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Course: SAT > Unit 11
Lesson 3: Writing: Grammar- Writing: Setting Up Ideas — Video Lesson
- Setting up ideas | Quick guide
- Writing: Strong Support — Video lesson
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- Writing: Relevant Information — Video lesson
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- Writing: Transition Words — Video lesson
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- Writing: Interpreting Graphs and Data — Video lesson
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- Writing: Precision — Video Lesson
- Precise word choice | Quick guide
- Writing: Concision — Video lesson
- Concision | Quick guide
- Writing: Formal and Informal Language — Video Lesson
- Writing: Formal vs. casual language — Example
- Formal vs. casual language | Quick guide
- Writing: Syntax — Example
- Writing: Sentence Fragments — Video Lesson
- Writing: Sentence Boundaries — Example 1
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- Writing: Modifier Placement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Modifier placement — Example
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- Writing: Verb Tense and Mood — Video Lesson
- Writing: Shift in verb tense and mood — Example
- Verb tense and mood | Quick guide
- Writing: Pronoun Clarity — Video Lesson
- Writing: Pronoun clarity — Example
- Pronoun clarity | Quick guide
- Writing: Pronoun Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Pronoun-antecedent agreement — Example
- Pronoun-antecedent agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Possessive determiners — Example 1
- Writing: Possessive determiners — Example 2
- Writing: It’s/Its Confusion — Video Lesson
- Confusion with "its" and "their" | Quick guide
- Writing: Subject-Verb Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Subject-verb agreement — Example
- Subject-verb agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Noun Agreement — Video Lesson
- Writing: Noun agreement — Basic example
- Noun agreement | Quick guide
- Writing: Frequently Confused Words — Video Lesson
- Writing: Frequently confused words — Example
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- Writing: Conventional Expressions — Video Lesson
- Writing: Conventional expression — Example
- Conventional expressions | Quick guide
- Writing: Logical Comparison — Video Lesson
- Writing: Logical comparison — Example
- Logical comparison | Quick guide
- Writing: End-of-sentence punctuation — Example 1
- Writing: End-of-sentence punctuation — Example 2
- Writing: Commas — Video Lesson
- Commas | Quick guide
- Writing: Semicolons — Video Lesson
- Semicolons | Quick guide
- Writing: Colons — Video lesson
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- Writing: Possessive Pronouns — Example
- Writing: Possessive Nouns — Video Lesson
- Making nouns possessive | Quick guide
- Writing: Items in a series — Example
- Writing: Punctuating Lists — Video Lesson
- Lists and punctuation | Quick guide
- Writing: Nonrestrictive and parenthetical elements — Example
- Writing: Nonessential Elements — Video Lesson
- Nonessential elements | Quick guide
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Writing: Pronoun Agreement — Video Lesson
David shows you how to approach a Pronoun Agreement question on the SAT Writing and Language test. Created by David Rheinstrom.
Want to join the conversation?
- Does the SAT recognize the singular they pronoun?(4 votes)
- Why is it hard?(2 votes)
- I don’t really Understand this stories(1 vote)
- what is the answer of question 43? i guess c?(1 vote)
- I think so too!
43 is a logical comparison-type question. We want to compare salaries to salaries, so that rules out D). A) just isn't something you say, and we want to compare two plural nouns, so we pick C) instead of B).(1 vote)
- Where's my "you got this :)" in this video?(0 votes)
- What is the difference between "which" and "that"?(0 votes)
- what is a pronoun(0 votes)
- A pronoun is a kind of word that stands in for a noun. Using pronouns helps us avoid repeating ourselves unnecessarily. For instance, we use the first-person pronouns to refer to ourselves. In the sentence I just wrote, for example, the pronouns "we" and "ourselves" refer to Diego.P, Johanna, and all the people who use English. It's a lot faster to use pronouns instead of elaborating that much, right?
You can also learn more about pronouns in the Grammar course on Khan Academy! I hope this helped!(0 votes)
Video transcript
- [Instructor] We are
looking at question 44 today. So I'm gonna read back a sentence or two and start here at job-sharing. "Job-sharing initiatives may involve "some extra cost for companies, "since the salaries and cost of benefits "for two job-sharing
employees are usually higher "than being for a single employee. "However, proponents contend "that the investment is worthwhile "because they enable companies to retain "the most talented employees." Let's take a look at our choices. We've got A, no change, so they enable, B, those enable, C any of them enables, and D, it enables. So these choices are all
different kinds of pronouns. Some of them are plural,
some are singular. And this is there for a
pronoun agreement question. You'll see one or two
of these on your SAT. Pronouns, you'll recall,
stand in for nouns, and we need to find the antecedent, the noun the pronoun is referring back to. Pronouns and the nouns they
refer to have to match. A singular pronoun needs to
refer to a singular noun, just as a plural pronoun
must refer to a plural noun. For example, we use the
singular pronouns he, or she, or it, or that to refer
to singular things, and the plural pronouns,
they, or these, or those to refer to plural things. So top tip number one
is find that antecedent. A pronoun has to refer to something, find that something and
identify whether or not it's singular or plural. And this can get complicated when there are multiple
nouns in a sentence. Let's look at an example. "Rock Creek Park, one of
DC's many national parks, "has a variety of trails to explore "within their 2000 plus acres of land." You see, even though it's
close to the plural nouns trails and parks, this pronoun logically refers to Rock Creek Park, which is a singular noun. So there should be changed to its. "Rock Creek Park, one of
DC's many national parks "has a variety of trails to explore "within its 2000 plus acres of land." Let's head back to the passage. If you want, pause the video now to attempt this question yourself. All right, let's get to it. So first things first, let's find the antecedent for the pronoun. What is the noun that this pronoun is logically referring to? Is it the proponents or
is it the investment? What are the subject and
main verb of the sentence? Proponents are contending. Okay, so far so good. But hold up, by using they, the underlined part is implying that the proponents are
also doing the enabling, but that's not right. It is the investment that is worthwhile, because the investment enables companies to retain the most talented employees. Proponents is plural and
investment is singular. And that means that we
need an it and not a they. That means any plural pronoun in the choices is automatically out. So they is out, goodbye choice A. And those in choice B is
also a plural pronoun, so choice B is gone too. Choice C, any of them enables. Let's plug that back into the sentence. "However, proponents contend "that the investment is worthwhile "because any of them enables companies "to retain the most talented employees." Who would the them be in the sentence? It just sounds awkward to me. And we're looking for a choice that fixes the pronoun agreement error, and makes it clear that the
investment enables companies to retain employees. So therefore, choice C is no good. But choice D, does that
simply and elegantly. And on the SAT writing and language test, simpler and more direct, concise language is almost always the better choice. That went pretty quickly. Let's review our strategy
for questions like these. Once you've identified a
pronoun agreement question, one, hunt for the antecedent,
is it singular or plural? Then, two, knock out
any number mismatches. And three, check the context, what pronoun works best for the situation?