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0:04 lifetime account at englishclass101.com hi everybody my name is Alicia in this lesson we're
0:11 going to look at how to use apostrophes let's get started okay in this
0:16 lesson I want to talk about two basic uses of the apostrophe the things
0:22 I'm going to talk about in this lesson will cover most basic uses of
0:26 the apostrophe there are two categories of use we're going to look at showing
0:31 possession and we're going to look at contractions to show the missing letters in
0:37 Words let's start by showing possession with apostrophes
0:41 so to show possession with an apostrophe you can use apostrophe s after a
0:49 noun so this expresses
0:51 that something belongs to the now
0:54 so let's look at some very basic examples of this first my teacher's pen
1:00 in this example we have my teacher
1:03 as the noun that we have to show possession for we have the apostrophe
1:08 here and then it's followed by s next is pen this shows
1:13 that the pen is owned by my teacher we can use apostrophe s to
1:19 demonstrate this let's look at the next example his sister's Carr his sister's car
1:25 in this sentence sister is the person owning something
1:30 or rather his sister
1:31 so again apostrophe s shows the ownership in this situation the car is owned
1:38 by his sister let's look at the last basic example it's my father's wallet
1:45 my father's wallet again we have apostrophe s after the owner of the object
1:51 so here my father is the owner of the wallet
1:55 so we can use apostrophe s to show ownership in this way
1:59 but there are some very important rules to keep in mind to make sure
2:04 that you always express this ownership clearly
2:06 and correctly so let's take a look at two key rules for you to
2:11 follow okay first number one
2:14 if it's a singular noun
2:17 so this means if you want to show the possession of something
2:20 that is a singular noun
2:22 that means just one thing
2:23 or just one person add apostrophe s to make it plural okay this is
2:30 true even if the singular noun ends in s
2:36 so this part right here is sometimes confusing even for native speakers you learn
2:40 sometimes I shouldn't put another s after the noun
2:43 when should I do
2:45 that I don't know
2:45 so this is the rule
2:46 so if it's a singular noun add apostrophe s to make it plural
2:51 so let's look at some examples of this first the businesses plan the businesses
2:57 plan in this situation business is our noun we want to express something
3:04 that is owned by the business
3:06 so business ends with an s
3:09 but it's a singular noun one business right we still have to add apostrophe
3:14 s to make it plural I'm sorry we still have to add apostrophe s
3:18 to show ownership this is a singular noun we're not making it plural here
3:22 the businesses plan so this shows the plan owned by the business okay let's
3:28 look at another example of this his bus's schedule his bus is scheduled
3:34 so again bus is a singular noun
3:37 that ends with s we still have to follow this rule we add apostrophe
3:41 s after the bus to show ownership
3:44 so this schedule belongs to the bus
3:48 or his bus in this case
3:49 so it's some kind of connection we're showing here here's one more example of
3:54 this s rule her dress is color her dresses color
3:58 so again dress is our singular noun it ends in s we still have
4:03 to put apostrophe s to show ownership
4:05 so in this case the dress doesn't actually own the color of course
4:10 but the color is a quality
4:12 that belongs to the dress
4:14 so even if your singular noun ends in s you need to put an
4:18 apostrophe s after it to show possession to show ownership we saw the same
4:23 thing up here so these singular nouns do not end in s
4:27 but we have to follow the same rule
4:29 so this one is an easy one right
4:31 if you're just talking about one of something one noun just put apostrophe s
4:36 after it to show ownership okay great
4:39 so let's continue on to rule number two rule number two is a little
4:43 bit trickier than rule number one
4:44 so let's take a look okay for rule number two
4:47 if it's a plural noun
4:50 so plural means more than one of something
4:52 if it's a plural noun use an apostrophe after the s
4:56 that means no additional s after it unless the plural noun does not end
5:02 in s so this is kind of tricky let's break down what this means
5:06 so plural nouns generally
5:08 when we create a plural noun we simply add s to the end of
5:11 the noun to make it plural right like teacher becomes teachers right
5:16 or sister becomes sisters
5:18 or father becomes fathers right more than one of something we add an S
5:22 to the end of it
5:23 so if it's a plural noun
