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Ask for help > usage of a lot of in negative sentences and help with a composition
usage of a lot of in negative sentences and help with a composition
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Pedro14
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usage of a lot of in negative sentences and help with a composition
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Yesterday I was explaining to a student of mine who had failed his third-term exam the use of the quantifiers much, many and a lot of. Don �t know if I �ve been doing it well so far because she started doing an exercise after my explanation when she found the following sentence: This book doesn �t provide many / a lot of information. She, obviously, chose many as the correct answer since I had told her many and much are used in negative sentences and questions. I checked the grammar bank of her book and a lot of was used in negative sentences in several examples. To what extent is a lot of used in negative sentences? Would it be considered its usage wrong in written compositions? Is there any volunteer who would kindly double check two compositions I have already corrected? They are advance level and it is a long time since I taught this level. Don �t want to give them back to my student having missed any mistakes. Thanks in advance. |
4 Jun 2017
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kohai
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Hi Pedro, My first thought was that your student should know that information is an uncountable noun and it can�t be used with "many". Cambridge Dictionary says: We use much with uncountable nouns and many with countable nouns: It doesn�t need much effort. Not: It doesn�t need many effort.
A lot of and lots of can both be used with plural countable nouns and with singular uncountable nouns for affirmatives, negatives, and questions: There weren�t a lot of choices.
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4 Jun 2017
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Pedro14
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Hi kohai, You are completely right. I also told my student that "many" is used with countable nouns and that "information" is an example of an uncountable noun. But then my student came to the conclusion that she can then always use a lot of in every fill the gap exercise when asked to use any of these quantifiers. I also told her that "many" and "much" can also be used in affirmative sentences in formal contexts, but to forget about that at her level of English. May using a lot of in negatives and questions be somehow considered a bit informal? |
4 Jun 2017
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yanogator
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Yes, Pedro, "a lot" is a bit (but not very) informal, but it is steadily gaining ground to the extent that "much" and "many" often sound stilted. "There were many people at the party" sounds like it came straight out of a grammar book, as compared to "There were a lot of people at the party". Bruce |
4 Jun 2017
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Jayho
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A lot of (lot�s of) is considered informal but very common in everyday conversation (negative and positive). Where I hail from, I don�t think a lot of people use many/much instead of a lot of in casual conversation. It�s interchangeable. In essay writing it is better to use formal language.
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4 Jun 2017
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