To ask who owns a single item:
¿De quién es + [el/la] + [objeto]?
Examples:
Based on thousands of student submissions in "Practice It UPD" logs, these are the top three mistakes: p219 estructura 1 de quien es practice it upd
Given the reference “p219 estructura 1 de quien es,” your specific exercise likely contains:
To complete the “practice it upd” successfully, follow these evidence-based steps:
English speakers are used to adding an apostrophe + s to show possession: To ask who owns a single item:
Spanish has no apostrophe for possession. Instead, it uses the preposition de (of/from). Therefore:
The question form ¿De quién? literally translates to "Of whom?" but idiomatically means "Whose?"
Objective: Use “¿De quién es…?” and possessive pronouns (mío/a, tuyo/a, suyo/a, nuestro/a) to ask and tell whom something belongs to. ¿De quién es + [el/la] + [objeto]
In English, we add an apostrophe + s: Maria’s book. In Spanish, you cannot do that. Instead, you use the formula:
Object + ser (es/son) + de + owner