Year 1 — Vocabulary

Everyday and descriptive words

Use everyday words correctly, and add describing words to make your sentences more interesting and clear.

💡Understand

Describing words tell us more about something — like its colour, size, or how it feels. Adding a describing word makes a sentence much more interesting than a plain one.

“I have a dog. → I have a fluffy, brown dog.”

The second sentence uses describing words ('fluffy', 'brown') to tell us much more about the dog than the plain first sentence does.

🔍Spot it

Which sentence uses describing words?

Question 1

Choose the one with describing words.

💡 'Tiny' and 'red' are describing words that tell us more about the ball.

Question 2

Choose the one with describing words.

💡 'Bright' and 'blue' describe what the bird looked like.

Question 3

Which describing word tells us how something feels to touch?

💡 'Soft' describes how something feels when you touch it.

🧠Think about it

Why is 'a big, scary, growling dog' more interesting to read than just 'a dog'?

✍️Try it

Choose the best describing word.

The ___ sun made everyone squint.

Question 1

Which describing word fits best?

💡 Think about what would make people squint their eyes.

📝Practise

Choose the best describing word for each sentence.

Question 1

The ___ ice cream was melting fast.

Question 2

The ___ giant took huge steps.

Question 3

The kitten had ___ fur.

Question 4

In one word, what do we call a word that describes something, like its colour or size?

💡 It's the topic of this whole lesson.

Question 5

The ___ thunder made everyone jump.

Question 6

She wore a ___ dress to the party.

🎯Apply

Read the passage, then answer the questions below.

The tall, green tree had shiny, red apples hanging from its branches.

Question 1

What describing words tell us about the tree?

💡 Look right after the word 'the' near the start.

Question 2

What describing words tell us about the apples?

Question 3

What colour were the apples?

💡 It's one of the two describing words used for the apples.

🏆Challenge

Can you make the sentence 'I saw a dog' more interesting by adding two describing words?

🔄Review

A quick mastery check — 3 questions.

Question 1

The ___ mountain was covered in snow.

Question 2

Why do describing words make writing more interesting?

Question 3

The ___ puppy chased its tail.

Want to practise building words from prefixes, suffixes and roots? Try the word-family builder →