels and consonants we make the words. A word is a group of letters that gives some meaning; examples : go, do, take, orange, etc.

• When words are arranged in alphabetical order, they are arranged in the same order as the letters of the alphabet.
• To arrange words in alphabetical order, we look at the first letter of the words.

Wrong spelling can change the meaning or be a wrong word.

Look at these words :

• ball
• doll
• ant
• chair

These words will appear in alphabetical order as -

• ant
• ball
• chair
• doll

• If the first letters of all the words are the same, we will look at the second letters of the words.

Let us look at some more words :

• pen
• pin
• paint
• plan

These words will appear in alphabetical order as -

• paint
• pen
• pin
• plan