What is wrong with the sentence “I went to party for new faces.”? Well nothing grammatically, but this is what one of my non-native English friends told me today. So I told him, “Really? What kind of faces did you get?”.

He looked at me strangely, and I realized he wasn’t sure what is wrong with the sentence. Well, let’s explain.

First, using the words “to party” is in the verb form. But that is not what he meant. What he meant to say was “to a party”. So you can see how adding an article changes the meaning of the sentence.

Second, using the words “for new faces” means that is the objective of the sentence; in other words it is the reason for going to the party. But, it is actually missing another verb, which in this case is “to meet”. So the revised portin of this sentence is “to meet new faces”.

So the revised sentence then reads “I went to a party to meet new faces.”

Popularity: 27%

There seems to be no end to the number of text books available to learn English as a second language. One book I recommend is English Grammar in Use 3rd Edition by Raymond Murphy (ISBN 0-521-5289-2). The same book can be purchased with a CD-ROM (ISBN 0-521-53762-2). However, be careful if just using a book without a native English speaker because a book can contain errors and a non-native English speaker may not be able to pick up on this mistake. Well, I found one in this book.

On page 33, exercise 16.2, problem 3 of English Grammar in Use, the original text as printed in the book is

Sarah got a job in factory. Five years later the factory closed down.

can you spot the error? It should be

Sarah got a job in a factory. Five years later the factory closed down.

When using articles, remember that if you are mentioning something for the first time you use a and then you use the in subsequent sentences to refer to the item. That is why a is used in the first sentence “Sarah got a job in a factory.” and the is used in the second sentence “Five years later the factory closed down“.

Popularity: 52%

What is wrong with this sentence?

• I went to flower shop

.

You need an article before the word flower shop. Both the and a are correct, but their use is different.
Use the when you have already mentioned the flower shop in the conversation.
Use a when you are talking about it for the first time.

Popularity: 54%

Using the articles a and an can be tricky for non-native English speakers, but it doesn’t have to be.  Think of it this way; use a or an before a countable noun preceded by an adjective.  In other words a/an + adjective + noun. Let’s look at some examples (some which contract with the use of the):

• I had a tee time for 7 am.
• If you were drinking tea, you would say “I enjoyed the 7 am tea time.”
• You say “I like the coffee break at my company.”, but you say “I take a coffee break at my company.”

The difference between a/an and the can also be summarized as not specific versus specific.

• a/an -> use when the object is not specific. The first example above indicates that you had one time out of many.
• the -> use when the object is specific. The second example above indicates that there is only one 7 am.

Popularity: 54%

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