Primary English tuition for Ai Tong School families should help students distinguish adjectives such as bored/boring, interested/interesting and confused/confusing by asking who experiences the feeling and what causes it. eduKateSG is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or part of Ai Tong School; this is an independent tuition resource for families.
This rebuilt legacy URL now owns one distinct teaching job: -ed vs -ing participle adjectives—experiencer → cause → meaning. The old school-specific boilerplate, stale phone number and generic 2017 claims have been removed.
eduKateSG currently teaches selected Primary English students in focused 3-pax small groups, typically 1.5 hours, at 83 Punggol Central, Singapore 828761 and 8 Fourth Avenue, Singapore 268674.
The Direct Answer
A useful first distinction is:
- -ed adjective: often describes the person/thing experiencing a state — I am bored.
- -ing adjective: often describes the person/thing causing that state — The lesson is boring.
Ask: who feels it, and what causes the feeling?
Bored vs Boring
“The student is bored.” The student experiences boredom.
“The activity is boring.” The activity causes boredom.
“I am boring” means I cause other people to feel bored—not that I feel bored myself.
Interested vs Interesting
“Mira is interested in astronomy.” Mira experiences interest.
“Astronomy is interesting to Mira.” Astronomy causes or holds the interest.
Confused vs Confusing
“The instructions are confusing.” They cause confusion.
“The students are confused.” They experience confusion.
Students often reverse these forms when translating directly from the idea of “confuse”.
Excited vs Exciting
“We are excited about the trip.”
“The trip sounds exciting.”
The same event can be described from the experiencer’s state or the event’s effect.
Worked Example: Surprised / Surprising
“The result was surprising.” = the result caused surprise.
“The teacher was surprised by the result.” = the teacher experienced surprise.
The by phrase can make the cause explicit.
Worked Example: Tired / Tiring
“I was tired after the hike.” = physical/mental state.
“The hike was tiring.” = it caused tiredness.
Not every -ed/-ing pair is purely emotional, but the experiencer/cause model remains useful.
Worked Example: Frightened / Frightening
“The child looked frightened.”
“The loud crash was frightening.”
Students can now connect linking verbs from other grammar topics: looked frightened describes the child’s state.
The Who/What Arrow
Draw:
cause → feeling/state in experiencer
Example: confusing instructions → confused student.
The -ing form often sits on the cause side; the -ed form often sits on the experiencer side.
Not Every -ed Word Describes a Feeling
Closed door, broken glass and written note are participial adjectives describing states/results, not emotions.
Students should not turn the experiencer/cause shortcut into a universal rule for every -ed/-ing form.
Not Every -ing Word Is an Adjective
“The child is running.” Here running is part of the progressive verb phrase.
“The running water sounded loud.” Here it modifies water.
Grammar depends on sentence function.
Worked Example: Writing
Draft: “I was very exciting when I heard the news.”
Repair: “I was very excited when I heard the news.”
Then transfer: “The news was exciting.” The pair is learned together.
Worked Example: Comprehension
Passage: “The instructions left Amir confused.”
Question: “How did Amir feel?” → confused.
Question: “How might the instructions be described?” → confusing, if the context supports that they caused the difficulty.
Preposition Patterns Matter
Many -ed adjectives occur with familiar prepositions:
- interested in;
- excited about;
- surprised by/at;
- pleased with;
- tired of/from depending on meaning.
Students should learn the adjective together with its common phrase pattern.
The Swap Test
Replace the -ed form with the -ing form. Does the sentence now describe the cause instead of the experiencer?
“The movie was bored” sounds wrong if the movie caused boredom. “The movie was boring” matches the intended role.
The Cause Question
If the sentence uses an -ed adjective, ask what caused the state. If the sentence uses an -ing adjective, ask who experiences the effect.
This makes the semantic relationship explicit.
P1–P2: Familiar Feeling Pairs
Young learners can compare bored/boring, excited/exciting and scared/scary in concrete contexts.
P3–P4: Wider Participial Adjectives
Middle-primary students can use interested/interesting, confused/confusing, surprised/surprising and related phrase patterns.
P5–P6: Function and Boundary
Upper-primary students can distinguish adjectives from progressive/passive verb forms and preserve experiencer/cause roles in editing. The MOE Primary English syllabus treats grammar and vocabulary as integrated resources for meaning. Official reference: MOE English Language Syllabus 2020 Primary.
Common -ed/-ing Failure Modes
| Symptom | Issue | Repair |
|---|---|---|
| “I am boring” for own feeling | Experiencer/cause reversed | Use bored |
| “instructions are confused” | Cause described as experiencer | Use confusing |
| All -ing treated adjective | Verb/adjective function blurred | Check sentence role |
| Preposition wrong | Phrase pattern not stored | Learn adjective + preposition chunk |
| Shortcut applied to broken/closed | Feeling model overgeneralised | Recognise result-state adjectives |
Why Three Students Helps
One student names an experiencer, one supplies the cause, and the third builds both paired sentences. The roles rotate until the grammar follows meaning automatically.
When Ai Tong School Families May Consider This Support
- Bored/boring and interested/interesting are reversed.
- Feeling adjectives are inaccurate in composition.
- -ing forms are always treated as verbs or always as adjectives.
- Adjective + preposition patterns are unstable.
- P5–P6 editing needs finer word-class control.
What Progress Should Look Like
A stronger learner identifies the experiencer and cause, chooses the appropriate participle adjective and recognises when an -ed/-ing form is performing a different grammatical job.
Independent tuition notice: eduKateSG is not affiliated with Ai Tong School. Current centres: 83 Punggol Central, Singapore 828761 and 8 Fourth Avenue, Singapore 268674. Contact +65 8823 1234.