Four quick decisions
Four pairs. One of each pair is what an English speaker says. Choose fast — you are testing what your ear already knows before we explain anything.
One right answer each. Do not deliberate.
1. Which do people say?
2. Which do people say?
3. Which do people say?
4. Which do people say?
An induction email
To: new starters. From: the office manager.
Welcome. You will have a desk on the second floor and a locker in the corridor. The desk is yours; the locker is shared, so please label your things.
Reception opens at eight. There is a kitchen on each floor — the one on the second floor has the good coffee machine, and people are protective about it.
You do not have to be at work before nine, but most people arrive early on Monday because the week starts with a team meeting.
If you are ill, email me before eight. If you are in hospital, obviously do not.
Sofia is our translator and Kemal is a first-aider. Both are on the second floor. Ask them anything.
Six phrases lifted from the email. Match each to the reason it takes the article it takes — or takes none.
Three choices, not two
Portuguese has definite (o, a, os, as) and indefinite (um, uma). English has those two — and a third: nothing.
The third one is not the absence of a decision. It is a decision, and it carries meaning. I like coffee and I like the coffee are two different sentences about two different things.
The decision, in order
| Ask | If yes | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Does the listener already know which one? | the | Close the door. There is one door and we are both looking at it. |
| Is it one of many, mentioned for the first time? | a / an | I bought a chair. |
| Do I mean the whole category, in general? | nothing | Chairs are expensive. I like coffee. Life is hard. |
| Is it uncountable and unspecified? | nothing | We need information. She has experience. |
| Is it a name, a day, a month, a meal? | nothing | on Monday · in March · after lunch |
| Is it a job, after be or become? | a / an | She is an engineer. Portuguese drops this. English cannot. |
The two errors go in opposite directions. This is why the problem feels unsystematic when it is not.
Adding one where English wants none: the life is hard, I go to the work, in the Monday, I like the music, the people are strange.
Dropping one where English needs it: She is engineer, He is very good teacher, I have car.
The first list is far longer, and every item on it comes straight from Portuguese. The second list is short and almost entirely about jobs.
Write a, an or the — or write - if English wants no article at all. There are gaps of every kind.
Kemal is nurse. He works in big hospital near the station. hospital has four hundred beds. He starts work at seven on Mondays and finishes after lunch on Fridays. He says nurses are underpaid everywhere, not just here.
Hunting your own errors
Six sentences with one article too many. Delete it and write the sentence out.
1. I go to the work by bus every day.
2. We have the team meeting on the Monday.
3. The life in a big city is expensive.
4. She had the lunch at her desk again.
5. I need the information about the new contract.
6. The nurses work very hard in every country.
Eight phrases English uses bare. Match each to what it means. Learn them as whole phrases, not as rules.
The test that settles most cases. Say the noun on its own and ask: which one?
If you can answer — that one, the one we mentioned, the only one here — use the.
If the honest answer is any one, it does not matter which, use a.
If the question makes no sense because you mean all of them, use nothing.
A short description of a workplace. Fill each gap with a, an, the or - for no article.
I work in small office above bakery. bakery opens at five, so whole building smells of bread by the time we arrive. There are eight of us. Marta is accountant and the rest of us do design work. We start at nine, except on Fridays, when we start at ten.
Write the induction
Task card · Writing then swapping · Pairs
Somebody starts at your workplace or on your course on Monday. Write them the paragraph the office manager wrote above.
Six to eight sentences. Where they arrive, what is there, who is who, and one thing they must not do.
- Introduce at least two things for the first time with
a, and refer back to one of them withthe. - Name at least one person by their job: Ana is a…
- Use at least three bare phrases from the practice — go to work, at night, by bus, have lunch.
- Then swap. Your partner circles every article, and every place one is missing.
The auditor’s instruction. Do not correct. Circle, and write one of three letters beside each circle: E for extra, M for missing, W for wrong one. Hand it back and let the writer fix their own.
The error going the other way
Four sentences missing an article. This is the shorter list — and almost all of it is about jobs.
1. My sister is architect in Lisbon.
2. He wants to become teacher.
3. She is very good manager.
4. I have car, so I can drive you.
The decision as a checklist
Put the three questions into the order you should ask them. The order matters — the first one that answers yes ends the decision.
Before next lesson. Find one thing written in English at your workplace — a sign, an email, a label, a policy. Bring it, or bring three sentences from it.
Next lesson you speak for two minutes without stopping. Anything real you can quote will help.