Adjectives with Nouns and Verbs; -ed and -ing Forms — English Grammar Exercises
He seems interested. It's an interesting idea. — 45 exercises on adjective form and position.
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Where adjectives go
- Before a noun: an interesting idea, a long flight
- After a linking verb (be, seem, look, feel, become, get): The idea is interesting. She seems tired.
-ed or -ing?
Many feeling adjectives have two forms:
- -ing describes the cause — what produces the feeling: a boring film, the news was surprising
- -ed describes how someone feels — the experiencer: I was bored, she felt surprised
| cause (-ing) | feeling (-ed) |
|---|---|
| The film is boring. | I am bored. |
| The trip was exhausting. | We were exhausted. |
| It's an interesting book. | She's interested in it. |
Watch out: I'm boring means "I make others bored". To say how you feel, use I'm bored.
Adjective or adverb after a verb?
After linking verbs — be, seem, look, feel, become, taste, smell, sound — use an adjective: ✅ The soup tastes delicious. ❌ tastes deliciously.
After an action verb, use an adverb: ✅ She sang beautifully. He looked at me angrily.
a- adjectives
alive, asleep, awake, afraid, alone, ashamed are used after a verb, not before a noun: ✅ The baby is asleep. ❌ the asleep baby → ✅ the sleeping baby.
Common mistakes
| ❌ | ✅ |
|---|---|
| The lesson is bored. | The lesson is boring. |
| I'm very interesting in art. | I'm very interested in art. |
| It smells wonderfully. | It smells wonderful. |
| She is an asleep child. | She is a sleeping child. |
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The film was so ___ that I fell asleep halfway through.
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boring
The film causes the feeling, so use the -ing form — 'boring'.
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After the long flight, the children were ___.
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tired
The children feel the effect, so use the -ed form — 'tired'.
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I'm really ___ in learning Japanese this year.
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interested
You feel the interest, so use the -ed form — 'interested in'.
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Her new book is absolutely ___.
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fascinating
The book causes the feeling, so use the -ing form — 'fascinating'.
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We were ___ by the bad news about the factory.
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shocked
The people feel the effect, so use the -ed form — 'shocked'.
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The journey home was long and ___.
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exhausting
The journey causes the feeling, so use the -ing form — 'exhausting'.
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This soup tastes ___.
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delicious
After the linking verb 'taste', use an adjective — 'tastes delicious'.
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She looked ___ when she heard the result.
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surprised
She feels the effect, so use the -ed form — 'looked surprised'.
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The ___ baby didn't hear the doorbell.
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sleeping
'Asleep' cannot go before a noun — use 'sleeping baby'.
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I was ___ with the hotel — it was much worse than the photos.
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disappointed
You feel the effect, so use the -ed form — 'disappointed'.
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The lecture was quite ___ — nobody understood it.
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confusing
The lecture causes the feeling, so use the -ing form — 'confusing'.
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Everyone felt ___ after the team lost the final.
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depressed
The people feel the effect, so use the -ed form — 'felt depressed'.
Adjectives with Nouns and Verbs, and -ed/-ing Forms: A Complete Grammar Reference
Two related but distinct systems govern how adjectives behave with verbs in English, and both are consistent sources of error at B1–B2 level. The first is the -ed vs -ing contrast in adjectives derived from emotion verbs — bored/boring, interested/interesting — where learners must decide whether the noun causes a feeling or experiences it. The second is the choice between an adjective and an adverb after a verb, which depends on whether the verb is a linking verb (be, look, feel, seem, sound, taste) or an action verb (speak, drive, sing). Research from the Cambridge Learner Corpus identifies the -ed/-ing confusion as one of the most persistent adjective errors even among learners who have studied English for several years, and it appears in speech as often as in writing, because the two forms differ by only two letters and sound similar. A smaller but equally fixed rule concerns 'a-' adjectives like asleep and alive, which cannot go directly before a noun. These 45 exercises cover all three areas systematically.
The -ed vs -ing Contrast: Cause vs Effect
Adjectives built from verbs like bore, interest, excite, confuse, and surprise have two forms with opposite roles. The -ing form describes whatever causes a feeling — a film, a book, a situation, a person. The -ed form describes the person who experiences that feeling.
