In order to first understand agreement between a pronoun and its antecedent, we must first know what is a pronoun and what is an antecedent.
A pronoun is used in place of one or more nouns or pronouns. (921)
Colin thinks he might be moving upstate.
An antecedent is the word or words that a pronoun stands for. (905)
Colin thinks he might be moving upstate. [ask: who is he? He is Colin.]
Agreement is the correspondence, or match, between grammatical forms. Grammatical forms agree when they have the same number and gender. (903)
SINGULAR: Ethan politely asked for an increase in his allowance.
PLURAL: Ethan's brothers politely asked for an increase in their allowance.
Inexact pronoun reference involves when a reader is unsure which noun or phrase is the pronoun's antecedent. (147)
INEXACT: My mother called my sister before she left for work. [Who left for work, the mother or the sister?]
EXACT: Before leaving for work, my mother called my sister.
Singular pronouns are used to refer to the following antecedents: each, either, neither, one, everyone, everybody, everything, no one, nobody, nothing, anything, anyone, anybody, something, someone, and somebody. (273)
INCORRECT: One of the horses closed their eyes.
CORRECT: One of the horses closed its eyes.
A singular pronoun is used to refer to two or more singular antecedents joined by or or nor. (273)
INCORRECT: Katy or Val has their grades.
CORRECT: Katy or Val has her grades.
Consult the following pages in your language text for more help on pronoun-antecedent agreement: 147, 273, 507-509, 903-904.
Possible assignments:
Language Textbook, Review E, page 509, 1-10, answers only
Language Textbook, Review F, page 510, 1-10, answers only
Language Textbook, Review G, page 512, 1-10, answers only
Language Textbook, Chapter Review, part C, page 514-515, 31-50, answers only
Language Workbook, Agreement of Pronoun and Antecedent A, 1-20, & B, 1-20, page 125-126, answers only
Language Workbook, Agreement of Pronoun and Antecendent C, 1-20, & D, 1-20, page 127-128, answers only
Language Workbook, Agreement of Pronoun and Antecedent E, page 129, 1-10, answers only
