Consider these sentences:
Camp for children from 6 to 12 years old.
Camp for children from 6 to 12 years old.
Camp for children from 6 to 12 years old.
You will notice that the first sentence uses “age”, the second uses “age”, and the third uses “age”. This type of construction is the subject of frequent queries, but all three uses are common English idioms. However, from year old Different function in each.
Use ‘Age’ and ‘Age’ for Range
In the first two examples, year old is a noun. We often see the same phrase used when talking about a single person:
A gift for his eldest daughter, year old 16.
“Age 16” is placed here as a relative clause with the usual introduction. Who omitted: Gift for his eldest daughter, [who is of the] 16 years old.
Plural noun ages generally works for age groups defined in a range:
Camp is for kids [who are of the] ages 6 to 12.
In June, the Food and Drug Administration approved the vaccine, distributed under the brand name Gardasil, for girls and women. ages 9 to 26. — Apoorva Mandavilli, DetectJanuary 2007
However, sometimes the singular noun year old encountered even when followed by a range:
For example, the first trial reported started with 56 children year old 3 to 14, two-thirds have true autism and one-third have a pervasive developmental disorder… — John Travis, Scientific newsNovember 17, 2001
Use ‘Age’ for Range
In the third example, old is a past participle adjective formed from the verb year old (year old adjective meaning 1 b: “has reached a specified age”).
Camp is for kids [who are] old 6 to 12
This work is the most criticized work. Some commentators use deprecation old, argues that adjectives should only modify things like barrel-aged alcohol and should not be used to associate people with their actual age. But usage is very well established in English.
When I started middle school, old eleven, Jake is sixteen and the star of the soccer team. — Sophie Kinsella, I owe you one2009
Japan certainly faces demographic challenges. It is already the oldest country in the world, as measured by both the average age of the population (46.3 years) and the percentage of the population old 65 years or older (26 percent). — Paul A. Laudicina, CNBC.comFebruary 11, 2018
Varsity Tutors has a virtual summer camp that offers free classes on everything from making slime to dinosaurs to making your own Lego movies. Children old 5 to 18 year olds can create their own schedule, with classes lasting one hour, five days a week for each session. —Lisa Milbrand, very simpleMay 21, 2020
old also used frequently as a conjunction to describe people of a certain age. It is sometimes attached to nouns, such as school, often associated with people of a certain age. Therefore, a word like at college age usually describes a young adult between 18-22 (although adults of all ages attend college), while middle-age describe people between 45 and 64 or so.
With a convenient location for a comic book store, most of the business the store receives is from sporadic colleges-old customers and the elderly middle-classold often with more income. — Isabella Colini, Pitt News: University of PittsburghJuly 17, 2019
Categories: Usage Notes
Source: vothisaucamau.edu.vn