After the long flight, the children were tired. (the children feel the effect)
Her new book is absolutely fascinating. (the book causes the feeling)
I was disappointed with the hotel. (I feel the effect)
My brother is so boring — he never stops talking about himself. (he causes the feeling in others)
The -ed form can also appear before a noun, not just after 'be': 'the excited children could hardly sleep', because the children themselves are the ones affected.
Adjectives After Linking Verbs (look, feel, seem, sound, taste, smell)
Linking verbs connect the subject to a description of the subject, so they take an adjective, not an adverb. This applies to be, look, feel, seem, sound, taste, and smell whenever they describe a state rather than an action.
Your plan sounds perfect. (not 'perfectly')
The bread smells fresh. (not 'freshly')
You look tired today. Are you okay? (not 'tiredly')
The same verbs take an adverb when they describe an action instead of a state: 'she sang beautifully' (the action of singing), 'he looked at me angrily' (the action of looking at something, with 'at').
A- Adjectives: asleep, alive, afraid
A small set of adjectives beginning with 'a-' — asleep, alive, afraid, alone, awake — can only be used after a verb, never directly before a noun. Before a noun, English substitutes a different word.
The asleep baby... ✗
Is the cat still alive after the accident? ✓ / a living creature ✓
Common Mistakes
✗ She looks tiredly. → ✓ She looks tired. (linking verb + adjective)
✗ He sang beautiful at the concert. → ✓ He sang beautifully at the concert. ('sing' is an action verb here)
✗ This coffee tastes bitterly. → ✓ This coffee tastes bitter. (linking verb 'taste' + adjective)
✗ The asleep dog was lying by the fire. → ✓ The sleeping dog was lying by the fire.
✗ Everyone felt depressing after the loss. → ✓ Everyone felt depressed after the loss.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between 'bored' and 'boring'?
'Boring' (the -ing form) describes the thing that causes the feeling: 'the film was boring' means the film itself was dull. 'Bored' (the -ed form) describes the person who experiences the feeling: 'I was bored' means I felt no interest. The same pattern applies to dozens of adjective pairs built from verbs of emotion: interesting/interested, exciting/excited, confusing/confused, tiring/tired, exhausting/exhausted, and disappointing/disappointed. A useful test is to ask whether the subject of the sentence is the cause of the feeling (use -ing) or the person affected by it (use -ed). Saying 'I'm boring' when you mean 'I'm bored' is a well-known error that actually reverses the intended meaning.
When do you use an adjective instead of an adverb after a verb?
After linking verbs — be, look, feel, seem, sound, taste, smell — English uses an adjective, because the word describes the subject, not the action: 'she looks tired', 'the soup tastes delicious', 'your plan sounds perfect'. These verbs don't describe an action being performed; they describe a state or quality. After action verbs — sing, drive, speak, look at, answer — English uses an adverb instead, because now the word describes how the action is performed: 'she sang beautifully', 'he looked at me angrily'. The verb 'look' is tricky because it can be both: 'you look tired' (linking) versus 'he looked at me angrily' (action, with 'at').
Why can't you say 'the asleep baby'?
A small group of adjectives that begin with 'a-' — asleep, alive, afraid, alone, awake — can only be used after a verb (predicative position), never directly before a noun (attributive position). So 'the baby is asleep' is correct, but 'the asleep baby' is not; English uses a different word before the noun instead, such as 'sleeping': 'the sleeping baby'. The same substitution applies to 'alive', which becomes 'living' before a noun ('a living creature', not 'an alive creature'). This is a fixed grammatical restriction on this specific set of words, not a general rule about all adjectives.
What are other common -ed/-ing adjective pairs to learn?
Beyond bored/boring, the most frequent pairs at B1–B2 level include: interested/interesting, excited/exciting, confused/confusing, amazed/amazing, surprised/surprising, embarrassed/embarrassing, disappointed/disappointing, depressed/depressing, shocked/shocking, and fascinated/fascinating. In every pair, the -ing form describes whatever causes the feeling (a person, film, situation, or piece of news), and the -ed form describes the person who experiences it. Learning these as fixed pairs, rather than as separate vocabulary items, makes it easier to apply the same cause/effect logic to new adjectives built the same way.
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