5:24 that follows this rule just add in a pass after the S you don't
5:29 need to add apostrophe plus s just one apostrophe
5:32 and it's good it's done it's finished it's good unless however there is an
5:36 exception unless the plural noun doesn't end in s
5:40 so there are some plural nouns
5:42 that don't end in s right they're special nouns right
5:45 so we'll see an example of this here
5:47 so let's take a look at these kinds of examples
5:50 that we have and break down what's happening
5:52 so first one my parents house my parents house
5:56 so in this example my parents is the noun this is the plural noun
6:00 two people parents right
6:02 and we have an apostrophe after the s in this situation there's no extra
6:08 s after this because it follows this rule
6:12 so the plural noun parents in this case just gets an apostrophe here like
6:18 this okay so my parents house this shows the house
6:22 that belongs to my parents okay let's look at the next example the next
6:27 example are children's grades our children's grades
6:31 so this is an example of the exception here
6:34 so children is an example of a plural noun
6:38 that does not end in s right we have one child two children right
6:43 so this is a plural noun
6:44 that does not end in s in this situation we need to use apostrophe
6:49 s just as we did with rule number one right
6:51 so in this situation
6:53 when you have a plural noun
6:54 that doesn't end in s make sure to add
6:56 that apostrophe s so
6:58 if you want to talk about other things like mice for example
7:01 so the mice is something we need to add
7:03 that apostrophe s so this is a good one to keep in mind
7:06 when you're writing a sentence
7:08 that uses those plural nouns
7:10 that are kind of irregular okay let's go to the last example the student's
7:15 party the students party
7:17 so here again we have a regular plural noun it's just student plus s
7:22 right students we again put the apostrophe after students no additional s
7:27 because it follows the basic rule right here
7:30 so no exception in this case
7:32 so keep this one in mind this one requires a little bit more thought
7:36 just consider that S at the end plural noun
7:39 or singular noun those are kind of the two things it's important to keep
7:42 in mind with this okay
7:44 so this is what I want to talk about for showing possession using apostrophes
7:49 to show possession let's go now to part two
7:52 so the other part of today's lesson is using apostrophes to show contraction
7:57 so a contraction is the short form
8:00 or the reduced form of two words generally
8:03 so we use apostrophes to show
8:05 or to kind of represent missing letters that's one way
8:09 that you can think of the apostrophe use here
8:11 so apostrophes can be used to show the missing letters in Words
8:17 so what does this mean let's take a look at some examples for example
8:21 when we write do not in the reduced form
8:24 or the contracted form we use this spelling right don't d-o-n apostrophe T
8:30 so you can think of this apostrophe
8:32 as kind of a replacement for the letter that's missing right
8:35 so we have do not o is missing here it's kind of like we're
8:39 showing the O is gone with the apostrophe
8:42 so don't here's another example we are we are becomes we're right
8:48 so again we have a letter missing in this case it's the a we
8:52 are becomes we're so the apostrophe shows where
8:56 that letter used to be one more example I am this becomes I'm again
9:01 we have a missing letter the a used to be right here we have
9:05 an apostrophe there instead
9:07 so apostrophes can be used in this way to show
9:10 that letters are missing from a word
9:12 so these are extremely extremely common you probably know about these already
9:16 but I also want to talk about another use that's typically done in books
9:21 and Other Stories those kinds of things sometimes this apostrophe this missing letter apostrophe
9:27 is used at the end of a word
9:29 or sometimes even in the middle it's a little bit rare usually this is
9:33 at the end of a word
9:34 but sometimes you'll see an apostrophe at the end of a word to express
9:39 a way of speaking
9:41 so this kind of sends tends to sound a little more casual
9:44 or sometimes this is used to indicate like a character a certain way of
9:49 speaking so let's look at some examples
9:51 so you can see what I mean here here's one I'm thinking about what
9:55 to make for dinner I'm thinking about what to make for dinner
9:57 so first we have this contracted form right the apostrophe here
10:01 and then we have this thinking thinking here the apostrophe is at the end
10:07 of the word so we tend to see this use a lot in ing
10:11 verbs actually verbs that end in ing to show
10:14 that the G sound is not clearly pronounced
