Possession Summary

GCSE English

When we want to indicate that something belongs to something else, we must be careful!

To belong to a person, we can always write 's after their name:
Angela's new car is lovely.
Put the coffee on Chris's desk.
The cards are Daphne's.

To belong to a person in general, we use his, her and hers:
Her new car is lovely.
Put the coffee on his desk.
The cards are hers.

To belong to it, we use the special word its:
"Can you pass me its lid?"
The dog was outside chasing its tail.

N.B. It's always means it is or it has!

For plural words ending in s, indicate possession with a single '. Otherwise use 's as before:
The dogs' teeth looked sharp.
Farmer Giles kept his sheep's pen clean.

There are other possessive pronouns such as:
whose (for who)
theirs (for her)
ours (for our)


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