FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: Negatives For the FCE exam, there's nearly always at least one negative in the word formation paper. There are lots of prefixes and suffixes we can use to make negatives. 1. Negative prefixes can be used with nouns, verbs, adjective and adverbs. For example disapproval, disapprove, disapproving, disapprovingly. 2. Usually im + p (impatient) but not always (unpleasant). (unpleasant). 3. Often il + l (illegal) but not always (unlikely). 4. Often ir + r (irregular) but not always (unresponsive). (unresponsive). 5. Usually -ful changes to -less (harmful/less) but not always (endless). 6. If you can't remember, choose un - it's the most common negative prefix.
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: Nouns with -ion One of the most common ways to change a verb to a noun is with -ion (e.g. act to action) and -ation (e.g. observe to observation). Sometimes we also change the verb stem as well when we make the noun like this (e.g. explain to explanation). The table below shows common nouns in which the spelling of the stem also changes.
Noun
Verb
Adjective
application
apply
applicable
permission
permit
permissable
solution
solve
unsolved
description
describe
descriptive
intention
intend
unintended
competition
compete
competitive
decision
decide
decisive
explanation
explain
unexplained
production
produce
productive
repetition
repeat
repetitive
consumption
comsume
consumable
qualification
qualify
qualified
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: Nouns with -ence and -ance Two common noun endings are -ance and -ence. Usually, their adjectives are made with ant and -ent. Here are some common examples which might help you in the FCE exam.
Noun (-ence)
Adjective
Verb
evidence
evident
-
existence
existing
to exist
(in)dependence
(in)dependent
to depend
difference
different
to differ
intelligence
intelligent
-
(dis)obedience
(dis)obedient
to (dis)obey
excellence
excellent
to excel
silence
silent
to silence
violence
violent
to violate
innocence
innocent
-
occurrence
-
to occur
(im)patience
(im)patient
-
Noun (-ance)
Adjective
Verb
attendance attendant (person)
-
to attend
assistance assistant (person)
-
to assist
(dis)appearance
apparent
to (dis)appear
distance
distant
-
(un)importance
(un)important
-
acceptance
accepting
accept
reassurance
reassured
to reassure
(ir)relevance
(ir)relevant
-
(in)significance
(in)significant
to signify
Note: You are only given the more common words here. There are other forms (for example, it is possible to use "to evidence something" as a verb) but these are less common.
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation Verb + ment / adjective + ness Many verbs can form nouns with the suffix -ment. And many adjectives can form their nouns with the suffix -ness.
Verb
Noun
Adjective
Noun
achieve
achievement
aware
awareness
amuse
amusement
dark
darkness
argue
argument
forgetful
forgetfulness
develop
development
happy
happiness
encourage
encouragement
homeless
homelessness
excite
excitement
lazy
laziness
improve
improvement
lonely
loneliness
involve
involvement
rude
rudeness
judge
judgement
tidy
tidiness
measure
measurement
weak
weakness
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: Irregular Nouns There are lots of standard noun suffixes (e.g -ment, -tion) or verb suffixes. But many nouns and verbs have irregular suffixes which you'll need to know for the FCE exam.
Noun
Verb
Adjective
Adverb
(dis)belief
(dis)believe
(un)believable
(un)believably
a choice
choose
chosen
-
a defense
defend
defensive
defensively
a death
die
dead/deadly
deadly
a gift
give
-
-
a loss
lose
lost
-
a marriage
marry
(un)married
-
practice
practise
practising
-
pretense
pretend
-
-
proof
(dis)prove
(un)proven
-
safety
save
(un)safe
safely
a sight
see
unseen
-
a speech
speak
(un)spoken
-
a success
succeed
(un)successful
(un)successfully
a thought
think
thoughtful/less
thoughtfully/lessly
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: Adjectives with -ful/-less Most adjectives which end in -ful make the negative with -less. But, not all. Note also that we can make adverbs from these adjectives with -fully or -lessly. For example, carefully and carelessly . This is a list of key words which might appear in the FCE exam. The words in this table all use -ful and -less to make the adjectives.
Noun
Verb
Adjective
care
care
careful/careless
harm
harm
harmful/harmless
help
help
(un)helpful/helpless
hope
hope
hopeful/hopeless
pain
pain
painful/painless
power
power
powerful/powerless
use
use
useful/useless
thought
think
thoughtful/thoughtless
taste
taste
tasteful/tasteless
The adjectives in this table take -ful or -less, but not both.
Noun
Verb
Adjective
count
count
countless/countable
end
end
endless
home
-
homeless
peace
-
peaceful
play
play
playful
price
price
priceless
success
succeed
(un)successful
truth
-
(un)truthful/(un)true
worth
worth
worthless
FCE (First Certificate) Word Formation: height, width... The word formation part of the FCE use of English exam often tests adjectives such as 'short', 'wide', 'dark' and their nouns and verbs. Here is a list of some of the more common adjectives and their forms.
