Bettering your English, useful sites with tips and...

jurjen_heeck · ‎2010 Sep 23

Since a lot of us, including me, are non-native English speakers we do make mistakes. Sometimes they lead to funny threads and/or amusing discussions like this one:

In this particular one I linked to the site:

[DailyWritingTips|http://www.dailywritingtips.com/category/misused-words/]

Another of my 'favorite' typo's has to do with the word definitely. To get that right surf to:

[d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y|http://www.d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y.com/]

Here's my question to you all:

Please contribute by adding sites to this thread so we all learn if we should use [Then or Than?|http://www.dailywritingtips.com/then-or-than/] and understand more about common mistakes made here on the forums and in our other (business) communications. Of course you may accompany them by examples of texts horribly gone wrong by simple typo's but let's not compete with the funny threads thread.

Thanks in advance!

Jurjen

Former Member · ‎2010 Nov 07

Consider this. Do, and un-do: un-do is to reverse what was done. Other simular word pairs are lock and unlock, dress and undress, and coil and uncoil.

Yet ravel and unravel mean exactly the same.

English is my native language and I still cannot get it right; I am certainly not going to think less of anyone for making a mistake. I am impressed with anyone who even attemps English.

Debi

zal_parchem2 · ‎2010 Oct 31

Jurjen and all others...I applaud your efforts in improving your non-native language skills. I like to believe I also speak a second language semi-fluently (German), however I know so many times I make a lot of mistakes others actually find amusing. Geez - I sure wish I had used "Alot". You cannot imagine how many times I have heard the German word "goldig" (which means cute in English) when I have made mistakes. Keep it up - if you do make any kind of mistake, just remember that a large number of people understand and take no offense.

Of course, I know you want to use approriate terms and grammar, but in the end, you are the ones actually doing us all a big favor by improving!

Many thanks - Zal

Former Member · ‎2010 Oct 28

Hi Jurjen/all,

First thing first.. Do not use bettering instead you can use improve or improving, there is no bettering word and its called slang as some people in US use wanting (Want).

1) Do not rely too heavily on your computeru2019s spell checking program. While spell check may recognize receive written as recieve as incorrect, it will not alert you when you spell dessert as desert. If in doubt, consult a dictionary.

2) If you find that you consistently misspell a word, practice writing it five or ten times the correct way. This will help you to remember the correct spelling the next time you use the word.

3) Read! read a lot by being an avid reader, you will be better able to recognize when the spelling of a word just doesnu2019t look right.

When asked, u201CHow are you doing?u201D many people will immediately answer, u201CI am doing good.u201D Unless theyu2019re talking about the good theyu2019re doing for their community, they should have answered instead with u201CI am doing well.u201D

In English, there are three primary ways of forming plurals:

a) Adding s, as in dogs and cats.

b) Adding es, as in peaches.

c) Adding an apostrophe and s, used in forming the plurals of letters, as in tu2018s.

Of course, there are some irregular words that do not comply with any of the above rules, such as goose and its plural geese, and moose and its plural moose.

There are so many sites on google where you can learn and make your english perfect.... ! One I am pasting below

http://www.ego4u.com/en/cram-up/tests

Enjoy !

Former Member · ‎2010 Oct 12

A useful language forum I read every day:

<a href="http://tek-tips.com/threadminder.cfm?pid=1256">http://tek-tips.com/threadminder.cfm?pid=1256</a>

"...light-hearted discussions on words, word usage, grammar, and related topics to improve our ability to communicate effectively and to help project the right image."

Former Member · ‎2010 Oct 11

Matt - are you leading the pedants' revolt?

Former Member · ‎2010 Oct 04

using this http://speedtest.10-fast-fingers.com/ is a good way to do 2 tihngs at the same time.

Not only increases it your typing speed, since it is using the most common used words in the language it also helps you bettering your English.

I also use it to reinvigorate my German language skills.

Cheers, Rob.

OttoGold · ‎2010 Oct 04

Hello,

a must for using English as a foreign language: Your MS Word (Open Writer etc.) can spellcheck for you. I think it is polite to use this every time you write and send something. Remember that you Outlook can do it as well! Same approach!

for the author of the thread: please make the thread a sticky, we do not want to lose this one out of sight...

Thank you for the ideas, time and effort, this is REALLY (!

Best regards, Otto

Former Member · ‎2010 Sep 29

The other day I was pulled up by one of my audience, during my presentation on a proposed design for a bespoke development - I had a slide titled "Authorizations". The person got really upset about this and begged me with tears in his eyes to correct it - apparently the correct way is to say "Authorisations", and to see it spelt the other way, really rubs him the wrong way.

The funny thing is I always try to use the UK spelling myself, and I honestly always thought spelling it with a "z" was the UK way. Anyway, this may be something which some of us can learn.

Thanks and Regards

monika_eggers · ‎2010 Sep 29

>


> Since a lot of us, including me, are non-native English speakers we do make mistakes. 
> Another of my 'favorite' typo's has to do with the word definitely. To get that right surf to: 
> [d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y|http://www.d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y.com/] 
>

I think native speakers get that one wrong just as frequently as non-native speakers, if not more often. I hate seeing "definately".

