How to Use the Definite Article (THE) & Zero Article (X) | Grammar Lesson

all right I think we are getting this show on the road so welcome I hope you guys are having a great weekend if you're watching this later in the future at some point I just hope that you're having a good today let's just get right into it and show you what we will be talking about so before we begin as you join this live lesson again tell us your name let us know let us know where you're from and also if you're watching this later on in the future again use the comments write your name write a question say hello tell us where you are watching from and just join the community because it's always good to continue practicing your writing and it's a great way to communicate so today as you can see we are going to do a grammar lesson yes we're going to be doing a grammar lesson talking about articles so again some people are joining us hello Roger from Malaysia awesome Estela Mohammed excellent awesome to have you glad you guys are with us so as I said today we are going to talk about articles and I promise if you stick with us I will you will learn something that you did not know before because again this is something that articles we learn at probably a beginner level and we're constantly using them throughout English and there are some tricky rules to articles now there are three things that you should know about articles so there are the definite article the there is also the indefinite article which is a and n we are not going to about those today and then there is the zero article in which case we don't use anything at all so today I'm just gonna focus on the definite and zero article and when to use them and show you the difference between the two and then at the end we are gonna do a practice and I am going to see just how much you were paying attention so again if you're just joining us say hello Eduardo from Brazil hope everything hope your summer is going well actually no wait in Brazil it's winter they're getting my north and southern hemispheres mixed up anyway I hope everything's well hi from Sri Lanka excellent also if you guys want to be super super super helpful you can share this video and tell others and bring more to our classroom so everybody can learn about articles so again today I'm going to talk to you about the difference between the definite article the and the 0 article in which case we're not using anything so let's get into it and talk about when to use the definite article the ok so as you can see right here we're talking about when to use the definite article the if you have any questions about this lesson in particular right um in the comments just you know I'll get to them if it's not if it's a separate question related to maybe pronunciation or something else still write it and we will try it I will get to it at the end of the lesson but right now I want to focus on articles so when to use the so here's a fun little fact for you that according to the Oxford English corpus the is the most common word in English that's probably not surprising or it shouldn't be surprising we use this word all the time and the Oxford English corpus is just a collection of basically the English language it's a collection of English in books in speeches in writing and the is the most common word so you can see just how important it is now we use the before singular and plural nouns and this is the key thing when we want to talk about something specific so the articles we use them before nouns and it kind of shows the relationship of this noun and kind of gives us more information about the noun so we're using though when we're talking about something specific so for example let's look at this conversation down below these two people talking and kind of these random sentences the first one says the car is in the shop so if I say the car we basically know which car is being talked about it could be my car it could be my family's car it could be my friend's car but if I say the car then basically we know which car is being discussed it is specific now if we look at the other use of the definite article the car is in the shop all right again this is specific we know what kind of shop were talking about now are we talking about a grocery store no are we talking about a flower shop no if you're talking about a car that is in the shop you should know that we're talking about the mechanic the car's broken something is wrong with it so we took it to the shop the next one is don't then the other person just responds out of nowhere and says hey don't buy the new iPhone again you know you wanna has an iPhone many of us like iPhones I have some Apple products I'm not saying you shouldn't buy the new iPhone if you want to feel free this is just an example so don't buy the new iPhone there are many different iPhones but we are talking specifically about the new one the other thing to keep in mind here is new is an adjective that is modifying iPhone we're talking about new a new iPhone and the comes before the adjective the new iPhone the big house the purple cat I don't know all right so the will always come before the adjective again if you're just joining us say hello to us in the comments tell us your name where you're from we are doing a lesson today on articles and then I'm going to do a practice at the end so it is very important that you guys practice what you learn and we will try to make this as active as possible so please write to us in the comments and let us know so these are all plant ways that you are using the so let's look at the zero article all right Oh let's switch here so here we go alright the zero article is right here we use it before plural or non count nouns that are not specific okay so plural nouns you know that things that typically get an S added to the end of it a non count noun are nouns that that you can't count are basically like any liquid water soda tea or hair is also a non count noun so let's see for example I want you to try to use this in a sentence and one of them I will ask you a question and I want you to answer it what do you like to drink alright I want you to tell me what you like to drink it is a non-count noun write it in the comments do not use an article okay so look at these examples we here have again another weird little conversation here apples are good for your teeth apples is play roll all right but we are talking is it specific