ESL Blogs

Are you familiar with the personal pronoun it? I hope so. Then, don't confuse it's with its. 

Yes, it's is a shortened form of 'it is' or  'it has' (a contraction), while its is the possesive of it. 

It may not be that easy to use them correctly, though - it's said that even native speakers confuse them. 

The possessive form of a noun has apostrope s ('s) added to it, e.g. Expector's, today's, but the possessive form of it is its (no apostrope).

Let's try to write a short paragraph or build a few sentences to make sure you don't confuse them. Here's a sample paragraph for you:

Sample Paragraph

It seems Expector tends to use contractions in his blogs - he'll use it's, there's or I'm instead of 'it is/has', 'there is' or 'I am'. Some people may argue that Expector should have used the full forms instead of the shortened ones, which means they don't think it's a good idea to use so many contractions in his writing. Expector, however, may try to make him sound natural or a little informal. Anyway, your blogs don't need to be that formal. Being too informal, on the other hand, isn't a good idea, either - you should know its limitations or you're spoiling an otherwise perfect blog, or rather, your blog could lose its charm or popularity. Nevertheless, I really enjoy reading Expector's blogs. 

Your Turn...

Note: Don't confuse contraction with construction - a contraction is the shortened form of a word or words, while construction is the building of things such as houses. 

By the way, Expector's can mean 'Expector is', for example, "Expector's a popular moderator of MyEC." - adding to the confusion:)