Which of these English mistakes do you make
Hi, I’m Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com.
Do you make these common mistakes in English?
Let’s talk about it.
Have you ever felt afraid to make a mistake
when you’re speaking in English?
What happens if you make a mistake?
Other people will say, “What?
What did you say?”
Maybe you will miss out on a friendship or
you won’t seem professional at work and your
heart will start beating.
You might start sweating.
It’s a terrible feeling.
I think that because of school we are all
brought up with the idea that mistakes should
be avoided at all costs.
Mistakes are terrible.
But do you know what?
The reality is, that when you learn anything
new, a language, when you’re learning English,
mistakes are inevitable.
Inevitable is a wonderful word that means
unavoidable.
You will definitely make a mistake in English,
because you’re an English learner.
And a little secret, I make mistakes in English
too.
So what I would like you to do, even though
we are talking about common mistakes today,
I would like you to take a deep breath with
me.
Because when you make a mistake in English,
this means that you are getting out of your
comfort zone.
This is excellent.
It means that you are learning and progressing,
and sometimes making a mistake is a great
way to learn.
So I hope that you will not fear making mistakes,
but instead you will feel confident that making
mistakes means that you are trying something
new that you’ve never done before, that you
are having courage to get outside your comfort
zone.
So, congratulations, you are doing something
challenging.
You’re learning something new and making mistakes
is part of that.
And to help you today, sometimes it’s nice
to learn from other people’s mistakes.
I would like to share with you 11 common mistakes
in English that my students often make.
These are some grammar mistakes, vocabulary
mistakes, pronunciation mistakes, and maybe
you make these mistakes too.
Of course, it’s not the end of the world,
but you are here because you want to level
up your English.
So I hope that these mistakes and corrections
will help you.
To help you with this lesson as well, I have
created a free PDF worksheet.
In this worksheet, I will give you all of
the mistakes, the corrections, sample sentences,
some tips and ideas about how to avoid them,
and what happens if you accidentally make
those mistakes.
And also, at the end of the worksheet, you
will answer Vanessa’s Challenge Question to
help you use what you have learned in this
lesson.
So don’t forget to download the free PDF worksheet.
There is a link in the description just for
you.
It is my gift.
All right, let’s go on to learn these 11 common
mistakes that I often hear my English students
make.
The first couple mistakes are grammar mistakes.
Then we’ll talk about vocabulary mistakes,
and finally some common pronunciation mistakes.
And you know what?
If you make these mistakes, even after this
video, I want you to take a deep breath and
to realize that you are doing something amazing.
You are learning a new language.
You are getting outside of your comfort zone.
You’re awesome.
All right.
Let’s start by talking about some common grammar
mistakes.
Mistake number one, “I went there by bus.”
“I went there by car.”
“I went there by plane.”
Okay, so grammatically in a textbook, they
would say this is okay.
But do you know what?
In daily conversation, we rarely use “by”
plus transportation.
I went there by car, by bus, by plane, by
taxi.
It feels a little bit like textbook English
or classroom English.
Instead, we’re more likely to use the verb
“take”.
“I took a bus.”
“I took a train.”
“I took a flight.”
“I took the plane.”
With driving, because you’re the one who is
in control, we often just say drive.
I drove to my friend’s house.
We drove to the beach.
That’s in the past tense, to drive, drove.
But here, we’re more likely to use a verb
instead of a by phrase.
So take a look at this sentence.
How can we change it to make it be a little
bit more natural?
“We’re going to Canada by plane next week.”
You see that phrase “by plane”.
And now you know it’s not so natural, how
can we change this up?
Well, we have two options.
We can use the verb “take”.
“We are taking a flight to Canada.”
Or you could just say, “We’re flying to Canada.”
It doesn’t mean you’re a bird and you are
actually flying.
This implies that you are going into the airplane.
So you could say, “We’re taking a flight,”
or, “We’re flying.”
Both of these are great options and you can
see how we use the verb to describe the action
instead of a “by” phrase.
Yes, you will occasionally hear this, but
I want to empower you to use the most natural
phrase possible.
All right, let’s go to our second grammar
mistake that is commonly made by English learners.
“I have 33 years.”
Huh?
No.
When we’re talking about age, we do not use
“have”.
instead we can say, “I am 33 years old.”
“I am.”
We use a “be” verb to talk about age.
This is something that I commonly see in my
students who speak a romantic language like
Brazilian-Portuguese or Spanish or Italian
or French.
I often hear, “I have 60 years.”
“I have 55 years.”
But instead we can have a little switch and
just say “am”.
“I am 66 years old.”
“I am 40 years old.”
Beautiful.
Common grammar mistake number three is, “We
were five people at the party.”
Huh?
This sounds very clunky and confusing in English.
It’s like there were five people in your head.
