What is a Contraction?
- A contraction is one word made up of two words.
- We do this to make things short and trim.
- The first word usually stays the same.
– I will à I’ll (the first word remained the same)
- And in some cases, both the first word and the second word lose letters.
- Shall not à Shan’t (Both words changed)
- An apostrophe will fill the space of the missing letters.
Examples
Where only the second word changes
- She is à She’s
- They had à They’d
- I am à I’m
- Cannot à Can’t
- Have not à Haven’t
- Is not à Isn’t
Where both the first- and second-word changes
- Will not à Won’t
- Shall not à Shan’t
- Contractions are used in normal speech and informal writing (writing notes / writing to family and friends)
- Don’t use them contractions in formal writing.
- Use complete words.
Example
‘Cannot’ rather than ‘can’t’
Pronoun Verb Contractions
Pronouns substitute proper and common nouns.
We do this to avoid repetition.
- E.g., The boy has lost his toy. He is crying.
We use contractions with pronouns to make it even shorter.
- E.g., The boy has lost his toy. He’s crying.
How to identify them?
- Keep an eye out for a pronoun.
- If it is followed by an apostrophe and then the end of the verb, then it is a pronoun verb contraction.
- The apostrophe replaced parts of the verb!
Why do we use them?
- We use pronouns to make sentences shorter and remove repetition. We don’t want to hear boy, boy, boy, repeated again and again, do we?
- So, the second time we use ‘he’
- And instead of writing or saying:
- “The boy’s crying”, we write “he’s crying”
Examples
- We are à We’re
- They are à They’re
- I am à I’m
- She would à She’d
- She had à She’s
- I had à I’d
- I would à I’d
- I will à I’ll
- It is à It’s
- She has à She’s
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