no we are talking about it in a general sense do we know which apples we are talking about no all right just apples in general could be red apples could be green apples any Apple they're good for your teeth so we do not use an article before the noun apples alright this is when the zero article comes into play and then the next one all right I like to drink water again water is a non-count noun so again we do not use an article in front of the noun water excellent example sentence perfect Eduardo I like to drink coffee I also like to drink coffee I probably had a little too much coffee today but hey you know that's okay it is what it is another great sentence I like to drink juice again these are non count nouns do not use an article and this is the thing as as simple as this is right now these are the common mistakes that whether you are a beginner learner or whether you idiot are an advanced learner that you you would hear people make from time to time and they might use an article in front of a non-count noun because when you're having a conversation and when you're talking you're not really thinking about okay wait is this a is this a non-count noun should I use an article should I not use an article you're just going to say it so these are good ways to just continuously practice and it's easy and then when you continue to use English and speaking and writing you will just be using it correctly because you've practiced these simple little things that we're doing today all right so let's look at the next part I want to compare the two I want to show you basically a little the difference between let's compare these okay so here we have two sentences one has the definite article the the other sentence has the zero article and there is nothing so again it's a difference between whether something is specific or whether it is not specific so let's look at these two sentences the boys play soccer okay it is specific we know which boys we are talking about we are talking about those boys right there okay the boys play soccer we know them or we can see them or we know about these boys and therefore it is specific and we use the definite article the now in the next sentence we're using the zero article and we're just making a statement saying well boys play soccer all right we don't know which boys we're talking about we just know that some boys play soccer so this is the difference between the definite and the zero article all right the definite is going to be specific the zero article is just in general and because of that this picture down here you can see we can't really see the boys we don't know them and actually the picture looks a bit funny because I don't know nobody really wears a hat like that when they play soccer but you get the idea okay again if you're just joining us say hello to us in the chat we are talking about articles the definite article and the zero article now what I want to do is go over some of the rules all right now I know what you're thinking you're thinking gosh I don't like rules because it's just more things that we have to memorize that we have to think about so rules yeah they can be problematic because it's just more information you have to learn the good thing is however is that because there are certain rules to follow then you know what is correct and what is incorrect it's just a matter of using them correctly when you are speaking or when you are writing now some of these rules these are not all of the rules when it comes to the definite article and the zero article but these are some of them that maybe you knew maybe that you didn't know so we use the when we are talking about rivers all right anytime you're talking about a river we should use an article the the Nile River the Ganges River all right so with rivers we use the we also used the the definite article when talking about oceans the Pacific Ocean the Atlantic Ocean so actually right now in the comments let's do it I want you to tell me in the name of a river in your country okay tell me the name of a river in your country and use the definite article the alright little maybe I'll learn some new names of rivers and if you are watching this later on again don't just sit there watching the video right use the comments section it's basically the same as its at write the name of the river in there say hello say what's up write a question and we will get back to you it doesn't matter whether it's tomorrow or a year from now just use the comments section so again in the chat write the name of a river in your country a famous river a local river it doesn't matter alright just write the name and use the definite article the okay we also use the when we are talking about bridges perfect Marcella the river Amazonas alright excellent we use them when we're talking about bridges for example this is where we used to live in San Francisco and you have the famous Golden Gate Bridge the era is on river excellent awesome one of the most the probably the most famous river in the world excellent so we use it with bridges also with regions okay so we're talking about you just gave some examples with the Amazon River the Amazon is a region you can say it is an area that is defined so we can use the with the region the Everglades which is in Florida is another region you can also use it when you're talking about regions such as on the coast the west coast the East Coast maybe you're talking about a region in the southeast part of a country so anytime you are identifying a region you would want to use the the definite article the okay the west coast the East Coast the Northwest the Northeast the Southwest used though with regions if you're just joining us again welcome we're talking about articles I know some of you probably join you like articles oh I'm out of here no giving you some quick rules and tips of when to use the and when to use no article because again some of these things these little rules can be tricky the gantt the ganga is the biggest river in india excellent thank you again this is all good practice so finally we use the when we are talking about buildings ok buildings or sites alright so for example in New York City one of the most famous buildings in New York City is the Empire State Building also a very well-known landmark in Paris is the Eiffel Tower so you we use it with buildings we use it with landmarks that is when we use the definite article the