From an early level, English students learn to add ‘s’ at the end of verbs
if the subject is 3rd-person singular.
< Yeah! But I forgot what that means. >
They also know to add ‘s’ at the end of plural nouns.
< That’s a lot of ‘s’s. >
So it’s common to make mistakes by having too many or too few ‘s’s.
< Oops. >
Luckily, there’s a simple trick to help students catch those mistakes.
< Oh, good. >
Consider the sentence:
< “My cat loves string.” >
Suppose your students know all words and the order needed for the sentence,
but they also know that words change sometimes,
which can make things tricky.
< One cat, two cats, three cats, four cats, … >
First, we add an ‘s’ to nouns that are plural.
But verbs can change, too.
< She loves, he loves, and it loves. >
Verbs that follow 3rd-person singular subjects need an ‘s’ at the end,
but verbs that follow plural subjects –
< we, you, and they love >
– don’t have an ‘s’ at the end.
So 'love' and other verbs sometimes have ‘s’ at the end, but sometimes not.
Even though students have learned the rules,
< we can say ‘cat’ or ‘cats’.>
it can be hard to keep it all straight when making a sentence.
< we can say ‘love’ or ‘loves’.>
So if they’re not paying very close attention,
they might get it wrong, even if they actually know the right way to do it.
But here’s a nice trick.
< Look at the ‘s’s.>
Notice that if there’s only one ‘s’,
< cat loves, and cats love >
it’s correct.
But with no ‘s’, or more than one ‘s’, it’s wrong.
< It’s the one red ‘s’ rule! >
When writing simple sentences in the present tense,
teachers and students should use a red pen, pencil, marker, or chalk
for every ‘s’ that’s added to the end of a subject or verb.
< ‘Pirates’ has a red ‘s’. >
Taking the action to switch colors can help
students think about whether they need an ‘s’, instead of just using one automatically.
< We already have an ‘s’, so I can’t add another one. >
If there wasn’t an ‘s’ at the end of 'pirates',
we would need to add one to ‘swim’.
The colors also help us find mistakes after sentences are written.
It’s easy to see if a sentence has no red ‘s’ –
< those ones are wrong >
– or if it has too many red ‘s’s.
< those are wrong, too >
The correct sentences are the ones with only one red ‘s’.
Now, there are some exceptions.
For example, verbs following 1st-person and 2nd-person singular pronouns
< I and you >
don’t need an ‘s’.
So those sentences have no red ‘s’s,
< but they are correct. >
Also, keep in mind that some irregular plurals don’t have ‘s’s at the end.
< one child, two children >
< one mouse, two mice >
But since they are plural, the verbs that follow don’t have an ‘s’ either.
So again, there’s no red in these sentences.
But this is interesting: our special and very common verbs –
< are and is, do and does, have and has >
– end with ‘s’ only for the ones that go with 3rd-person singular subjects,
< like ‘she is’, ‘he does’, and ‘it has’ >
so the one red ‘s’ rule still works for these.
< That makes it easier! >
These special verbs can be the main verb of a sentence,
… or … they can be helping verbs,
which leads us to another application of the one red ‘s’ rule.
'Do' and 'does' is used mostly in questions and negative sentences.
< Does Kendall like olives? >
< No. Kendall doesn’t like olives. >
So far, we’ve looked at positive sentences,
but the rule applies to questions and negative sentences as well.
< There’s still only one red ‘s’. >
< It’s just in a different place. >
If you have two or more red ‘s’s, the sentence is wrong.
If you don’t have any red ‘s’s, the sentence is wrong.
< You need one, but only one. >
If your verb phrase needs an ‘s’,
it should go to the helping verb
< like ‘does’ >
if you have one, instead of the main verb.
So, while students learn rules like:
* verbs following 3rd-person singular subjects need an ‘s’
< that’s hard to remember. >
and * verbs don’t need an ‘s’ after plural subjects,
and *if you have a helping verb, the main verb should not have an ‘s’*
< oh, that’s a lot >
the key thing to remember is this:
only use 1 red ‘s’!
< Yeah, I can do that! >
And that will solve a lot of problems.