To; two; and too | Frequently confused words | Usage | Grammar Video Lecture | Complete Course on English Grammar: Upgrade your Speaking & Listening - Personal Skills

hello grammarians today we're going to
talk about the confusion that happens
between these three homophones these
three words that sound exactly the same
the preposition to the number two and
the adverb to now these words all sound
very similar in fact they sound exactly
the same if I were going to write this
out phonetically here's what I would do
that's how you'd write it in the
international phonetic alphabet for
every pronunciation you say that word -
you say that word - you say that word -
if you were looking this up in a
dictionary that's how you would render
this spelling phonetically that's the
sound of those words they all sound
exactly the same so what we need to do
is come up with a way to keep them all
separate and the way I'm going to do
that is with the prints of foods the
pizza let's just call that a pizza now
to tio is a preposition and so that
means that it's expressing some kind of
relationship in time and space in this
case we can say one of its many many
meanings is that it means it's moving
towards something so for example I am
headed to Franks Arizona's pizzeria
right so we can see in context this is
intentional it's in motion and that's
why we want to use a preposition where
am I going - Frank's Arizona's pizzeria
next TW o also pronounced - you're
welcome
is a number it's this thing so we use
this mostly as an adjective to describe
how many things there are so I would say
at the pizzeria I ordered two pizzas and
ate them by myself right so when we're
talking about the number of things you
want to use T wo and finally we have t
oo - which is an adverb and it can
either mean an overabundance of
something or also so let me give you
examples for both of those cases so
example case number one the excessive
amount
I ate too much pizza I feel awful now
some of you may take issue with that
because you don't believe that there is
such a thing as too much pizza I
understand so that's that's our
excessive amount that's that's just you
know mountains and mountains of Pizza
more than one person can or should
reasonably eat that's that's that
definition and then there is the in
addition or also meaning so my sister
wanted pizza too but because of my greed
she did not get me sorry Julie or I made
her cry oh so in order to keep these
three very similar sounding words
straight here's what you need to
remember to Teo is a preposition that
means towards something I am headed to
Franks Arizona's pizzeria TW oh the
number two is a number suit say I
ordered two pizzas
finally tio oh the adverb means either
there's an overabundance there's too
much or in addition my sister wanted
pizza - so grammarians I say unto you
remember the pizza you can learn
anything David out