But it's funny when people type "definatly" and MS Office automatically replaces this with "defiantly" ^^. I often get e-mails from colleagues saying things like "We should defiantly do this" ... yes, we should definitely put all our defiance into this .

>


> Also using "could of" as in "You could of done this some other way." It probably means "You could have done it some other way.
> 
> This is not necessarily always by non-native speakers.

Actually this particular mistake is made almost exclusively by native speakers (or quasi-native speakers, like people from Hong Kong or India who start learning English at 3 or so). I wondered for a long time how they could possibly confuse "have" and "of", until someone explained that they are not replacing "would have", "could have" etc. with "would of", "could of", but "would've", "could've". Additionally native speakers pronounce "of" approximately as "ev" (the o in "of" is reduced to a schwa if the "of" is not in a position where it is emphasized) ... which is exactly the same or very similar to the way the 've part of "would've", "could've" is pronounced. So for a native speaker this is almost as innocent a mistake as writing "you're" for "your" or "there" for "their".

I hate this error very much. For non-native speakers something like "would of" is extremely hard to parse, because when reading this and pronouncing the words in our heads we do not reduce the "of" to "ev", we read it kind of like "off", and cannot associate this with 've or have.

>


> Never say "a lot", say "a great deal". Or "quite a few".

There is nothing wrong with "a lot" (when properly separated by a space). This is perfectly correct English.

>


> If a group or collection is countable then use "fewer" rather than "less".

This statement is not correct. One can use "less" for both countable and uncountable nouns. The usage with uncountable nouns even predates the one with countable nouns (9th vs. 14th century). But there are guides that recommend against using "less" with countable nouns and some even claim this to be incorrect.

What I hate very much is when people use "less" when they should use "little". Only non-native speakers do this, of course. But quite often and even in official documents . I find this really cringeworthy. "There is too less time to do this or that" for example. The opposite of much is little, not less! Little cannot only mean small.

A funny mistake, also in an official document: "The information in this document is objective to change." instead of "... subject to change". I think the author must be too object-oriented .

MaheshChandra · ‎2010 Sep 24

in present days English Language is growing rapidly with the usage of words, if more people using the Wrong word and felling it as right, then its added to E language (based on Oxford dictionary edition list).

some of the words added to English (Indian) in 2010 are

Overthink: think about (something) too much or for too long.

some more prejudjement, social Networking, soft skills

Cool hunter: a person whose job it is to make observations or predictions about new styles and trends.

Bromance: a close but nonsexual relationship between two men.

Exit strategy a preplanned means of extricating oneself from a situation.

Defriend another term for unfriend (remove someone from a list of friends or contacts on a social networking site). some more in the list. and unfriend is the new word of year 2009.

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_English_Dictionary

http://oed.com/help/updates/latest-additions.html#oos

regards

Mahesh

matt · ‎2010 Sep 24

That's "Tricks" not "Trics"...

I hate with a deep and abiding hatred the use of "could of". It isn't a typing error - it's just WRONG. "Could have" is correct.. But "you're your, their, there, they're" are common typos. I make them all the time.

Never say "a lot", say "a great deal". Or "quite a few".

If a group or collection is countable then use "fewer" rather than "less". E.g. There are fewer point hunters on SCN since strict moderation came in. Use "fewer" when you could replace it with a number and the sentence would still make sense.

If the collection isn't countable, then you use "less". E.g. there is less beer in my glass than there was five minutes ago.

More is the antonym of both fewer and less, so the problem doesn't arise when the quantity has increased.

OttoGold · ‎2010 Sep 24

Hello,

first: I like this initiative, I am not a native speaker and am sure I will be ble to learn something from here.

But to our defense: Many of my typos (especially in blogs or emails) are because of the MS Word (where auto-correction done something wrong or I didn´t switch the laguage to English and the typos are corrections of the English text using my native language Vocabulary).

Sometimes these mistakes look very funny and I feel ashamed I publish something with this kind of error.

But again, keep this going, maybe even make this thread a sticky...?!

Regards Otto

Former Member · ‎2010 Sep 23

Couple of things that really get my goat

People writing "your", when they mean "you are".

Also using "could of" as in "You could of done this some other way." It probably means "You could have done it some other way.

This is not necessarily always by non-native speakers.

Former Member · ‎2010 Sep 23

a lot / alot / allot

A lot, meaning a large amount or number of people or things, can be used to modify a noun.

For example:-

"I need a lot of time to develop this web site."

It can also be used as an adverb, meaning very much or very often.

For example:-

"I look a lot like my sister."

It has become a common term in speech; and is increasingly used in writing.

Allot is a verb, which means to give (especially a share of something) for a particular purpose:-

For example: "We were allotted a desk each."

There is no such word in the English language. If you write it this way - imagine me shouting at you - "No Such Word!"

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