know your idioms! lesson two. or three?

contenders: “make do” vs. “make due”

It’s “make do”, not “make due”.

If i have to “make do”, that means I will get by with whatever less than ideal materials i possess.

If i have to “make due”, I am literally making a requirement for something to be turned in to me, and this requires both an object that I am making due and a willingness to sound like Ainsley Hayes in the West Wing, as in”I need to make due these papers by Friday in order to have grades in”.

Got it?  Go forth and make do, and (for my fellow teacher friends) make due.  Do both.  Class dismissed.