Conventions of Composition Rule 179

Rules: The indefinite articles a and an refer to any one of the category defined by the noun. The definite article the refers to a specific one of the category. Use the indefinite article to refer to any non-specific version of the noun in question.

Note: You may omit an article when you use a number.

Examples:

Correct: I want to go to the Senior Dance. The dress she picked out looks great.

Correct: I don't want an apple in my fruit basket. He needs a calculator for the exam.

Correct: I bought two books and a pencil.

Correct: I want to buy a car we looked at yesterday. (Could be any of a number of cars.)

Correct: I want to buy the car we looked at yesterday. (You only looked at one.)

Practice deciding if and where to put articles:

1. Ilya looked at book for the several hours before she had quiz.
2. Li Jing gave bag he found to police officer.
3. Marquis won spelling competition for eighth year in a row.

Resources for more information about articles:

Purdue OWL's Articles

Scribindi's Articles