Grammar - ways to remember tricker stuff...

[User163639]

I loved the apostrophe thread.

Can we all pitch in some grammar rules that are often forgotten?!

I struggle with whose and who’s etc...educate me?

‘Less’ and ‘fewer’ are largely a countable (fewer) or uncountable (less) thing.

Just remember, ‘This cake recipe needs fewer eggs and less flour than the other.’

As to there, their and they're, here's how i explained it to someone. Bear with me, it's quite long.

There- if you can remove the t, thereby making it here and it still makes sense, that's when you use it. "The dog is over there" . Remove the t,"the dog is over (t)here.

Their- has an i in it. I rhymes with my. Again replace their with my, does it make sense? "Their dog is sitting down". My (rhymes with i) dog is sitting down.

They're- shortening of "they are". Extend the sentence to see if it makes sense. " they're sitting down". "they are sitting down ".

All together " they're sitting down there by their dog".
"They are sitting down here by my dog".

Using the car will affect the environment.
The effect will be devastating. The car has badly affected the environment.

All of these are correct I think, it's a mine field! Effect is the end result,

RAVEN = Remember Affect Verb Effect Noun

Supermarket, I'm one of those pedants that would say 'fewer' cows, not 'less' cows, but I agree that that rule is frequently ignored nowadays. My DD has started complaining to me that her teachers both use 'less' where they should use 'fewer', and I've advised her to keep quiet about it (but to continue to use 'fewer' herself where appropriate).

There's another problem in your sentence:

"shall we walk through that field as there's less cows in there than that field".

There's means there is, so for cows (plural) it should be there are. For, e.g. mud (singular), there is is fine.

It could be:

There's less mud in that field or There is less mud in that field.

or

There are fewer cows in that field.

Good grammer is the difference between knowing your shit and knowing you're shit.

Still unsure on who’s or whose? Who’s is who is? And whose is...

The apostrophe in who's indicates that it's a contraction - i.e. there are letters missing, because it's short for who is or who has (so the i is missing or the ha is missing).

Whose is always asking who something belongs to, or referring to something that belongs to someone. 'Whose cat is that?' or 'The man whose cat I saw' etc.

A really common one that people find tricky and get wrong a lot is e.g. John and me or John and I, but it's really easy to solve. Just take John out of the sentence and it becomes obvious which is correct.

John and me went to the cinema or
John and I went to the cinema?

John and I went to the cinema (Not 'me went to the cinema!)

She talked to John and I or
She talked to John and me?

She talked to John and me. Not 'She talked to I'!

@tantamountto
Both past simple and present perfect can be used with "today". It depends when it's being said:
I've been for a walk today- it's still early enough for me to go for another, "today" isn't yet finished.
I went for a walk today- it's probably evening and you're not going for another.

@LetItGoToRuin

Supermarket, I'm one of those pedants that would say 'fewer' cows, not 'less' cows, but I agree that that rule is frequently ignored nowadays. My DD has started complaining to me that her teachers both use 'less' where they should use 'fewer', and I've advised her to keep quiet about it (but to continue to use 'fewer' herself where appropriate).

There's another problem in your sentence:

"shall we walk through that field as there's less cows in there than that field".

There's means there is, so for cows (plural) it should be there are. For, e.g. mud (singular), there is is fine.

It could be:

There's less mud in that field or There is less mud in that field.

or

There are fewer cows in that field.

You're quite right, no excuse! Sorry.

@lazylinguist

A really common one that people find tricky and get wrong a lot is e.g. John and me or John and I, but it's really easy to solve. Just take John out of the sentence and it becomes obvious which is correct.

John and me went to the cinema or
John and I went to the cinema?

John and I went to the cinema (Not 'me went to the cinema!)

She talked to John and I or
She talked to John and me?

She talked to John and me. Not 'She talked to I'!

To be fair, where I live "she talked to I " would be very common! (Somerset border)

Ah, ok @TheOrigBrave so that’s more not knowing what is a noun and what is a verb in a sentence. In your example the word ‘affect’ is a verb so you spelt it correctly. Because it’s a ‘doing’ word. I’m really bad at explaining things so hopefully someone can explain noun and verb better.

Whom is Used when something is done to the person, so For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Although I never use whom, I like to know when it should be used

Does anyone have an easy way to help a 6 year remember the difference between “where” and “were”?
They are on ds’s spellings this week and he can never remember which word has the h in it.

H is for home or house (ie a place)

What about if someone is lying down? I always think that looks completely wrong but I think it is right?

One of the knottier ones for me is when to use 'who' and when it becomes 'whom'? I sort of feel that 'to whom?' is better than sounding like an owl saying 'to who?', but I'm not sure of the rule.

thanks! :)

Oh! Should have scrolled up a tadge... Darkestofallseasons has picked this one up previously.

One more from me then whilst I remember - 'an hotel'? I'm not clear on the rules of 'an' and 'a' - and 'an hotel' sounds all kinds of wrong to me even though I understand that it's correct?

Whom is when who is the indirect object. So preceded by a preposition usually.

H is silent or not in hotel depending how posh you are. The Queen will say "an 'otel" William will say "a hotel"

It's because of the original being French where the H was silent.

(I didn't study that, so may have made it up but it's definitely to do with it being of non-English origin )

Effect is a verb as well as the noun though. To effect change is the context. To bring something about. Different from to affect. But I don’t know when it is different to and different from!

"Is s the verb and c the noun as in advise, advice?"

If you're not sure whether you need the verb or the noun, then add 'ing'

Advising and practising works; advicing doesn't.

As in I don’t know when to use different to and when to use different from. Can anyone help?

LunchBoxPolice, could he remember that "there" is the answer to "where"?

Or just that here/where/there are all about places so you just add a letter to the front of "here".

For practise versus practice:

Think of Advise (Verb) and advice (noun)

The c and s is the same, so practice is a noun and practise is a verb.