Friday, July 13, 2012

Wouldn't it be an unit?

When we were in school weren't we all taught that you have to add an "n" before a word that starts with a vowel and "a" before a consonant.

An apple
An elephant
An igloo

A dog
A hand

Come to find out you have to add the "n" for a vowel SOUND!  What the heck, did I just not listen correctly when I was younger?  Oh well, at least I can teach my students the correct rule.  Some examples that I thought were exceptions to the rule were:

An hour

A unit
A unicorn

But these were always correct from the beginning because I didn't know the SOUND was a part of the rule.  It is AN hour because hour has a vowel sound in the beginning.  It is A unit and A unicorn because the "u" make a -yoo sound. 

3 comments:

  1. First off, I thought I would be alone in the blogging universe. Secondly, I just had my mind blown.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Don't read anything on here! (I had to do it for school)
      And no you're not alone, I have two other blogs set up just for school purposes...we English people like to write:)

      Delete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete