1. It is a good idea to use pictures of people, animals or things to teach comparatives and superlatives. For example, use pictures of two pop/sports stars, to elicit examples with comparative forms, e.g., ‘Jacky is taller than Andy. Andy is thinner than Jacky. Andy is more handsome than Jacky.’ Make sure you use both short and long adjectives. Write the comparative forms on the board in two columns (short and long adjectives) and try to elicit the rule form the students, e.g., we add ‘-er’ to short adjectives and use ‘more’ for long adjectives. Then we add ‘than’ after the comparatives.

4. Give less able students some extra words to rearrange and form complete sentences. You can use the additional items on the page. For stronger classes, divide the students onto pairs and ask each student to think of some jumbled words for his/her partner to rearrange into a complete sentence. Make sure students include adjectives in their sentences. To make the activity meaningful, tell students to describe friends, classmates or other familiar people.

Part B

Teaching procedures

3. For less able students, go through the words in Part A to check understanding. Ask students to rearrange the words on their own. Then invite several students to read out their complete sentences to check the answers.

2. For weaker classes, read the linking verbs in the tip box and check understanding. For stronger lasses, elicit the verbs.

1. Tell students that we use adjectives to describe people and things. Explain that we can put an adjective before a noun or after a linking verb. Read the examples on the page and invite students to think of more examples. Prompt students by giving an example with an adjective, e.g., placed before a noun, and ask students to put the adjective, e.g., after a linking verb and make another sentence.

4. To compare two people/ things using ‘(not) as’+ adjective+ ‘as’

Background information

This section further develops the use of adjectives already introduced in the reading and vocabulary sections. The story moves on from describing best friends for a magazine competition to describing classmates at Beijing Sunshine Secondary School. Daniel wants to write to his e-friends about his classmates. We already know some students’ features from earlier passages but we will learn more about their physical appearance and abilities in this section. Most adjectives are familiar so that students are able to focus on using them accurately in sentences. The use of ‘(not) as’+ adjective+ ‘as’ is introduced in the context of a survey about outdoor activities.

Part A

Teaching procedures

3. To use superlatives to compare three or more people/ things

2. To use comparatives to compare two people/ things

1. To use an adjective before a noun or after a linking verb to describe someone/ something

2. Alternatively, tell students who are drawing the pictures to ask as many questions as possible to get information about the person they are drawing, e.g., ‘Is your person a boy/ a man/ a woman/ tall /small /fat /thin? Is his/ her face square/ round?’ The student looking at the picture is only allowed to say ‘Yes.’ or ‘No.’.

Grammar

Objectives