This is my biggest grammar weakness. I know the rules—contractions vs possessive pronouns—but in the heat of writing, I still mess up 'your' and 'you're' constantly.
And 'its' vs. 'it's' is even worse because the possessive doesn't have an apostrophe, which feels wrong because in English, apostrophes usually show possession . I've tried memorizing the rule: contractions have apostrophes because they're replacing missing letters; possessives don't (except for personal names, which is a whole other confusion).
But when I'm typing fast, my fingers just go on autopilot. Does anyone have memory tricks that actually work? I've heard that if you can replace the word with 'it is' or 'you are,' then use the contraction. If not, use the possessive form. That helps sometimes, but I still slip up. How do you train yourself to catch these errors before submitting?
And 'its' vs. 'it's' is even worse because the possessive doesn't have an apostrophe, which feels wrong because in English, apostrophes usually show possession . I've tried memorizing the rule: contractions have apostrophes because they're replacing missing letters; possessives don't (except for personal names, which is a whole other confusion).
But when I'm typing fast, my fingers just go on autopilot. Does anyone have memory tricks that actually work? I've heard that if you can replace the word with 'it is' or 'you are,' then use the contraction. If not, use the possessive form. That helps sometimes, but I still slip up. How do you train yourself to catch these errors before submitting?