Hello everybody and welcome to today’s lesson. Today we’re going to talk about the difference
between the words “no” and “not”. A lot of people have asked me this, so I’m
going to give you some examples when to use the word “no” and some examples when to
use the word “not”. I know it might seem a little confusing at
first, but I promise, once you know the basic rules, it’s really not complicated. Alright? So here we go! The first case, we’re going to start with
“no”, so the first case when you want to use the word “no” is in a response. In an answer. So for example, “Are you going out tonight?” “No, I’m not.” or “No, I’m not going out tonight. “Did you get my message?” “No, I didn’t get your message.” “Did you do what I asked you to do?” “No, I’m sorry, I didn’t.” These are classic examples of when to use
the word “no” in a response, okay, and that’s probably the most common time when
you hear the word “no”. The second time you use the word “no”
instead of the word “not” is when you are using it before a noun. Remember a noun is a person, place, or thing. Okay, so BEFORE a person, place, or thing. Alright? So, for example, “There is no place for
us to go tonight.” Okay? “We don’t know where to go. There is no place to go.” Okay? “There are no stores open today.” Okay? “It’s Sunday, there are no stores open.” Another example you can use is if there is
no food in the refrigerator. You open up the refrigerator, “Hey, there’s
no food in here.” Okay so you can also use it when you are talking
about a noun with an adjective. Okay? So, there is no strong candidate in the presidential
election… for example. So you can also use the word “no” before
a noun but with an adjective between the word “no” and the noun. Okay, so for example, “There is no strong
argument in this case.” Let’s say if you’re in court, “there
is no strong argument here”. Another time you can use it is if you’re
talking about… “there are no good-looking men or women here.” Good-looking meaning beautiful or handsome,
okay? So, “There are no beautiful women here”
or “there are no handsome men here”. You use it before the adjective. And then the adjective will precede the noun. So the adjective comes BEFORE the noun. Now, there is one exception. You do not use the word “no” before any
of the following words: any, many, or much, or enough. Okay? Do NOT use the word “no” before those
words. In those cases, you would use the word “not”. So, for example, instead of saying “There
is no much to do here”, you don’t say that. You say “there is not much to do here.” Okay, so you just saw how you use the word
“not” before the words any, many, much, or enough. I’ll give you one more example because this
is one of the main uses of the word “not”. But for example, if you want to use the word
“not” with the word “enough”, you could say something like, what I personally
like to say is, “there is not enough time in the day.” Okay? It’s very little time. “It’s not enough.” I would like to have more time in the day. Okay? Not enough. Another time when you use the word “not”
instead of the word “no” is before a noun that has an article. Hopefully you know what an article is. An article is either the word “a”, “an”,
or “the”. Okay so now… if you are using the word “not”,
then it would come before the words “the”, “an”, or “a”. So, for example, “This is not the scene
of the crime.” You don’t say, “this is no the scene of
the crime.” “This is not the idea that I had in mind.” You have either the word “the”, “a”,
and “an” in between the word “not” and the noun. Okay, now finally, one of the biggest uses
of the word “not”.. pay attention because this is very important, is to make a verb
negative! You don’t use the word “no” to make
a verb negative, okay? You use the word “not”. So for example, “I do not know.” Or you could say something like, “I am not
going.” “I don’t like it.” “You don’t see it.” “We don’t live here.” Remember those contractions - don’t - that
is for the word “not”. That is turning the words “do” and “not”
into the word “don’t” okay so that’s using the word “not” there. “We don’t know” or “we do not know”. Anytime you are using it to make a verb negative,
you use the word “not”. Okay, so I hope this video has been helpful
to you. Keep scrolling down for the activities, you’ll
see a lot more examples, notes, and worksheets that you can print out and of course, a little
quiz at the end to make sure that you completely understand, alright? I’ll see you in the next lesson. Bye!
