How to use SOME & ANY | English Grammar Lesson

Do you have any questions about when to use

'some' and 'any'?

I have some helpful tips for you today.

Hey there I'm Emma from mmmEnglish.

Now these two words,

they're very common English words that are often

confused and misused by English learners.

And although they seem to have very similar meanings,

they're not often interchangeable

so it's important to know which word to use

and when to use it.

In this video I'm going to clear up some of that

confusion so that you can avoid making those

mistakes in the future.

We'll go through the meaning of 'some' and 'any'

the general uses and some of the exceptions

to the rules so make sure you keep paying attention

throughout the video.

There's going to be a quiz at the end.

Now if you're not a subscriber yet, then click that button

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in case I'm speaking a little too quickly for you.

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The first thing you need to know is that we use

'some' and 'any' before plural

and uncountable nouns.

And we do it to talk about a certain number or amount

of something when we don't actually know exactly

how much or how many of that thing we want.

So I need to buy some bread.

I'm saying that I need to buy an amount of bread

but I'm not being specific, I'm not saying exactly

what number or amount I need.

Now again we want to know if there's pasta left,

but I don't really care about the specific amount,

I just want to know if there is an amount.

Now because 'some' and 'any' are both used in quite

similar situations, it's often difficult to know

which one you should use, right?

So we're going to go over the general grammar rules

to help you decide which one to use.

But definitely stick around until the end of this lesson,

there are some exceptions to these rules

that you need to know.

And I'll get to those in a little bit but later, later, later on,

I've also got a quiz that's going to help you to test

what you've learned in this lesson.

So as a general rule, we use 'some' with positive

or affirmative sentences.

Now we can use 'any' with negative sentences

and questions, okay?

So that's pretty simple right?

There are some clear rules there

but like many things in English, there are several

exceptions to this rule as well.

Now this is where the fun starts.

Alright take a look at this question.

We use 'some' and it's a question.

Now this is an exception.

We use 'some' in questions when you're

pretty sure that the answer will be yes.

I'm asking you to pick up coffee because I know

there's a high probability or a strong chance

that you'll say yes, that you will buy the coffee.

Now often questions that we are expecting the answer

to be yes are offers or requests okay?

Alright I'm being polite.

I'm asking you but I know that you probably want

milk in your coffee.

Now if I said

I'm asking because I actually don't really know

if you have milk in your coffee or not.

Now I already know that you need money

and I'm expecting you to say yes

but if I said:

I'm asking

because honestly I don't really know the answer.

Now this isn't the only exception

okay? We have a couple more important ones

to get through but that one

is an important one to remember.

Alright so that was a very subtle difference.

Now let's move on to the second exception.

Before I said that 'any' is used in

negative sentences and not positive ones, right?

Do you remember? But you can use 'any' in an

affirmative sentence or a positive sentence

if the sentence has a negative feeling.

Now positive sentences that include negative feelings

usually have words like:

in them.

Now this sentence is a positive structure

but we're talking about the lack of money

which is a negative feeling or a negative idea.

That's what we're talking about.

Now there's one last situation where 'any' can be used

in an affirmative sentence.

Now this is a special exception because it's also the

only time that you might see 'any' or 'some'

being used with a singular countable noun.

That's a general rule that we're breaking here.

We can use 'any' in an affirmative sentence

and commonly with a singular countable noun

as a way to say it doesn't matter which one, alright?

It doesn't matter which road you take, it's not important.

You can take any of them.

It's not important which shirt you take,

you can have whichever one you want.

It doesn't matter which one.

Now that we've been through some examples,

you really shouldn't have any problem

with this little quiz now, okay?

Let's do the first one together.

All you need to do is choose the correct word,

'any' or 'some'.

Could be either but let's go with 'any'

because 'any' is used in a question, especially

one that you don't know the answer to and usually

you're asking because you don't know.

Now if I was asking someone who I thought had kids,

then I'd probably use a question tag and I'd say:

Next one.

Now let's imagine that the person we're asking is a huge

fan of dessert and always wants more.

Alright so we probably can assume that the answer

will be yes and it's an offer.

So 'some' is the correct answer here.

Now this is a singular countable noun here, it's a clue.

So it would have to be 'any'.

Any or some?

You got it. It's 'any', right?

Because 'any' is used in negative sentences.

Now for the last one let's go with:

Now even though this is an affirmative sentence,

we're using 'hardly' which gives us a negative

feeling, right? So we would use 'any'.

So how did you go? Did you get any of them wrong?

Tell me in the comments below if you did

and let me know if you've got any questions about them.

Try to write some example sentences of your own

so that I can come down and check them out.

The English language is full of confusing word pairs

just like these ones

that are very similar in meaning

but they're not exactly the same.

And I've got a whole playlist of those lessons right here

so if you want to keep going with these

types of lessons, you can go check that one out.

And if you've got a specific pair of words that are

particularly confusing for you, then let me know

in the comments below.

I'll try and make a lesson about it really soon.

But for now, let's go check out this lesson together.