Suffixes

Vocabulary

1. Suffixes

Your friendship means a lot to me.

This activity can be dangerous.

2. Types of suffixes

Suffixes can be used to form nouns, adjectives, adverbs, verbs, comparatives... In this topic we will focus on the formation of nouns and adjectives.

• To form a noun we can add a suffix to a verb, an adjective or another noun. Some of the more common suffixes are:
  

  Suffix	Root word	Opposite	Root word	Opposite
  -TION / -SION	Inform	Information	Decide	Decision
  	Infect	Infection	Conclude	Conclusion
  -ANCE / -ENCE	Patient	Patience	Ignore	Ignorance
  	Obedient	Obedience	Important	Importance
  -ER / -OR	Drive	Driver	Act	Actor
  	Employ	Employer	Instruct	Instructor
  -MENT	Improve	Improvement	Treat	Treatment
  	Develop	Development	Entertain	Entertainment
  -NESS	Lazy	Laziness	Happy	Happiness
  	Sad	Sadness	Kind	Kindness

• To form an adjective we can add a suffix to a verb and a noun mainly, although it can also be added to some adjectives. Some of the most common suffixes are:
  
  

  Suffix	Root word	New word	Root word	New word
  -ABLE / -IBLE	Comfort	Comfortable	Access	Accessible
  	Predict	Predictable	Sense	Sensible
  -FUL	Use	Useful	Pain	Painful
  	Help	Helpful	Power	Powerful
  -LESS	End	Endless	Home	Homeless
  	Harm	Harmless	Hope	Hopeless
  -Y	Cloud	Cloudy	Health	Healthy
  	Luck	Lucky	Noise	Noisy
  -OUS	Danger	Dangerous	Fame	Famous
  	Disaster	Disastrous	Poison	Poisonous

  We will have to look in the dictionary to know which suffix we should use and also to check the spelling.

Remember!