10:16 so I'm thinking about what to make for dinner
10:18 so this Lincoln is a little bit different from thinking right I'm thinking about
10:24 what to make for dinner would be the standard way to say this right
10:27 but this thinking sounds a little bit more casual people may choose to use
10:32 this kind of thinking to express a certain kind of casual level of speaking
10:38 or to express a kind of accent something like
10:41 that so that's what this apostrophe at the end of an ing verb means
10:46 it means that g sound is missing let's look at another example we've been
10:50 walking for hours we've been walking for hours
10:53 so here again we have this basic contraction we have we've been walking for
10:59 hours so again there's this apostrophe at the end of this ing word right
11:04 and the g is missing
11:05 so the apostrophe is showing us something is missing
11:09 and we've cut the word off early
11:10 so walking becomes walk-in walking we've been walking for hours
11:15 so this expresses a kind of rough
11:17 or casual manner of speaking one more you're working hard you're working hard you
11:23 might hear people say this to you at work like your co-workers might make
11:26 this comment to you you're working hard again we have a basic contraction here
11:31 you're you are okay
11:33 and here working so the standard spelling is working with a g at the
11:39 end we have this apostrophe here
11:40 that shows something is missing you're working hard
11:43 so this sounds kind of more casual a little more friendly than you're working
11:47 hard okay so that's what you might see occasionally usually we see this in
11:52 text like stories and maybe novels maybe short stories
11:56 or essays that kind of thing
11:58 but oftentimes people like to speak this way
12:01 and sometimes they want to text
12:02 that way as well too
12:03 so if you see this in like a text message
12:05 or something that's what this apostrophe at the end of the word means
12:09 and as I said you might see it in the middle I suppose in
12:12 certain places you might even see it at the very beginning of a word
12:15 but that's an indicator that's a sign
12:17 that someone has cut off usually like a letter
12:20 or something thing like
12:21 that a very small sound
12:22 and they're showing that with the apostrophe okay great
12:25 so those are the two key points
12:26 that I want to talk about for this lesson we use apostrophes to show
12:30 possession and we use apostrophes for contractions to show missing letters I want to
12:35 finish this lesson by covering a very common couple of questions some very common
12:40 errors some problem points for Learners
12:42 and for native speakers this question box right here shows them there are the
12:48 differences between it's with an apostrophe it's with no apostrophe
12:52 and who's with an apostrophe s
12:55 and who's h-o-s-e at the end here what is the difference
13:00 so let's talk about it's
13:01 and it's first it apostrophe s means it is it is I.T no apostrophe
13:10 s is the possessive
13:12 so this is an exception to what I talked about over here of course
13:17 that's like kind of hard for you to remember I know
13:19 but thankfully it's just this one there's only one
13:22 that you need to remember at this exception for
13:24 so it's with no apostrophe is the possessive form okay it is is this
13:30 it with an apostrophe S at the end
13:33 so this is one tricky one to remember okay
13:36 then the second one is who's whose question
13:38 so H I'm sorry w-h-o apostrophe s means who is who is w-h-o-s-e is
13:49 the possessive so whose bag is this right we're asking about someone's possession whose
13:55 bag is this whose marker is this we use this w-h-o-s-e word to do
14:00 that who's with an apostrophe s means who is like who's he talking to
14:05 right that's not a question of possession
14:08 so these were words sound exactly the same
14:10 when we are speaking right
14:12 but it's important to remember
14:14 that they are very different on paper
14:16 so keep these small differences in mind
14:18 because they do matter okay great
14:20 so this is a quick introduction to how to use apostrophes this is a
14:25 very basic introduction to this very important punctuation mark
14:28 but these rules will help you in the majority of situations
14:32 so keep this in mind of course
14:34 if you have any questions
14:35 or comments or if you want to practice making some apostrophe words feel free
14:39 to do so in the comment section of this video also
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14:50 that can help you with your English studies thanks very much for watching this
14:53 video and I will see you again next time bye want to speed up
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