There are thousands of words in any language. But not all words have the same job. For example, some words express "action". Other words express a "thing". Other words "join" one word to another word. These are the "building blocks" of the language. Think of them like the parts of a house. When we want to build a house, we use concrete to make the foundations or base. We use bricks to make the walls. We use window frames to make the windows, and door frames to make the doorways. And we use cement to join them all together. Each part of the house has its own job. And when we want to build a sentence, we use the different types of word. Each type of word has its own job.

We can categorize English words into 8 basic types or classes. These classes are called "parts of speech".

Its quite important to recognize parts of speech. This helps you to analyze sentences and understand them. It also helps you to construct good sentences.

In this lesson, we have an overview of the eight parts of speech, followed by a quiz to check your understanding:

Parts of Speech Table

This is a summary of the 8 parts of speech*. You can find more detail if you click on each part of speech.

part of speech	function or "job"	example words	example sentences
Verb	action or state	(to) be, have, do, like, work, sing, can, must	EnglishClub.com is a web site. I like EnglishClub.com.
Noun	thing or person	pen, dog, work, music, town, London, teacher, John	This is my dog. He lives in my house. We live in London.
Adjective	describes a noun	a/an, the, 69, some, good, big, red, well, interesting	My dog is big. I like big dogs.
Adverb	describes a verb, adjective or adverb	quickly, silently, well, badly, very, really	My dog eats quickly. When he is very hungry, he eats really quickly.
Pronoun	replaces a noun	I, you, he, she, some	Tara is Indian. She is beautiful.
Preposition	links a noun to another word	to, at, after, on, but	We went to school on Monday.
Conjunction	joins clauses or sentences or words	and, but, when	I like dogs and I like cats. I like cats and dogs. I like dogs but I dont like cats.
Interjection	short exclamation, sometimes inserted into a sentence	oh!, ouch!, hi!, well	Ouch! That hurts! Hi! How are you? Well, I dont know.

* Some grammar sources categorize English into 9 or 10 parts of speech. At EnglishClub.com, we use the traditional categorization of 8 parts of speech. Examples of other categorizations are:

• Verbs may be treated as two different parts of speech:
  • Lexical Verbs (work, like, run)
  • Auxiliary Verbs (be, have, must)
• Determiners may be treated as a separate part of speech, instead of being categorized under Adjectives

 

Parts of Speech Examples

Here are some sentences made with different English parts of speech:

verb Stop!

noun verb John works.

noun verb verb John is working.

 

pronoun verb noun She loves animals.

noun verb adjective noun Animals like kind people.

 

noun verb noun adverb Tara speaks English well.

noun verb adjective noun Tara speaks good English.

 

pronoun	verb	preposition	adjective	noun	adverb
She	ran	to	the	station	quickly.

 

pron.	verb	adj.	noun	conjunction	pron.	verb	pron.
She	likes	big	snakes	but	I	hate	them.

Here is a sentence that contains every part of speech:

interjection	pron.	conj.	adj.	noun	verb	prep.	noun	adverb
Well,	she	and	young	John	walk	to	school	slowly.

 

 

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