A and An

One of the simplest grammar rules had been one of my biggest downfalls for a long time. “A” is supposed to be used before words that begin with a consonant sound and the word “an” is supposed to be used before words that begin with a vowel sound. In order to overcome this ridiculous issue I simply had to focus on the sound coming from the word immediately following the “a” or “an” word. Here are two examples of how the words are used incorrectly: 1. My favorite instrument is an guitar. 2. Wilco is a awesome band. In order to turn these into proper sentences you must look at and pronounce the word immediately following the “an” or “a”. In Sentence number one, the word guitar begins with a consonant so the word prior to that should be “a.” In Sentence two, the word awesome begins with a vowel sound so the word “an” should be used in front of it. So, the correct way to write these particular sentences would be; 1. My favorite instrument is a guitar, and 2. Wilco is an awesome band. Once you get the hang of it, it is fairly simple.