now no article all right I think I think learning the is a little more easier I think the no article becomes tricky because people just have a natural tendency to use the instead of using no article hey Ricardo how's it going happy to have you with us again today excellent so we're talking about rules for articles now we use no article with names ok I think when you become when you're more more advanced learners I don't think they have an issue with this but definitely when more beginner and intermediate learners I will often hear the with names all the time not so much with people like friends when they're talking about him but when you're talking about somebody for example like in history King George alright no article it is the name of a person or somebody famous the late Michael Jackson everybody mostly everybody knows who Michael Jackson is but again we would not use an article with the name of a person the next one which is all so confusing streets street names we do not use the with street names so for example Park Avenue is a famous street that you would find in the US Main Street is a common name of a street that you will find again let's you know you do not use the with the names of streets so I want you again in the comments again let's just practice what is the name of a famous street in your city or town what's the name of a famous street or a popular street in the downtown area you can just write a famous street is blah blah blah all right and remember do not use an article this is easy but this is all good practice another great location exactly we just somebody said the Taj Mahal again that is a landmark we use the definite article the so continuing with no articles we don't use articles with names we don't use articles with the names of streets okay we just say the street names we also don't use it with languages okay we just say English or I'm learning English I'm learning Spanish I'm learning Japanese I'm learning Swahili we do not use the with the languages okay also lakes alright so for example Lake Titicaca is a famous lake in Bolivia no Arkell with that Lake Malawi famous lake in the country of Malawi and again there is no article with lakes now there is little exception here if you are talking about a group of lakes all right then you would use it an article so for example you could say the Great Lakes alright lakes is plural and it's talking about a collection of lakes in that case you would use an article but again that is a rare exception typically with the names of lakes we are not using an article if you're just joining us say what's up say hello to us in the comments what's your name where are you joining us from and stay with us we are getting ready to do a quick practice we're talking about articles the definite article the and the zero article so finally we use no article with the names of mountains alright so think of famous mountains that around the world probably first one Mount Everest okay everybody knows of Mount Everest and we don't use an article with Mount Everest also mount Mount Aconcagua which is the highest mountain in South America again no article with that we have people joining us Turkey excellent welcome glad to have you so these are not all the rules but again these are rules that you should be aware of they exist when it comes to using articles and again with speaking you're just gonna talk you're probably not gonna think about the rules with writing you might be a little more conscious of it but this this is a very simple lesson because I think all of you right watching this right now you understand this like oh okay we use our we use the with the name of a river okay we use no article with a name the difference is once you get into that conversation it becomes a whole new thing and this is where people make small mistakes so it's good to just do a quick little practice a quick little refresher a little reminder as to when you should and should not use these so again these are the rules now I would like to practice Steve and uh could you speak a little sorry yes I will try all right so let's practice again these rules I want to go over quickly just to review in case you are now joining us that we use here is the again when to use the definite article we use it with singular and plural nouns when we want to be specific when you know what the noun that is being talked about use the definite article the so if I say hey let's go to the park then you should know which Park I'm talking about because it is specific the park if we're talking about zero articles again to review we use those with plural and non-count nouns when we are not being specific we are talking about things in general okay I gave you those two example sentence apples are good for your health we don't need the article and I like to drink water I just asked all of you a while back what do you like to drink it's a liquid it's a non-count noun it is not specific so you'd say yes I like to drink tea I like to drink juice I like to drink soda I like to drink water okay so now let's do our little practice so I am going to give you alright a sentence right here alright and what I want you to do is I want you to write in the comments the answer all right I want you to write the or for no article you can just put in X now if you want to be you know go above and beyond and do a bit more practice then you can write the full sentence in the comments okay are you using no article or are you using the definite article the so this first sentence the first sentence we have is this alright look at mmm cats over there look at em cats over there we are talking about the plural noun cats are we going to use the definite article the or the zero article in which case just write x and just put it in the chat again if you are watching this later on next week in the future next year ten years from now you can still do this practice use the comment section that you see and just write the answer again it's always good to produce the language and actually use it instead of just watching alright so we're getting some comments all right all right so again we're talking about cats let me see in this situation all right I'm saying look at mmm cats over there all right so putting this into context you would think well we are looking at the cats we can see the cats that we are talking about in that case it is specific all right so we would want to say this look at