The Sunday News
Highway to Success, Charles Dube
Levels of meaning — The effect that a word has on its audience is part of the meaning of the word. A word can have different meanings for different people and in different situations. Understanding the effects that your words have will help you make better choices when you write.
Specific words — The English language is full of general nouns and verbs. Last week we dealt with such examples. For instance, the word house is a general noun that could refer to any number of specific dwellings, a brick row house, an apartment house, a split level, a prefab, an adobe hut, a mobile home, or a farmhouse. General words tend to weaken your writing because they call up only a vague picture in the reader’s mind.
This is a recap from last week’s presentation. For example, the sentence “I went to the store.” Is it a video store, a hardware store, a grocery, a deli, or a boutique? Even the verb went could be more specific — did the speaker walk, run, dash, meander, or fly? Maybe the speaker rode the bus or drove? Today we move on to the adverb. An adverb is a word used to modify a verb, an adjective, or another adverb.
Most adverbs modify by telling how, when, where, or to what extent. Adverbs are most commonly used to modify verbs and verb phrases. Examples: He writes quickly. (how) He writes early in the morning. (when). He writes everywhere. (where). He writes clearly. (to what extent). Adverbs may modify adjectives. Examples: She is quite creative. (The adverb quite modifies the adjective creative telling to what extent.) Adverbs may also modify other adjectives.
Examples: Jane runs very fast. The adverb very modifies the adverb fast, telling to what extent. It’s too soon to know your fate.
(The adverb too modifies the adverb soon, telling to what extent.) Please note that the word not and its contraction n’t, are classified as adverbs; they tell to what extent. Adverbs can also be placed in many different positions. They can come after or before a verb or verb phrase or even between the words in a verb phrase.
Adverbs modifying verbs. Where? Examples: fell below, move aside, climbs down? When? — left early, arrived today, begins then. In what way? — happily ran, will end abruptly, sung loudly. To what extent? — partly understands, wash completely. We also have adverbs modifying adjectives and adverbs. Many descriptions can be made more meaningful by adding an adverb to an adjective. An adverb modifying an adjective answers only one question: To what extent?
When an adverb modifies an adjective it usually comes directly before the adjective. Examples: very happy, entirely grateful.
Sometimes adverbs are used to sharpen the meaning of other adverbs. Key concept noted here is that an adverb modifying another adverb answers just one question: To what extent? Some nouns can be used as adverbs. My sister came yesterday.
The noun yesterday is used as an adverb telling when.
She returns home Friday. (The noun home is used as an adverb, telling where. The noun Friday is used as an adverb telling when. Teaching grammar can be a boring exercise unless accompanied by the teacher’s enthusiasm, creativity and lively classes. At low levels of learning teachers can give students passages and ask them to identify various parts of speech together with asking them to construct sentences. Making sentences will help students with relevant practice for future use.
There is a saying which goes: “Strike the iron while it is still hot.” In this vein can I take this opportunity to congratulate those students who excelled in last year’s public examinations — well done. Keep up the spirit of hard work as you go on to higher levels of learning. Some might not be that happy with their performance but the reality is that is what they worked for. There is room for improvement as they continue learning.
There are some who lost hope the moment they sat for their examinations and decided not to set foot at their schools to collect their results. They knew from the start that they did not do well in the examinations. But the decision not to collect the results is defeatist and unacceptable in learning. A good student should learn to accept failure and learn from it. She or he should rise up from that failure with determination to work harder to come up with improved results.
The best such students can do is to lift themselves up and go and collect their results, no matter how they are.
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