Apostrophes
📋 What it is
An apostrophe shows possession (Sam’s bag) or a contraction (do not → don’t). It does NOT make a word plural.
🗣️ Coach says
The apostrophe has ONE job it is NOT for: making plurals. “Two dog’s” is wrong (just “two dogs”). It DOES show owning (the dog’s bone) and squished words (isn’t). BOLT sprinkles apostrophes on every plural — catch them.
🧠 Memory hook
Owning or squished-together → apostrophe. Just “more than one” → NO apostrophe.
😂 Giggle
Why was the apostrophe so proud?
It always knew whose was whose!
😲 Whoa!
The greengrocer's apostrophe — putting apostrophes in plurals like "apple's 50p" — is so common it has its own name.
🖍️ Grade BOLT-3000's apostrophes.
You're the teacher — mark BOLT-3000's work, then reveal how you did. (Grading a robot: all the skill, none of the sting.)
BOLT wrote: “The teacher graded all the test’s.”
✗ Needs a fix — “test’s” is just a plural: “all the tests” (no apostrophe).
An apostrophe never makes a word plural; "tests" is simply more than one test.
🧪 Try it! (2 minutes)
Write “the cat that belongs to Mia” and “more than one cat” — punctuate each correctly.