Describing character (Vocabulary, Part II)

-

Intellectual Ability

-Ability: intelligent          bright          clever         smart        shrewd        able        gifted               talented       brainy

-Lacking ability: stupid        foolish      half-witted       simple       silly        brainless                      daft        dumb        dim

-Clever in a negative way: cunning         crafty       sly


Attitudes towards life

-Looking on either the brigt or the black side of things:     optimistic       pessimistic

-Outward-looking or inward-looking:     extroverted       introverted

-Calm or not calm with regard to attutude to life:     relaxed       tense

-Practical, nit dreamy in approach to life:     sensible        down-to-earth

-Feeling things very intensely:     sensitive


Attitudes towards other people

-Enjoying other's company:     sociable        gregarious

-Disagreeing with others:    quarrelsome        argumentative

-Taking pleasure in others' pain:     cruel        sadistic

-Relaxed in attitude to self and others:      easy-going         even-tempered

-Not polite to others:     impolite       rude       ill-mannered       discourteous

-Telling the truth to others:     honest     trustworthy     reliable     sincere

-Unhappy if others have what one does not have oneself:     jealous     envious




1. Try to guess the meaning of the previous adjectives to describe character.



2. Do you think that the speaker likes or dislikes the people s/he is talking about?

  • Di's very thrifty
  • Molly's quite bossy
  • Sam' very cunny
  • I find Dave down-to-earth
  • Don't you think Jim's ill-mannered?



3. Magazines often publish questionnaries which are supposed to analyse your character for you. Here you have some questions which aims to decide whether a person is like; can you tell the perfect adjective for them?
  • Do you prefer to be in the company pf other people?
  • Look at the picture. Do you think 'my glass is half empty'?
  • Do you find it easy to tell your boss if you feel he or she has treated you badly?
  • Do you always look out of the window if you hear a car draw up?
  • Do you often buy your friends presents for no particular reason?
  • Do you frequently disagree with what other people say?
  • Do you lie awake at night if someone has said something unkind to you?


4. Let's talk or write!
Which adjectives do you think best describe either your own or a friend's charactter? How do you or your friend demonstrate these characteristics?








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Alexander Graham Bell (Use of English)

-
Read the text below and choose word from each space. Alexander Graham Bell Alexander Graham Bell 1.___ born in Scotland in 1847. His father, an expert on speech, 2.____  a way of teaching how words 3.___ be pronounced. He translated the 4.___ of words into straight or curvy lines. Alexander 5.___ to be a teacher and, when his mother went deaf, he started to be 6.___ in how deaf people communicate. In 1870, because his children were in poor health, Alexander and his family moved to the United States. He hoped that a warmer 7.___ would be better for the whole family. It was while he was teaching deaf children there 8.___ he invented a new machine. It was very 9.___ to the human ear itself, and Bell discover it could carry human speech 10.___ a wire from one place to another. It was not long before the telephone was a part of 11.___ our lives! 1. A.was   B.is   C.has   D.had 2. A.grew   B.built   C.developed   D.worked 3. A.ought   B.should   C.might   D.would
Read more

Computers (Past Simple vs. Present Perfect Simple)

-
Computers Since computers were first introduced to the public in the early 1980's, technology  has changed  a great deal. The first computers were  simple machines designed for basic tasks. They  did not have  much memory and they  weren't  very powerful. Early computers were often quite expensive and customers often  paid  thousands of dollars for machines which actually  did  very little. Most computers  were  separate, individual machines used mostly as expensive typewriters or for playing games.  Times  have changed . Computers have become  powerful machines with very practical applications. Programmers have created  a large selection of useful programs which do everything from teaching foreign languages to bookkeeping. We are still playing video games, but today's games  have become  faster, more exciting interactive adventures. Many computer users  have also got  on the Internet and have begun  communicating with other computer users around the world. We have start
Read more

How the recycling symbol was created (Reading)

-
Image
Six sentences have been removed from the article. Choose from the sentences A-G the one which fits each gap. How the recycling symbol was created  Gary Anderson designed a symbol which we see everywhere nowadays I studied engineering at the University of Southern California at a time when there was a lot of emphasis in the United States on training young people to be engineers. That said, I eventually switched to architecture. I just couldn't get a grasp on electronics and archircture seemed more concrete to me. It was around that time that I saw a poster advertising a design competition being run by the Container Corporation of America. The idea was to create a symbol to represent recycled paper. One of my college requirements had been a graphic design course so I thhought I'd give it a go. It didn't take me long to come up with my design: only a day or two. 1.___. But I already had arrows and angles in my mind because on my course I'd done a present
Read more