What?
We were five people.
It’s very confusing in English.
So instead, it’s much more natural, and in
fact, just better grammar to say, “There were
five people at the party.”
Or you could say, “There were five of us at
the party.”
If you want to include yourself, the word
“us” includes yourself.
So you could say, “There were five of us at
the party,” or, “There were five people at
the party.”
Both of those are excellent and they use the
word “there” instead of “we”.
“We were five people.”
No.
“There were five people.”
Great.
Grammar mistake number four is, “Don’t be
scary.”
Huh?
Is it Halloween?
Are you dressed up like a vampire?
Don’t be scary there’s children here.
No, this phrase means stop scaring people.
You’re dressed up as something really scary.
Stop being scary.
Don’t be scary.
No, instead, a much more common phrase is,
“Don’t be scared.”
I find that when my English students want
to say, “Don’t be scared,” they accidentally
say, “Don’t be scary,” which has a very different
meaning.
You are dressed up as something scary for
Halloween.
So when you’re trying to comfort someone or
soothe someone, you could say, “Don’t be scared.
I know that speaking English can be a little
bit difficult and maybe you feel nervous,
but don’t be scared.
I’m nice.
I hope that you can speak with me and feel
comfortable.
Don’t be scared.”
Let’s go onto some common vocabulary mistakes
that my English students make.
All of the words that I’m about to talk about
are real English words, but they often get
mixed up in conversations by English learners,
and you know what, sometimes English native
speakers too.
So let’s start with the first common vocabulary
mistake.
Definitely, defiantly.
Hmm.
Take a look at this sentence.
“I definitely do not want to jump into the
cold water.
I definitely do not want to jump into the
cold water.”
But take a look at this sentence.
“He defiantly jumped into the cold water when
I told him not to.”
Hmm.
“He defiantly”.
Look at the spelling difference between these
two words.
For myself, I’ve found that as I’m writing
sometimes I accidentally write the word defiantly.
What’s this word mean?
This means that you’re rebellious.
I told him not to jump into the cold water,
and do you know what he did?
He looked at me and said, “Hm,” and he jumped
into the cold water anyway.
He did it defiantly.
He was being rebellious.
He defiantly jumped into the cold water even
though I told him not to.
Hm.
Now, I’m definitely upset.
So make sure that when you’re using these
two words, whether it’s spelling or speaking,
we use them in the correct way.
All right, let’s go to our second vocabulary
mistake.
Dessert, desert.
Ooh.
“When I was walking across the desert, all
I could think about was eating some ice cream
for dessert.”
First, let’s take a quick look at the spelling
differences between these two words.
When we talk about dessert, something sweet
and tasty, ice cream, cake, cookies, there
are two Ss.
A good way to remember this is usually you
want more dessert.
So we have two Ss.
And when we’re talking about the hot, dry,
sandy place, desert, there’s only one S. That’s
the spelling differences, but let’s talk about
the emphasis and the pronunciation differences.
“I want to eat some dessert.
I want to eat some desserts.”
There is emphasis on the second syllable.
Can you say that with me?
I want to eat some dessert.
Dessert.
But what if I decide to go on vacation to
visit that dry, sandy place?
We might say, “I’m going to the desert.
Desert.”
There’s emphasis at the beginning, de-, desert.
“I’m going to the desert.
Desert.”
Wonderful.
So make sure that when you are spelling these
words, they’re correct.
And when you’re emphasizing them, it’s also
correct.
I’m going to tell you a really silly story
of when I was a kid.
I always wanted to ask my parents for some
dessert, but I knew that if I just asked them,
“Mom, can I have some dessert?” they might
say no.
So I had to come up with a creative way to
ask them for some more dessert.
So me and my sister and my two neighbors,
who we always spent time with, I remember
crawling down the hallway towards my parents
and we said, “Oh, it’s so hot in the desert.
Oh, it’s so hot in the desert.
I need some dessert.”
We were very silly.
So we were trying to get them to laugh and
have a little bit of fun with the difference
between these two words so that they would
give us dessert.
I hope this little story helps you to remember
desert and desert.
Okay.
Let’s go to our next common vocabulary mistake.
Quiet and quite.
This is another one that’s easy to misspell
when you’re writing, because they’re quite
similar, quite similar.
Let’s a look at this sentence.
“I was very quiet when I walked up the stairs.”
Take a look at the next sentence.
“He was quite noisy when he walked up the
stairs.”
We have an opposite meaning here.
“I was very quiet,” this means I didn’t make
much noise.
I was very quiet when I walked up the stairs.
Or, “He was quite noisy.”
We use the word quite as an emphasis.
“He was quite noisy.”
He was very noisy when he walked up the stairs.
He was quite noisy.
Excellent.
