Englishfor English speakers
he
Pronoun
—
A person or animal that we do not know the gender of.
Kill that spider, before he gets away!.
he
Noun
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A he refers to a male person.
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He is the name of the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets such as Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic and others.
explain
Verb
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If you explain something, you talk about it so that somebody can understand it.
Can you explain the difference between the two?
He explained the difference between the two.
Explaining my thoughts on the topic was useless.
it
Pronoun
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used to refer to an object without identifying or describing it; the object might have been described earlier in the text.
The house was very big. It had many rooms.
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used to describe the weather
It is very hot today.
I'm staying in because it is raining
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used to describe a situation in general
I don't like it when people tell me to do something.
It is hard to find a job.
it
Abbreviation
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It can be a short way of writing:
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# Italy or Italian
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# Information Technology, the use of computers
by
Preposition
—
near or next to.
The mailbox is by the bus stop.
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at some time before (the given time).
Be back by ten o'clock!
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if something is done by somebody, it is done through their action
The matter was decided by the chairman.
The boat was swamped by the water.
He was protected by his body armour.
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if something is created by somebody, they are the creator, author, etc.
There are many well-known plays by William Shakespeare.
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shows how someone does something
I avoided the guards by moving only when they weren't looking.
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using the rules or logic of.
I sorted the items by category.
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with a change of. In this case, by shows how much something has changed.
Our stock is up by ten percent.
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shows how slowly, or how quickly, someone does something (used in the form "X by X" or "by Xs")
We went through the book page by page.
We crawled forward by inches.
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If you multiply mathx/math by mathy/math, you multiply mathx/math × mathy/math.
Five multiplied by seven is 35.
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If you divide mathx/math by mathy/math, you find how many mathy/maths are in mathx/math.
35 divided by seven is five.
the
Determiner
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Used, instead of a, to reference something specific, already known to exist.
Compare "I read a book." and "I read the book."
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Used with a stress, to show that the word following is special.
Are you the John Smith that I went to school with?
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Used with an adjective that acts like a noun to mean all of the people concerned
The poor are always with us.
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Used with superlatives forms of adjectives and adverbs.
You are the best.
fact
Noun
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A fact is something that is true.
That is not just my idea, it is a fact.
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A fact is a piece of information.
He collects little-known facts.
that
Determiner
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Used to show which thing we are talking about; used with things that are not close to the speaker.
Give me that book, not this one.
Give me that, not this.
That dog is hungry.
that
Subordinator
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used to link a subordinate clause to a main one
You said that you liked me.
Give me the book that I dropped.