IS or ITS Most Common English Errors English Grammar Pronunciation Mistakes

hello everyone and welcome back to

english with lucy today I’ve got a very

short little lesson but I’m hoping to

correct an error that I hear and see a

lot of you make especially students that

have Spanish as their mother tongue so

this lesson might not be relevant for

everybody you might watch this and say

Lucy do you think we’re stupid but no I

started teaching Spanish students

because I was teaching in Spain and I

always thought that they really really

struggled with this because Spanish does

not have the same structure of English

regarding this particular grammar point

yours however might do so if you get

through this video and you find it a

relevant every grammar topic can be

relevant for everyone before we get

started I just wanted to remind you to

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listening exercise anyway let’s start

with the lesson today I’m going to talk

about the difference between is and it’s

now before we get started I want to just

quickly talk to you about the

pronunciation of these two words because

I hear a lot of people saying if if both

of these are in correct

it should be firstly it a short vowel

sound not e a so that’s the first

mistake corrected if not e a stop the

voice with your throat a e-e-e okay see

if you can guess what I’m going to talk

about next

regarding the pronunciation of the two

words is its is its they end with a

different phoneme even though the

phonemes are represented by the letter S

so in is a voiced sound

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it’s unvoiced sound so if doesn’t exist

it is if it is it now if you apply this

to your speech you will instantly sound

more native now the next error that I

want to correct with these two little

words is the repetition of a subject

don’t repeat the subject Spain it’s

wonderful Spain is wonderful which one

is correct what is the subject of this

sentence the subject is Spain if I say

Spain it’s wonderful I’m actually third

Spain it is wonderful and that means

I’ve got two subjects I have repeated

the subject so that it is not necessary

Spain subject is wonderful now compare

these two sentences today is sunny today

it is sunny what’s the difference

which one is incorrect neither of them

are incorrect both of them are correct

today it is sunny it refers to the

weather today is sunny very slight

different so be careful with that

what does the it refer to another error

that I

here made by Spanish because a lot is no

is okay I had a wonderful wonderful

student an amazing academic if you gave

him anything to do with computers he

would just sort it out it was amazing

but he couldn’t get it into his head

that it’s not no it is it’s not or isn’t

but because in Spanish you say nice

nurse’s eat some people brains want to

say in English no is because it’s also

similar doesn’t it noise noise noise

noise but this isn’t didn’t isn’t case

if I want to say noise no I failed for

example I have to say it’s not him or it

isn’t him I can’t say noise him it

doesn’t exist now for some people that

might seem quite basic it’s hard not to

translate things directly from your own

language nah know if is I can totally

understand why a Spanish speaker would

translate nice as know it but take it

from me it’s not correct and if you want

to speak and sound like a native then

you need to start saying it isn’t isn’t

she isn’t nice it isn’t good it’s not

fair

right so the points you need to take

away from today’s lesson pronunciation

it is it is it is it is together so is

has no subject and it has the subject it

is the subject it is the subject in it

oh this is quite a difficult topic to

explain it seems so simple but actually

it’s not simple the next point be very

very careful when repeating the subject

do you need to repeat it the answer is

almost always no Spain is different

Spain it

different which one is it it is because

Spain is the subject and then the final

point with the negative it’s never know

is it is always it is not it’s not it

isn’t that’s it for today’s lesson don’t

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will see you soon for another lesson

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you