Their, There, They're..........HELP

[Lacey]

When I was in first grade, a long long time ago, my teacher gave us an assignment using their, there, and they're....I did not get it at all.  I was sent back to my seat to correct my work over and over again while the other kids were finishing and getting to move on to a fun activity.  I still remember this 20 years later.  I get it now, I think from that experience and years of thinking about it before I spell it.  How did you learn? Is there an easy way to remember which one to use? 

[jubvman]

Writing has also been tough for me but this is something I just picked up easy. There are harder ones though such as affect/effect, still can't get my head around that!

In basic terms:

Their - That is their bike (their is used when something is owned; a bike, house, book, whatever)

There - I'm going over there later (there is used when referring to a location)

They're - They're travelling the world (they're is used in substitute of 'they are')

[songsing]

I haven't really stumbled upon any sorts of tricks to remember this, except you can substitute in "they are" to see if you should use "they're" or not. Otherwise you just sort of have to remember-There is for a place, and their is for the possession of a group. If anyone has a shortcut for remembering this, please share!

[misty1987]

I still to this day have to remind myself which one is the correct one to use in my sentence. To help me remember which one to use I do a sort of elimination process in my head.

Say I wanted to write "Their hair was a complete mess". The first one I usually try to eliminate is 'They're', so I'll say to myself, 'they are, no that's not right'. I never get confused with 'there' so by process of elimination,  I know the correct one to use is 'Their'.

Complicated and somewhat unnecessary for a 26 year old but it works for me =)

[harpy]

Although I am a native English speaker, I do have issues with spelling and using their, there, and they're from time to time. Their pronunciation isn't helping either! They're practically homophones, so I remember these three guidelines when choosing which word to use in a sentence:

There - for place

Their - for possession

They're - a shortcut (of they are)

Normally, I just remember 'there' and 'their' because I mix up those too pretty badly. 'They're' is not difficult to remember. Since it has that apostrophe, I know it's a shortcut of a longer word.

[Trellum]

Well, you can simply remind yourself this:

Their: A possessive pronoun denoting an object belongs to someone.

There: is a noun, an adverb, a pronoun, or an adjective and it shows NO possession.

They're: They: subject and pronoun.  Are: verb. 

Not as hard as it seems, but sometimes teachers just don't know how much they're screwing things up when asking this kind of assignments (often causing more confusion).

[Baburra]

I didn't have much trouble learning this myself, but I can see how it could be confusing to some. I think as long as you understand the basic structure of English then it would be easy to apply those rules to this situation.

[TheJamal]

Writing has also been tough for me but this is something I just picked up easy. There are harder ones though such as affect/effect, still can't get my head around that!

In basic terms:

Their - That is their bike (their is used when something is owned; a bike, house, book, whatever)

There - I'm going over there later (there is used when referring to a location)

They're - They're travelling the world (they're is used in substitute of 'they are')

Yep, this is how I remember this as well. Having examples to keep them straight is a great way to separate the different definitions. I actually use examples for all these sorts of words to keep them straight

[whnuien]

I don't really remember of having trouble with those words when I started learning English but I was annoyed a lot because there are many words that come with different spelling, same pronunciation, and different meaning. I made more mistakes with other words in the past and I actually still do today but at least never with their, there, and they're.

[Bobcar23]

I think it's just a matter of practice, many native English speakers don't know the difference and usually use the wrong word so I wouldn't stress too much over it.