When the teacher asks you to hold an object and say, “This is a/an…,” it is a way of practicing identifying objects and using articles (“a” or “an”) correctly in English.Use “a” when the word that follows starts with a consonant sound.Example: This is a ball. / This is a pencil.Use “an” when the word that follows starts with a vowel sound (a, e, i, o, u).Example: This is an apple. / This is an eraser.