small words
Short, common terms
Small words is a phrase used to describe the brief, common function words that form the backbone of English sentences—articles, prepositions, conjunctions, pronouns, and auxiliary verbs like a, the, of, and, it, is.
Despite their size, these words carry enormous grammatical weight and appear with such frequency that they account for a large portion of any text.
Language learners and writers are often advised to pay attention to small words because errors with them are conspicuous.
- littleSmall in degree
- minusculeExtremely small in size
- tinyExtremely small in size
- interjectionsEmotive verbal outbursts
- diminutiveVery small, or nickname form
particles · compact · petite · brief · bits and pieces · nuts and bolts · building blocks · connectors · pronouns · determiners · prepositions · an · conjunctions · miniature · the · auxiliaries · monosyllables · language
small wordsnouns
Words naming entities
verbs · adjectives · adverbs · loaded words · technical terms
small, smaller, smallest, smallish, smallness, word, words, worded, wording