What for?

People very often confuse the purpose of an action (what for?) with the reason why we do it. If we look carefully we will realize that they are two different concepts. In simple words we could say that the "purpose" looks ahead and generally has to do with ourselves, with our personal intentions or objectives, while the "reason" usually looks back and often has to do with other people's impositions upon us.

Today we are going to study purpose clauses and very soon we'll study the clauses of reason. Here you will find a good explanation on how clauses of purpose work, a set of exercises and a few sentences in Spanish to translate into English. Good luck! Remember the teacher is always around to help you if you need it.

Here's a short poem by horror writer Kristy M. Tallman called "Why & what for..."