Lately, articles in publications like The Wall Street Journal and Time Magazine have pointed out that more and more people are now accepting they as a grammatically correct singular third-person pronoun.

In other words, it’s now okay to say:

Everyone has their pencil and paper.

Each student was talking to their partner.

First person: I went to my doctor today. Second person: Oh, what did they say? (Because the second person doesn’t know whether the doctor is male or female)

I’m meeting a friend and going to their house. (Because maybe you don’t want to say whether you are going to be with a male or female.)

Using they in these situations saves speakers the problem of using awkward phrases like he or she and his/her.

Sometimes we can avoid this problem by making our sentences plural. For example:

Every student did his or her work can be changed to All the students did their work.

However, this doesn’t always work. Sometimes, you are talking about a single person, but you don’t know their sex or you don’t want your listener to know. Notice that in that last sentence I used their to refer to a single person! Often this is just inevitable in English and it’s nice to know that language experts and editors are finally coming around. You may have a grammar teacher who doesn’t agree, but then you can just refer them to one of the articles I mentioned above (notice that I just used the singular third-person they again!).

Most English grammar books introduce personal pronouns like he, she, him, and her very early on. However, it seems to take many ESL students a long time to really master them. Unfortunately, when you misuse these little words, you can really confuse your listener. Also, using personal pronouns correctly can improve your scores on tests such as the TOEFL iBT and IELTS.

When I taught Low Intermediate Grammar, I used to have the class practice personal pronouns by arranging the students in a circle and having them take turns describing each other. But how do you practice when you’re by yourself?

One simple way is to get a group photo of men and women from the Internet or a magazine. Practice describing these people out loud. For example, you could say: She (a woman) is wearing a green dress. Her shoes are green too. She is sitting by a man. He looks like her father. His hair is gray. He is talking to her. They look happy.

Be sure to speak aloud and don’t just “think” the words. It’s important to get really comfortable with speaking quickly about men and women. Your goal should be to be able to use the correct personal pronoun without giving it any thought. This can take time, but it’s worth the effort.