3 Types of -ing Verb
Ready for some challenging academic grammar?
English grammar can be difficult because sometimes the same word works differently in different situations. This is true for -ing verbs, which can do three different things.
Let's look at the 3 types:
Three types of -ing verb
CONTINUOUS VERBS
The man is walking.
This is the most basic one: a present continuous verb. The subject in the sentence is "man" and "is walking" tells us what he is doing right now. If you see an -ing verb after a be verb (am, is, are, was, were), it is probably a continuous verb.
Another name for continuous verbs is progressive verbs. Continuous and progressive mean the same thing.
PARTICIPIAL ADJECTIVES
The walking man lives with my friend Paul.
The man walking across the street lives with my friend Paul.
In both of these sentences, walking works like an adjective, not a verb. Walking describes the man, and the verb in the sentence is lives. When an -ing verb describes a noun, we call it a participial adjective. Participial adjectives can come before or after the noun, but it is more common to put them after the noun.
Read a little more about participial adjectives here.
GERUNDS
The man likes walking.
In this sentence, we have a subject: the man. We have a verb: likes . What is the -ing verb here? It's the thing that the man likes. What does he like? Walking. Walking is the object of like. What are some other things you can like? Sports, travel, English. All nouns. Object of verbs are nouns, so walking is acting as a noun here. That's what a gerund is: an -ing verb that works like a noun.
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The Most Common English Adjectives
If you want to quickly expand your English vocabulary, adjectives are a great place to start! Adjectives are a really important part of speech. An adjective is a word used to describe a noun.
It is a good idea to focus on the most common ones in the language. Below are lists of the 50 most common words in both American and British English.
| No. | Adjective |
|---|---|
| 1 | OTHER |
| 2 | NEW |
| 3 | GOOD |
| 4 | AMERICAN |
| 5 | GREAT |
| 6 | BIG |
| 7 | HIGH |
| 8 | OLD |
| 9 | DIFFERENT |
| 10 | NATIONAL |
| 11 | SMALL |
| 12 | LITTLE |
| 13 | BLACK |
| 14 | IMPORTANT |
| 15 | POLITICAL |
| 16 | SOCIAL |
| 17 | LONG |
| 18 | YOUNG |
| 19 | RIGHT |
| 20 | BEST |
| 21 | REAL |
| 22 | WHITE |
| 23 | PUBLIC |
| 24 | SURE |
| 25 | ONLY |
| 26 | LARGE |
| 27 | ABLE |
| 28 | HUMAN |
| 29 | LOCAL |
| 30 | EARLY |
| 31 | BAD |
| 32 | BETTER |
| 33 | ECONOMIC |
| 34 | FREE |
| 35 | POSSIBLE |
| 36 | WHOLE |
| 37 | MAJOR |
| 38 | MILITARY |
| 39 | FEDERAL |
| 40 | INTERNATIONAL |
| 41 | TRUE |
| 42 | FULL |
| 43 | HARD |
| 44 | SPECIAL |
| 45 | RECENT |
| 46 | RED |
| 47 | OPEN |
| 48 | PERSONAL |
| 49 | GENERAL |
| 50 | CLEAR |
| No. | Adjective |
|---|---|
| 1 | OTHER |
| 2 | NEW |
| 3 | GOOD |
| 4 | OLD |
| 5 | DIFFERENT |
| 6 | LOCAL |
| 7 | GREAT |
| 8 | SMALL |
| 9 | SOCIAL |
| 10 | IMPORTANT |
| 11 | NATIONAL |
| 12 | HIGH |
| 13 | BRITISH |
| 14 | POSSIBLE |
| 15 | LARGE |
| 16 | RIGHT |
| 17 | LONG |
| 18 | LITTLE |
| 19 | YOUNG |
| 20 | POLITICAL |
| 21 | ABLE |
| 22 | GENERAL |
| 23 | ONLY |
| 24 | PUBLIC |
| 25 | AVAILABLE |
| 26 | FULL |
| 27 | EARLY |
| 28 | BEST |
| 29 | BIG |
| 30 | MAIN |
| 31 | MAJOR |
| 32 | ECONOMIC |
| 33 | SURE |
| 34 | REAL |
| 35 | LIKELY |
| 36 | BLACK |
| 37 | PARTICULAR |
| 38 | INTERNATIONAL |
| 39 | SPECIAL |
| 40 | DIFFICULT |
| 41 | CERTAIN |
| 42 | CLEAR |
| 43 | WHOLE |
| 44 | FURTHER |
| 45 | WHITE |
| 46 | OPEN |
| 47 | EUROPEAN |
| 48 | FREE |
| 49 | CENTRAL |
| 50 | SIMILAR |
Most of the most common adjectives are the same in the US and the UK (78% of the top 50 and 92% of the top 25 words appear in both lists). Notice that American is the 4th most common adjective in American English and British is the 13th most common adjective in British English. We shouldn't read too much into these simple lists, but it is interesting to note that military, federal, and personal all appear in the American list. Do you notice any other patterns?
That's all for now! Start studying!
If you're looking for something similar, check out the most common verbs in English.
Sources: The primary sources for compiling this article were the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) and the British National Corpus.
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Basic Geometry Vocabulary
Basic geometry vocabulary
Rob from Ginseng English recently took a trip to Shanghai and recorded a lesson on geograph—err, geometry vocabulary. Take a moment and have a look!
Geometry Vocabulary List
Vertical (adj.) - positioned up and down rather than from side to side; going straight up
Horizontal (adj.) - positioned from side to side rather than up and down; parallel to the ground
Diagonal (adj.) - not going straight across or up and down
Beam (n.) - a long and heavy piece of wood or metal that is used as a support in a building
Post (n.) - a piece of wood or metal that is set in a vertical position, especially as a support or marker
Narrow (adj.) - long and not wide
Wide (adj.) - extending a great distance from one side to the other; not narrow
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If you're trying to improve your English vocabulary online, check out these other free vocabulary resources from the Ginseng English Blog:
Collocates with Summer
Collocates with summer
It's summer in Boston! ☀️😎🏖
Let's take a look at some of the words that are most common after summer. Remember, a collocate is a word that is often used with another word. Focusing on collocation is a very good way to learn common English phrases and expressions.
Here are some of the most common words after summer that we hope you find useful as you learn English!
If this was helpful, check out these other English collocates!
