Purpose

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to correctly identify and use all seven English personal pronouns in place of a noun.

Lesson Explanation

A personal pronoun replaces a specific noun (a person or thing already mentioned) so you do not have to repeat it. English has these subject pronouns:

I     (the speaker, always capitalized)
you   (the person spoken to, singular or plural)
he    (one male)
she   (one female)
it    (one thing or animal)
we    (the speaker plus others)
they  (two or more people or things)

The pronoun I is always written with a capital letter, no matter where it appears in a sentence — this is a fixed rule specific to this one word, unlike other pronouns.

Example replacing a noun with a pronoun: Sarah likes coffee. She drinks it every morning. — here, She replaces Sarah (a female), and it replaces coffee (a thing).

Choosing the correct pronoun depends on two things: whether the noun is singular or plural, and if singular, whether it refers to a male, a female, or a thing.

Practice Questions