Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • Hi. I'm Rebecca from engVid. Do you think you speak good English?

  • Well, let's find out.

  • In this lesson we're going to look at 10 common errors made by English students, and let's

  • see if you know the difference between right and wrong. Okay? Let's get started.

  • So, here's the first one: "Whose this?" or "Who's this?"

  • Now, these are homonyms. That means they're two words that sound the same

  • or almost the same, but they're spelled differently

  • and they have different meanings. So which one is correct in this question?

  • Okay? Think about it.

  • So I hope you said that this is correct. Okay? Because this one is the word

  • we use when we're talking about possession. Okay? "Whose bag is this?",

  • "Whose book is this?" Like that. Okay? But: "Who's this?", "Who's" means: "Who is this?"

  • Okay? Let's go to the next one.

  • "Its Maria." or "It's Maria." Another homonym. A lot of people get this wrong, so look at

  • it carefully. What should it be?

  • I hope you said that this is correct and this is wrong.

  • Okay? Because this again means: "It is Maria." And the other one is the possessive form.

  • Okay? Now, you'll have a chance to understand all of these in more depth-okay?-more clearly.

  • I'll tell you exactly where to go because we have lessons on every single one of these

  • points in case you get them wrong.

  • Okay, next: "I think you're beautiful." or "I think your beautiful." Two more homonyms.

  • Which one is correct? Ready?

  • Okay, so it should be... This is right, this is not. Okay? Because

  • again, you want to say in this sentence: "I think you are beautiful", not "your", which

  • is the possessive form, like: "Your bag is on the table." Like that. Okay? This is a

  • very common error made, unfortunately, also by English speakers.

  • But you don't want to do that because you know better.

  • Next: "Can you advice me?" or "Can you advise me?"

  • Now, here the pronunciation was a little bit different,

  • but which one is correct? Which word do we need here? What do you think?

  • It should be this one, not this. This is the verb. Okay? "Can you advise me?" It almost

  • has a "z" sound, and this with the "c" is the noun. "Can you advice", so that's not

  • right. We can't say: "Can you advice me?" You need to say: "Can you give me some advice?"

  • That would be fine. Then we use the noun, but in this sent-... This question, we say:

  • "Can you advise me?"

  • Last one on here: "Bring this file over there." or "Take this file over there."

  • Which one is correct? Very common error, kind of a vocabulary issue here.

  • So, the correct answer is: "Take",

  • this is wrong, because we said: "Take this file over there." Okay? So the difference

  • is you take something away from you, and you bring something towards you. Okay? So because

  • we had the word "over there", the direction is away from you, so you needed to say: "Take".

  • Next we'll look at five more. All right?

  • Okay, number six: "Did you lose your keys?" or "Did you loose your keys?" Okay? You see

  • that there's a spelling difference. There's also a slight pronunciation difference in

  • those two words. So which is the correct answer?

  • It is the first one. Okay? Because this is

  • the verb, "lose", it has one "o", l-o-s-e, and the other word is the word "loose", as

  • in: "His pants are loose." or "His shirt is loose." Okay? So that's not what you want

  • here. You want the verb.

  • Next. Here you have a choice of three. Okay? See if you can find the right one.

  • "They're going home." or "Their going home." or "There going home."

  • Okay? Again, these are homonyms,

  • three of them that sound almost exactly the same so you must know which word is the right

  • word to use. So, which one is it?

  • I hope you said this one. Okay? These are not correct,

  • because this is a contraction which is two words which are shortened into one, which

  • stands for: "They are going home." Okay? This one: "Their", t-h-e-i-r is a possessive form:

  • "This is their house." And "there" is the opposite of like "here", "there", that kind of thing. Okay?

  • Number eight. "George lived here five years ago." or "George lived here five years before."

  • Okay? Which one is right?

  • This is a common mistake as well.

  • Okay. The correct answer is: "five years ago".

  • Because if you said "before", then you have to say something after

  • that, like: "George lived here five years before I did", or "before he went to college",

  • or "before he got married", or something like that. