Adverbs Practice Sheet 1

Adverbs are words that modify

• a verb (He drove slowly. — How did he drive?)
• an adjective (He drove a very fast car. — How fast was his car?)
• another adverb (She moved quite slowly down the aisle. — How slowly did she move?)

As we will see, adverbs often tell when, where, why, or under what conditions something happens or happened. Adverbs frequently end in -ly; however, many words and phrases not ending in -ly serve an adverbial function and an -ly ending is not a guarantee that a word is an adverb. The words lovely, lonely, motherly, friendly, neighborly, for instance, are adjectives:

• That lovely woman lives in a friendly neighborhood.

Adverbs practice:

Fill in the following adverbs in sentence gaps:

1. Come here ________________. You have to see this!
2. We knew that she had got the job when we saw her ________________ talking on the phone.
3. He ________________ put the vase on the table. It fell to the floor.
4. Sharon is throwing a party on Saturday. She ________________ finished her PhD.
5. Let's walk ________________. I don't want to be the first one at the meeting.
6. Alex ________________ put up the bookshelves. It was too difficult for me to do on my own.
7. Every thing happened so ________________. We had to move to California in less than a month.
8. Why does he always have to talk so ________________. You can hear him in the next room!
9. Although she speaks five languages, she did not do ________________ on the translation exam.
10. I was so surprised. His new apartment was ________________ decorated.

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