English Word Skills Exercises for A2 – Adjective suffixes

1. Complete the adjectives with all the possible suffixes below.

-able      -al      -ful      -ish      -less      -ly      -ous      -y

5   enjoy……………

6   self……………

7   week……………

8   taste……………

2. Complete the text with the correct suffixes from exercise 1. Use one suffix three times.

The Beale codes

This is the story of three ¹mysteri…………… documents and a box of buried treasure. The treasure, worth $64 million in today’s money, belonged to an American man called Thomas Beale. He got it by risking his life on a ²danger…………… adventure in New Mexico and he buried it somewhere near the ³snow…………… mountains of Virginia. He then wrote three messages in secret code to describe the exact location. Later, Beale became ⁴friend…………… with a man called Robert Morriss. He believed that Morriss was a ⁵reli…………… person so he left the three messages with him when he had to go away in 1822. He never returned. Morriss could not solve the secret messages and, years later, gave them to a friend. The friend used an important ⁶nation…………… document (the Declaration of Independence) to solve one of the messages, but the other two remain a mystery to this day. Some historians are very ⁷suspici…………… of the whole story. They think people are ⁸fool…………… of to waste their time hunting for treasure that might not exist. But thousands of code-breakers and treasure-hunters are still ⁹hope…………… that they can find the treasure.

3. Complete the adjectives by adding them to the table below. You can make more than one adjective from some of the words.

afford      beauty      care      child      coward      drink

green      help      magic      pain

4. Complete the sentences with words from exercise 3.

1   This coffee isn’t very nice, but I suppose it’s …………………………..

2   I bruised my arm playing basketball and it’s still very …………………………..

3   The receptionist was very ………………………….. and suggested lots of good restaurants near the hotel.

4   There isn’t much to do on this island, but the scenery is …………………………..

5   We can’t eat this bread – the edges look …………………………..

6   More people go abroad for holidays now that flights are more …………………………..

5. Complete the sentences with the correct form of the words in brackets.

1   The criminal chose the most ………………………….. way to travel – by bus. (economy)

2   The food was disappointing: overpriced and ………………………….. (taste)

3   The witness said the suspect had ………………………….. eyes: a mixture of brown and green. (brown)

4   It was ………………………….. that James wasn’t carrying anything valuable when he was mugged. He only lost a cheap watch. (luck)

5   The police are pleased when burglars are ………………………….. and leave fingerprints behind. (care)

6   They noticed the contrast between the ………………………….. setting and the terrible crime. (peace)

7   The mugging victim was ………………………….. that the police hadn’t arrested anyone. (fury)

8   The lawyer didn’t want to use him as a witness because he wasn’t very ………………………….. – his version of what happened kept changing. (rely)

9   It’s ………………………….. to walk around on your own late at night. (danger)