Schoolhouse Rock!

"Unpack Your Adjectives"

Original Air Date

March 9, 1974

A young girl and her turtle friend go camping in the forest, using adjectives to describe people, places and things they encounter. This song was voted the 14th best song on the 30th Anniversary DVD Top 25.

Lyrics to "Unpack Your Adjectives"

Came home from camping last spring.

Saw people, places and things.

We barely had arrived,

Friends asked us to describe

The people, places and every last thing.

So we unpacked our adjectives.

I unpacked "frustrating" first.

Reached in and found the word "worst."

Then I picked "soggy" and

Next I picked "foggy" and

Then I was ready to tell them my tale,

'cause I'd unpacked my adjectives.

Adjectives are words you use to really describe things,

Handy words to carry around.

Days are sunny or they're rainy

Boys are dumb or else they're brainy

Adjectives can show you which way.

Adjectives are often used to help us compare things

To say how thin how fat how short how tall.

Girls who are tall can get taller,

Boys who are small can get smaller,

Till one is the tallest

And one is the smallest of all.

We hiked along without care.

Then we ran into a bear!

He was a hairy bear!

He was a scary bear!

We beat a hasty retreat from his lair,

And described him with adjectives!

Whoah! Boy, that was one big, ugly bear!

You can even make adjectives out of the other parts of speech, like verbs or

nouns. All you have to do is tack on an ending, like "ic" or "ish" or "ary". For

example, this boy can grow up to be a huge man, but still have a boyish face.

"Boy" is a noun, but the ending "ish" makes it an adjective. "Boyish": that

describes the huge man's face. Get it?

Next time you go on a trip,

Remember this little tip:

The minute you get back,

They'll ask you this and that.

You can describe people, places and things.

Simply unpack your adjectives.

You can do it with adjectives.

Tell them about it with adjectives.

You can shout it with adjectives.