By the end of this activity you will be able to: Use its & it’s correctly in different contexts.

It’s and its sound the same and look very similar. However, they are two very different words with different meanings.

It’s is short for the words it is or it has. The apostrophe ( ‘ ) shows something has been missed out – the i from “it is” or the ha from “it has”.

Its means belonging to it – notice there is no apostrophe!

Look at this example: The bird flew to its nest. The nest belongs to the bird. If you put an apostrophe in, you change the meaning. The bird flew to it’s nest means the bird flew to it is nest, which doesn’t make sense, does it?

Now try these. Choose which fits best into the sentence.