Find the verb, adjective or adverb the adverb modifies. Adverbs only describe these three parts of speech. For example, in "She drives carefully," "carefully" is an adverb because it modifies "drives," which is a verb. In "Vegetables are very important for your health," "very" is an adverb because it modifies "important", which describes "vegetables." Finally, "too" in "She drives too carefully" is an adverb because it describes "carefully," which is an adverb.
Ask yourself if the word answers one of the following questions: where, when, how, how often or how many and to what extent. An adverb answers one of these questions. For instance, in the sentence "She drives too carefully," "too" answers the question "How carefully did she drive?" and so must be an adverb.
Check if the adverb's placement emphasizes the word you would like it to. Adverbs are flexible and placement is optional. "The teacher spoke seriously to her students" and "The teachers spoke to her students seriously" have equivalent meanings.
Find the noun that the adjective describes. An adjective's function is to modify a noun, such as in the sentence, "The house is brown." "Brown" gives the reader information about "house," which is a noun. If the word does not describe a noun, it is not an adjective.
Check if the word ends in -ful, -ish, -less or -like. These are typical adjectival endings. Not all adjectives have these endings, but if a word does, it probably is an adjective.
Order adjectives properly. When more than one adjective precedes a noun, they sequence in the following order: determiner, expressions of order or number, expressions of quantity, judgments or opinions, size or shape, age or condition, adjectives and qualifier. For example, in "A few tiny red ants," you cannot arrange the adjectives "few", "tiny" and "red" in any other way.