Bored or Boring? -ed and -ing Endings

Was Juan bored or boring? In this case, it seems that he was both! Were you scary or scared, as the movie was scaring you? If this topic interests you, are you interested or interesting in it?

Let’s clarify when to use -ed and -ing endings to create adjectives from verbs, so you can avoid this common error in English.

The -ed ending refers to emotions. The -ing refers to characteristics. So if you are bored, it means that you are not interested in or engaged by what is happening. If you are boring, it means that you are not an interesting person.

Let’s look at some more examples.

Why is this confusing?

What’s confusing for students is that the -ed and -ing endings turn verbs into adjectives, and they also change basic verb forms into verb tenses like the Present Perfect and Present Continuous. The formal name for these types of adjectives is ‘participial adjectives’, because they have the same form as present and past participle verbs. Let’s look at a couple of examples.

You overwhelmed me with work in an overwhelmingly awful way. I was so overwhelmed and pissed off at you. That can’t happen again.

The first instance is a verb to overwhelm in the past participle. The second is an adjective of emotion.

Stop talking about the guide book. Your advice is just confusing and distracting me. The book is badly written and confusing.

Here, the first one is the verb to confuse in the present participle, and the other is an adjective of emotion.

Try a quick quiz!

Let’s talk.

1.) Take turns selecting feelings and asking the question:
Have you ever felt ___? Tell me about it.
2.) Try to use all of the forms in your answers.

Try the quiz!

-Ed or -Ing Movie Quiz

Further Reading

Check out what the Cambridge Dictionary has to say on this topic.