The key to exercise solutions in chapter 7.1 - Food for thought for the textbook New Total English Upper-Intermediate - Students' Book with authors Araminta Crace and Richard Acklam from Pearson Education
Question
Look at the quantifiers in bold in the Active grammar box and match them with the rules (A-C).
Look again at the quantifiers in bold from the Active grammar box. Which group (a-c) does each quantifiers belong to?
What is the difference between few / a few and little / a little in the sentences (1-4) below?
Answer
a)
a large number of; many; a few
a great deal of; a little; much; a piece of; a bit of
b)
a large number of; a lot of; a great deal of; many; much; lots of
a little; a few
some; a bit of; a piece of; any
c)
few and little (without a) are used in a rather negative way, meaning not as many / much as you expected or wanted
a few and a little are used in a more positive way