Learning English can be demanding, and it can be even more challenging if you don’t go about it in the right way. With about a billion English language learners from all over the world, English is the most widespread second language worldwide. Certainly, millions of native speakers of all languages have developed proficient English skills for business, family, or personal reasons. But gaining fluency in English doesn’t come without its fair share of problems. Below, in this article, we’ve gathered some of the most common mistakes we’ve seen among English language learners.
Mistakes that English Speakers Often Make
Little details can make a big distinction in how effectively you speak. Here are we mentioned some mistakes you may not realize you are driving, and how to correct them.
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Indefinite and definite articles, “or” “a,” “an” and “the” as they are more generally known, are hard for even native English learners to keep straight. “The” is only used when you’re talking about something that is known to both the writer and the reader, while “a” or “an” can be directed to anything. Confusing absolutely. Again, “an” is only used before a vowel. Yet, why do we say an hour but a horse?
(“An” is operated before a vowel sound, even if it’s not actually a vowel)
Mass nouns
These are nouns that act “singular” but guide to more than one thing. A family or group is made up of more than one person but works as a single unit in sentences. Other often confusing mass nouns are advice, news, garbage, and water.
Adverbs vs. Adjectives
Confounded by many native English speakers as well, English learners often mix up adverbs and adjectives. Well is an adverb, good is an adjective. So technically you ran well but your run was right and the test was good but ran well.
Prepositions
These are hard in every language because every language employs them a bit differently. In English, “IN” is used both for closed areas and periods, “AT” is used for a specific time or place and “ON” is used to represent the surface something is on or a day.
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SVO Word Order
That is Subject-Verb-Object word order. In English, unlike many different languages, the subject is ALWAYS necessary.
Pronouns
Combining “he” and “she” is another typical mistake made by English learners. Some languages, like Japanese, don’t determine every event of these articles.
3rd Person “S”
When employing 3rd person singular (he, she, it), always add an –s to the end of the verb. The “s” is often missed by English learners!
Don’t
The use of “don’t” in negative sentences gives English learners, particularly Spanish speakers a bit of trouble. In English, you must add “do” and “not” to obtain a negative meaning.
Apostrophes
Apostrophes are employed in contractions or to show possession. Yet, they are not used with possessive pronouns like his, her, or their.
Capitalization
What to capitalize is diverse in every language and often hard to keep straight. In English, we capitalize
- “I” as a subject
- The first letter of a sentence
- Proper names, national nouns, and adjectives
- Days of the week, months
If you remember your goals and remember what you’re striving for, this should help to offer you the motivation to stay on track.
Remember, learning English isn’t a journey that you begin and you come to a final stop, an endpoint where you can say ‘right, that’s it. I’ve learned English’.
Mistakes are common in learning. Learning is a continuous journey, with ups and downs, and if you assume the journey, not the destination, then this should help you to avoid getting too disheartened, or at least when you do bring disheartened it’ll be more comfortable to get back on track. You can learn English and find out your mistakes in our well-prepared English learning course “English Padikkyam with Inverted Coconut” by Aparna Mulberry. Sign Up to ENTRI Learning App now and find a way to learn English in a better way.