the cats over there look at the cats over there it's specific we know which cats we are talking about all right let's do another one okay so the next one that I have for you guys and we'll see if we can make this fit is this question right here all right let me change this around a little so in this next sentence all right there are two that you need to fill in all right I'm gonna make them a little try to make them a little more difficult a little more tricky as we go along our so it is mmm doctors say drinking mmm soda is unhealthy so there are two nouns the first one is the plural noun doctors okay the next one is soda alright so before doctors are we going to use the definite article the or no article all right and then before the next one soda are we going to use again is it the or is it no article all right I'll give you just a moment again write your answers in the comments if you're a quick typer alright go ahead and write the whole sentence if you can it makes it you know that's even better if not then just write either the or an X the for definite and X for no article so let's see what do you guys think xx it depends yes it does depend yeah again try to put it put it into context see what you think about you know what if you're having this conversation again I put all of it in quotes so it's kind of like you know we're having a conversation here if somebody was saying this to you what would it mostly be all right what are we talking about what do you think doctor mmm doctors say drinking mmm soda is unhealthy all right so without further ado let me tell you what it is all right so if this situation again we're talking about probably you know doctors in general because not often are you going to be talking about doctors in a specific sense of the oh you know the doctors you you you see the group of doctors typically you might talk about the doctor as in one person so in this case we would be saying it would be the no article BAM doctors say drinking again no article soda is unhealthy soda is a non-count noun it's just talking about in general what's something that doctors would tell you ah right doctors say drinking soda is unhealthy we do not use an article before either of those nouns next one let's do this one let's see and change it up on you a little bit or maybe not all right here what do you think okay so let me make sure this fits into there we go that's a little better so we have mmm Washington Boulevard is named after mmm George Washington alright again there's two nouns Washington Boulevard I'll give you a hint it is a Boulevard is a type of Street okay a Boulevard it's kind of a a synonym again for for talking about a street and George Washington alright little American history question for you George Washington is a person he was a general during the Revolutionary War and the first President of the United States so what do you think again we're talking are you going to use again there's two nouns we're talking about Washington Boulevard Street and George Washington person all right mmm Washington Boulevard is named after mmm George Washington again if you just joined us we're doing a little practice with the definite article the and the no article all right so just warm up those fingers and write the answers in the chat okay what do you guys think all right so we are getting some answers all right we had one question so it's a I said the people or people which is correct again it depends on the context both of them can be correct if you're talking about people specifically alright the people are marching then we know which people that we're talking about we can see them or we know them personally if we say you know people like to travel no article we're just talking about people in general alright so this is where it can kind of be a little confusing so this next one alright let's go over this Washington Boulevard it is like I said it is a street do we use articles with street names all right no all right we just say there is no article in front of Washington Boulevard it is just Washington Boulevard is named after George Washington is a person do we use articles with people no all right so this one again Washington Boulevard is named after George Washington all right I think again this is where it becomes a little tricky I think when to use the no article I think oftentimes even Advanced Learner's will you'll sometimes hear they'll throw an article in there before a street name or before maybe a mountain or something and again it's not going people will still understand what you're talking about but these are little little small mistakes that we can always correct so let's do another one all right I got a couple more for you here's one all right if you're just joining us we're doing a little practice with the definite article the and the zero article all right let me make this a little bigger wallah all right so we have mmm Danube river flows into mmm Black Sea all right so we're talking about a river a river in Europe I'm using this because we we live right next to this river so I almost gave you the answer um and we're talking about sea all right what do you think we didn't necessarily talk about some bodies of water whether we should use the definite article or no article what do you think all right mmm Danube river flows into mmm black sea all right what are we going to use with this one what do you think again if you're just joining us don't be shy write your answers in the chat if you can write the whole sentence if there's time so we are talking about two nouns the river I just don't the river and we're talking about I'll just tell you the Black Sea okay so again with these with rivers again we are going to use the definite article the the danube river flows into again when you're talking about oceans we use the definite article the and when you're talking about seas we also use the bodies of water the Black Sea the Mediterranean Sea all right we are going to use the definite article the the Danube River flows into the Black Sea let's do another one this one I think we can all relate to how about this question right here what do you guys think okay boom all right let me make this a little bigger all right so we have mmm YouTube is great for learning hmm English alright again in this sentence we have two nouns are we going to use the definite article the are we gonna use no article all right two nouns we are talking we