So make sure that when you’re writing and
when you’re speaking, you use quiet and quite
in the right way.
Before we go onto some common pronunciation
mistakes, let’s go to our final vocabulary
mistake that I commonly see with English learners,
and maybe this is difficult for you too.
Take a look at these two words, recipe and
receipt.
Let’s talk about pronunciation first.
Recipe, usually, if there is an E at the end
of a word, it’s silent, like the previous
word we talked about, quite.
Quite, we don’t say quite-y.
But in this word we say the final E, recipe.
Can you say it with me?
Recipe.
This is what you read that gives you instructions
for cooking.
I found a great recipe for making chocolate
chip cookies.
A recipe.
But that’s second word, receipt.
So many letters that are cut out.
Receipt, re-, it sounds like R-U, receipt,
seat.
So the P is cut out and the E-I is just an
E sound, receipt, receipt.
This is the paper that you get when you go
to the store.
The cashier will hand you the receipt.
And it’s a list of everything that you’ve
purchased.
So let’s look at these sample sentences.
“I followed the recipe well, why are my cookies
so awful?”
The instructions for cooking, I followed the
recipe well, why are my cookies so awful?
Or you can say, “I checked the receipt, and
oh, I bought salt instead of sugar.”
Let me tell you, if it says to put this much
sugar in your cookies, you should not put
this much salt in your cookies instead.
They will be awful.
So you can check your receipt from the store
and see, “Oh, I bought the wrong thing.”
Oh, well, I guess that’s the answer.
Let’s go on to three common pronunciation
mistakes that I often hear my English students
make, but I want to make sure you can avoid
them.
The first one is pronunciation?
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
It’s true.
This word is long, there’s a lot going on,
and I often hear my English students mix up
this word in so many different ways.
I have heard pronunciation, pronunciation,
pronunciation.
It’s very mixed together in the middle because
there’s a lot of syllables.
So what I would like to do is I want to break
down this word.
We’re going to make it nice and clear and
simple to understand and to say, “Are you
ready?”
Pruh-nun-see-AYE-shun.
That T-I-O-N is going to sound like an sh,
shun.
Let’s try to speed it up a little bit.
Pronunciation, pronunciation, pronunciation.
How’s your English pronunciation?
How’s your English pronunciation?
I hope you can pronounce the word pronunciation
correctly now.
Have you ever been walking down the grocery
store aisles and thought, “Ugh, I can’t find
what I’m looking for.
What aisle is the sugar on?
I need to buy sugar and not salt for my cookies
next time.”
Well, this word aisle, A-I-S-L-E.
Why in the world is it spelled A-I-S-L-E?
Good question.
But it is pronounced eye, like your eye, eye-ul.
Aisle.
Aisle.
So forget the A at the beginning, forget the
S, and just say aisle.
Aisle.
It sounds like the contraction, I will.
I’ll go to the store and walk down the aisle
to look for some sugar.
Aisle, aisle, this is the row in a store where
you might find different things.
So you can go down different aisles.
And if you’re in a store and you can’t find
a product and you ask someone, “Where’s the
sugar?” they might say, “Oh, go down aisle
eight.
Aisle, eight.
Excellent pronunciation.
The final common English mistake, especially
with pronunciation, that I often see my English
students make is with this word.
How do you say that word?
Is it drawer.
Nope.
Instead, there’s two different ways, they’re
very close, that we can pronounce this word.
You might say, “I put my clothes in the drawer,”
with a J sound, or, “I put my clothes in the
drawer,” drawer, with a little bit more of
a clear D-R sound.
Drawer, drawer.
But for both of those words, the W is pretty
much cut out.
So don’t let that confuse you and try to split
that and say, “Draw,” like you’re drawing
a picture, or “drawer.”
We don’t say that.
Instead, it’s jor or droor.
Both of those can be used commonly in daily
conversation.
So where do you put your clothes?
I put them in the drawer.
I put them in the drawer.
Excellent work.
So how did you do?
I hope that with this lesson, these mistakes
will definitely get better for you.
Don’t forget to download the free PDF worksheet
to go with today’s lesson.
You can review all of these common mistakes
and their corrections, some sample sentences,
and at the end of the worksheet, you can answer
Vanessa’s challenge question to help you use
what you’ve learned today.
So now I have a question for you.
Let me know in the comments, what is your
favorite dessert?
I would love to know, is it chocolate cake,
chocolate cookies, or maybe something that’s
only unique in your own country?
Let me know in the comments, what’s your favorite
dessert?
And I’ll see you again next Friday for a new
lesson here on my YouTube channel.
Bye.
The next step is to download the free PDF
worksheet for this lesson.
With this free PDF, you will master today’s
lesson and never forget what you have learned.
You can be a confident English speaker.
Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel
for a free English lesson every Friday.
Bye.