A short video lesson on the definite and indefinite article
For many students – particularly those whose native language doesn’t have definite or indefinite articles, using them correctly can be a bit challenging. This short video, written for IELTS students but useful for anyone at upper-intermediate to advanced level, looks at this area of English.
Transcript for ‘Using Articles’
Hi and welcome to this short video lesson on the use of articles. These are the words ‘a’, ‘an’ or ‘the’, of course.
For many students, particularly those whose native language doesn’t have the definite or indefinite articles, using them correctly can be a bit challenging.
The good news is, in terms of general communication, using them incorrectly won’t often lead to you being misunderstood. Take this student for example.
I come from small town in Japan.
The examiner wouldn’t have any problem understanding where she comes from. But of course if you’re aiming for a high grade in your Speaking exam, you’ll want to show your proficiency in English, and of course that includes using articles correctly.
So in this lesson we’ll look at the main reasons for using them. Articles are a big area and we won’t have time to cover each and every usage, but we’ll certainly deal with the main reasons for using or for not using them.
Let’s start by finding out what you know already!
If you use the IELTS speaking website, that’s ieltspeaking.co.uk, you’ll probably know about our online practice tests that students can record themselves doing. These 6 statements were taken from recordings of students who tried one of the tests on the subject of accommodation.
Reason why I don’t put anything on the ground floor is because of flooding
Where we live has an access to a great sports centre.
Our children would enjoy country lifestyle
It’s quite hard to get an accommodation in my city
At the moment I live in village. it’s village I was born in but one day I’d like to move somewhere busier.
I think best place to live would be an apartment.’
Each of the statements has a mistake in the use of articles. Perhaps there’s an article missing, or one has been used but incorrectly.
As you know, articles are used – or not used – before nouns. So, to make life easier, here are all the nouns, or adjective plus nouns, highlighted. How many mistakes in the use of articles can you see? Stop the video now and start it again when you’ve found them all.
Reason why I don’t put anything on the ground floor is because of flooding
Where we live has an access to a great sports centre.
Our children would enjoy country lifestyle
It’s quite hard to get an accommodation in my city
At the moment I live in village. it’s village I was born in but one day I’d like to move somewhere busier.
I think best place to live would be an apartment.
OK, before we go through each of the sentences let’s try understanding one of the main reasons for using them. We use articles before singular, countable nouns. So if you can add an ’s’ to the end of the noun to make it plural the chances are it’s a countable noun. By the way, articles are one example of what are called ‘determiners’ and it’s not only articles that are used this way. You may also find different determiners before the noun such as ‘my’, ‘your’, or ‘this’, ‘that’.
Anyway, so here we have three examples.
I’m reading a good book about …
I live in an apartment with a friend …
I’m hoping to take an/the exam soon …
‘Book’, ‘apartment’ and ‘exam’ are all singular, countable nouns so they are preceded by an article. In the first two examples we use the indefinite article ‘a’, so ‘a good book’ and ‘an apartment’. The third example we could use ‘an’ or ‘the’ – we’ll look at when to use the definite or indefinite article in a minute.
Now, when don’t we use articles? Well, we don’t use them with plural or uncountable nouns with a general meaning. Now the important word here is ‘general’. If the noun just has a very general meaning we don’t use the article. So,
‘Our house is full of books’.
There are two nouns here: house is preceded by the determiner ‘our’ but there’s nothing before books. Now that’s because we are talking about books in general.
I think English is a difficult language
Again in this statement there’s nothing before ‘English’ because we are talking about English in general.
But, we do use articles before plural or uncountable nouns if the noun has a specific meaning. So what do we mean by specific?
Well, look at this example.
Our house is full of books. The books in my bedroom are what I use for studying.
The first reference to ‘books’ is general, the same as before, so there’s no article. But the second reference is to ‘books in my bedroom’. We’re talking about particular books here, ‘the books in my bedroom’ so it’s definite it’s specific so we use ‘the’.
The English people use in America is sometimes different to the UK.
And in this example, we are talking about a particular form of ‘English’, the English people use in America, so again we use the definite article, ‘the’.
Another kind of specific meaning is when the noun has been mentioned before, so we know which ‘thing’ the person is talking about. Here’s the kind of example you’ll often find in grammar books.
We’ve got a dog and a cat. The dog’s called Bonnie.
We don’t know about the dog when it’s first mentioned, it’s ‘indefinite’ so we use ‘a’ because it’s a singular countable noun. But once we know the speaker has a dog, we know which dog they are referring to later so the dog becomes specific or definite, and we use the definite article, ‘the dog’.
Right, using these guidelines let’s look through these 6 statements again.
Reason why I don’t put anything on the ground floor is because of flooding.
Let’s take the first one. There are three nouns. and the mistake here is that there’s a missing article before ‘reason’. Why is this? Because it’s a singular countable noun, so it needs an article and it also has a specific meaning, because it’s a specific reason – the speaker doesn’t put anything on the ground floor ‘because of flooding’. So that’s specific, so it should be ‘the reason’. ‘The ground floor’ is correct because we are referring to a specific floor, ‘the ground floor’. And finally there’s no article before ‘flooding’ because it has a general meaning.
Where we live has an access to a great sports centre.
Now In this statement there are two nouns and one mistake. ‘Access’ is an uncountable noun. It doesn’t have a specific meaning here so there shouldn’t be article. ‘A sports centre’ is fine as this is a singular, uncountable noun. mentioned for the first time.
Our children would enjoy country lifestyle.
Now, there are two nouns here. The first ‘children’ is preceded by the determiner ‘our’ so that’s OK. We are missing the definite article before ‘country’. This is because we are talking about a particular lifestyle, ‘the country lifestyle’.
It’s quite hard to get an accommodation in my city.
Right now in this statement we have 2 nouns. ‘Accommodation’ is uncountable and it has a general meaning so there shouldn’t be an article. ‘City’ is preceded by ‘my’ so that’s fine. So just one mistake there.
At the moment I live in village. It’s village I was born in, but one day I’d like to move somewhere busier.
Now there are two nouns here, both ‘village’ with an article missing in both cases. So two mistakes. The first use of ‘village’ should be preceded by ‘a’ because it’s ‘indefinite’, we haven’t been introduced to the idea yet. However, the second ‘village’ is by now definite, specific , we are talking about the village that was mentioned previously, so it’s definite, or specific so we need to use ‘the’. the village.
I think best place to live would be an apartment.
Finally there are two nouns here. The second one, ‘apartment’ is a singular, countable noun with a general meaning so we use ‘an’, and so this one is correct. However, we always use the definite article ‘the’ with a superlative structure, ‘the biggest’, ‘the smallest’. And if you think about it, this fits with what we said earlier. If something is ‘the biggest’ or ‘the smallest’ it’s not general, it’s specific, as there’s only one. So we need to say ‘the best place to live’.
OK, that’s the end of this very general look at articles. We’ll soon be publishing a second lesson looking at some of the more unique uses of articles.