Common Mistakes with Adjectives - ED or ING?

Am I Bored or Boring?


I frequently hear students make this mistake, so don’t worry if you have done this too. It is very quick and easy to fix this error.


First of all, let’s remind ourselves about what an adjective is.

Adjectives are an important part of speech and simply put, an adjective describes a noun or a pronoun by providing further information and indicating things like size, shape and colour etc.
Adjectives can take many forms and can be used to describe many different aspects of a noun, including how you feel about something or someone.

So, let’s take a look at the previous example above of Bored and Boring.


These adjectives have been created by adding the suffixes ED or ING to the verb Bore.

You can do this to almost any verb to create an adjective you can use to describe a noun in more detail. Here are some more examples:

Interested / Interesting
Excited / Exciting
Worried / Worrying
Confused / Confusing

Knowing how to create these words is the first part, however, using them correctly is a really important thing. So, here is a very simple way to remember how to use your ED & ING adjectives correctly.

The noun you want to describe is a thing. It may be a feeling you have, or it may be an actual object. Whatever it is, it is a thING.

So, there is your first clue as to which adjective form is used to describe the object.


The presentation was interestING
The concert was excitING
It is worryING
The contract is confusING

To describe how you feel, use the ED ending.


I was interestED in the presentation
I was excitED by the concert
I was worriED
I am confusED

So, no more mistakes with ING and ED adjectives!


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