APIEHow + adjective: Asking about measurements
Mountains, rivers and deserts
Answers and an explanation for each question appear once you add this activity to your own library.
How + Adjective Questions and Measurements
Learn how to ask about size, distance and height, and how to give the answers with exact numbers or everyday estimates.
📋 How to use this lesson
🧑🏫 For the teacher
• Give learners five minutes for the rule table and seven minutes for the twelve practice tasks.
• Check answers as a class by asking learners to read the full question and answer aloud.
🎒 For the learner
• Read the four rules first and look closely at the underlined words in the examples.
• Do the practice tasks one by one and use the one-word clue in brackets when you need help.
Example to remember
"The valley is about two kilometres wide, and the cliff behind it is 150 metres high."
Four Rules for Asking and Answering
Look at how each word works in everyday speech.
Picking the right word
Choose the word that matches the kind of size you want to know. Use high for tall things, long for rivers and roads, wide from side to side, and deep down into water.
• "How high is the peak?"
• "The cliff is very tall, but how deep is the stream below it?"
Word order in questions
Keep how and the word together at the start, and put is or are after them. Say How wide is it? and never say How is it wide?.
• "How high are the cliffs near this village?"
• "How wide is the green valley?"
Giving the measurement
Say the number first, then the measuring word, and put the size word at the end. Add about before the number when you do not know the exact count.
• "The path to the top is about five kilometres long."
• "That big rock is three metres high."
Asking about distance
Use how far when you ask about the distance from one place to another place. The answer usually has the word from.
• "How far is the desert from the city?"
• "How far is the river bank from our camp?"
Try It Yourself (12 Items)
Work through these tasks from easiest to hardest. Check your hints if you get stuck.
Choose the sentence with the correct words and word order:
Choose the sentence that gives the measurement correctly:
Choose the right question to ask about the distance from one side of the valley to the other:
Sentence: The mountain stream is [one metre] deep.
Rewrite the sentence as a question to ask about the words in brackets:
Sentence: This desert cactus is [three metres] high.
Rewrite the sentence as a question to ask about the words in brackets:
Sentence: The steep cliffs are [eighty metres] high.
Rewrite the sentence as a question to ask about the words in brackets:
Complete the question by writing the missing measuring word:
"How ____ is the desert from our village?"
Complete the question about the grassy river bank with is or are:
"How wide ____ the grassy bank of this river?"
We do not know the exact size of the rock. Type the word that means not exact:
"That round rock on the hill is ____ four metres high."
Rewrite the underlined question correctly:
____Rewrite the underlined sentence with the words in the right order:
____Rewrite the underlined question using the right question phrase for distance:
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