have the first noun YouTube and the next noun English it's a language all right we are all teaching English so many of you some of you also teach English and some of you are learning English all right but that's why we're all here so what do you think again about this one mmm YouTube is great for learning mmm English all right this one's a little tricky I went over those rules but I didn't probably get specific enough to to also make this an example but this is again this is good practice what do you think are we going to use definite articles ax or no article so we are talking about YouTube again this is a name alright it's like it's like the name of think I said with names we don't use an article alright that includes you know the names of people alright the names of companies the names of cities and the names of countries all right so with names we use no article we would just say YouTube is great for learning again languages no article is great for learning English okay YouTube is great for learning English I hope all of you feel that way because we're on YouTube right now alright let's do one more alright one more right here the last one is this and let me resize this a little bit for you huh okay so we have mmm Mount Everest is mmm tallest mountain in mmm world alright there are three nouns in this sentence Mount Everest we're talking about mountain and world all right what are we going to use or we which are we going to use the definite article the or the no article and you can just write an X alright what do you guys think for this one alright again I'll give you a moment we're talking about there are three three nouns in this one Mount Everest mountain and world okay what do you think mmm Mount Everest is mmm tallest mountain in mmm world all right getting some answers in here which is great excellent excellent all right so let me go over this let's do this one at a time again if you're if you're watching this if you if you're not live in the chat and you happen to be watching this later again use the comment section write these sentences in the comments it's good to use the language and keep practicing that is the best way to learn because then you're not only listening you are actually producing and doing something so let's look at these one at a time we're talking about Mount Everest it is the name it is a mountain all right with mountains we do not use an article all right so we just say Mount Everest this one I meant to point this out to you before we are talking about tallest mountain it is the superlative okay so when you're talking about superlatives we would use the you always use the with the superlative the reason for this is because you were being specific you are identifying something one thing among all other things all right talking about Mount Everest among all the other mountains it is the tallest we're saying something specific about the mountain so the tallest mountain alright and finally the last one again we're talking about the noun world how many worlds are out there that you guys you know know about how many are we there's really just one there's one earth there's one world that we are referring to so it is the world alright because there's no Everest is here so Mount Everest is the tallest mountain in the world so I want to practice one more thing with the superlative so again I'm gonna ask you guys a question all right which type of pizza is the best all right I'm asking you a question just practicing using the superlative which type of pizza is the best write it in the chat all right or if you're watching this later again write it in the comments let us know which is the best it's always good to practice using these articles again with the superlative you want to use the definite article the the best the greatest the fastest the smartest the tallest all right so let's see again to review the last thing I'd want to say is remember these are some of the rules that we went over these are not all of the rules there are more but it is good to keep these things in mind when you're talking about articles okay so again that is basically that is all for our lesson today on the definite article the and the 0 article which is just no article we will continue some of these lessons in the future and I might probably do another lesson on the indefinite article a and and save that for another time but these are it's great practice these are small things that learners no matter which level you're at sometimes it can confuse people and make some of these simple mistakes alright so again thank you guys so much for joining up for joining us hope you enjoyed this lesson if you're watching it later please give us a thumbs up write to us in the comments write a question write a comment and we will respond and get back to you ok and if you want to be very helpful to us share the video on Facebook Twitter whatever type of social media you might be using so we can spread the and help others who are trying to practice and improve their English alright so thank you guys so much for joining us have a wonderful rest of the weekend so I would say Arena Edoardo for a cot you said I'm late I'm sorry we're getting ready to wrap things up and again just for food-for-thought wrap things up means it is ending but you will be able to watch the video because it will be on our video list on our YouTube channel so thank you guys for joining us we hope you have a wonderful weekend and we will see you next week next Saturday we will do another live lesson not really sure what time just yet probably early afternoon I will make a post on Facebook and Twitter all right Marcella Thank You Dom if I don't know the name target English spoken club awesome thanks for being here have a great weekend we will see you guys next time so long

Channel: Interactive English

Views: 17,781

Keywords: Interactive English, Learn English Free, Practice English, Learn English Online, Learn English Speaking, Study English, English Learning, تعلم الإنجليزية, english grammar lesson, english grammar, learn english articles, learn definite article the, learn zero article, how to use definite article, how to use zero article, learn english grammar, advanced grammar lesson, intermediate grammar lesson, practice english grammar, how to use english articles, useful english grammar

Id: mXyXuNdGx1k

Length: 43min 43sec (2623 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 29 2017