Possessive Nouns and Pronouns

1. Grammar Stuff You Need to Know! Possessive Nouns and Pronouns

2. What’s the deal? • Possessive nouns and pronouns demonstrate OWNERSHIP . • Pluralnouns indicate MORE THAN ONE person, place or thing.

3. How do I recognize POSSESSIVES? • Possessive nouns typically include an apostrophe. For example: • Jennifer’s imagination ran wild as she pictured the accident. • The kitten’s toy is a stuffed catnip mouse. • Think of the apostrophe mark as a hook or hand reaching out to take ownership of the object. Without the little hook or hand grabbing onto the ‘s’ or the next word, the noun is simply plural.

4. So what do Possessive Pronouns Look Like? • Personal pronouns as possessives look like this: • We decorated our house for the holidays with colorful lights. • My car is red.

5. Basic Rule #1 • To make a singular noun show possession (aka, ownership), ADD an ‘s • Good Examples: • Dog’s bone • NBA’s decision • Mother’s love

6. Basic Rule #2 • When you have MORE THAN ONE of something, you have a PLURAL. And when you want to show Possession for more than one thing (aka, ownership), ADD AN APOSTROPHE to words that END in the letter S. Good Examples: • Horses’ tails • Countries’ armies

7. Basic Rule #3 • Personal pronouns never use the apostrophe to show ownership. Personal pronouns are words like my, your, her, his, our, their and its. They already imply ownership within the word itself. • Correct example: Your cell phone is ringing. • Bad example: Yours’ cell phone is ringing.

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