NOTE: Adverbs do not normally modify linking verbs which mostly require adjectives. She easily falls for men who never intend to keep her.We rarely visit Mom but we video chat often.He loved her wholeheartedly, but it wasn’t enough.

The students who listened carefully during the class got the highest grades.Learn how an adverb (in bold) expounds the meaning of the verb (italicized) modified. Related Reading: Adverb Phrase – Phrase Modifying Another Word Adverbs Modify VerbsĪn adverb is most commonly used to describe verbs and, in such cases, you can easily track it. HOW? Suddenly, everything changed.TO WHAT WHEN? Good moments happen every time you’re around. We’re used to adverbs ending in -ly but note that they sometimes take the form of adjectives (I feel bad).Īn adverb usually answers any of these questions: Where? When? How? To what extent (how much or how long)? What is an Adverb?Īn adverb is a word that modifies a verb (he walks slowly), an adjective (it’s quite dirty), another adverb (she arrived very early), or a whole clause ( Luckily, he survived the fall). The only noticeable pattern is when certain adjectives such as ‘adequate’ or ‘essential’ are formed into adverbs using the suffix ‘-ly’, as in ‘adequately’ or ‘essentially’.Let’s learn how to define and use an adverb. Unlike the major word types, students may find it tricky to identify adverbs because they lack clear patterns of word formation. Though these words certainly do share similarities, it can sometimes seem that adverbs comprise many minor word types which have been grouped together simply because they do not function like any of the major types, such as nouns, pronouns or prepositions.

In truth, adverbs are a large and jumbled grouping of words that perform a wide variety of functions. While words such as ‘adequately’, ‘furthermore’ and ‘somewhat’ are traditionally considered as belonging together under the label ‘adverb’, some grammarians argue that this categorisation may be a lazy one. Are there clear similarities among adverbs?

What do adverbs do