<I>The British Council?s language clinic with ?Dr Danny?</I>

Hello and welcome to the English Language Clinic. This week I have been asked two questions. The first is ?What is the plural of ?knife??? The noun ?knife? has an irregular plural form: ?knives?. If it had a regular plural form, it would be ?knifes? and you may read or hear this word. However, ?knifes? is not a noun, it is a verb. To ?knife? someone is to attack them with a knife, usually involving a stabbing action. ?Knifes? is the ?third person singular? form of the verb; in other words, it is used after the words ?he?, ?she? and ?it?.

The second question is ?What is the difference between ?effective? and ?efficient??? If something is ?effective?, it is capable of producing or doing something (known as an ?effect?). For example, if you wanted to carry some water from one place to another, a bucket would be ?effective?, a cat would not be! If something is ?effective?, you might describe it as ?working?, or that it ?does the job? or ?does the trick?.

If something is ?efficient?, it is capable of producing a desired effect (it is effective) without waste. Imagine you were asked to carry a certain amount of water from one place to another. You are given the choice between two buckets, one has a small hole in the bottom, and the other does not. Both buckets would be ?effective? (you could carry water in both of them) but the one without the hole would be more ?efficient? (you could finish the job more quickly as you would not be wasting the water that leaked out of the hole).

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