Commonly Confused:  you're and your

 

Which word - "you're" or "your" fits into the blank below?

You are wasting __________ money on this item.


Here we continue with our unit on possessives. Possessive adjectives are commonly confused with other words and word forms.  In this lesson, we will help you to distinguish between a possessive adjective and these other forms.

This will help you with your reading comprehension and with your writing.

Let's first answer the question to define our terms: What is a contraction?

A contraction is a word that is formed when two words combine by eliminating a letter and using an apostrophe in place of the dropped letter.   One common contraction is "you're". This is formed by a subject pronoun (you) + the appropriate form of the "be" verb (are).  In writing, the contraction you're is often confused with the possessive adjective your.


  • you're (you are) is a contraction formed by combining the subject pronoun you and the 2nd person form of the "be" verb are, and replacing the "a" of "are" with an apostophre '.  you + are = you're

  • your is a possessive adjective.

Exercise 8

 

  Exercise 8:  Your or You're ?

1.  You are wasting _______________ money on this item.

2.  ______________ the luckiest person in the world right now.

3.  ______________ just learning about life.

4.  He is ________________ new baby brother!

Click here for the answers to this exercise.

Next...

 

In our next lesson, we discuss: Commonly Confused:  he's and his

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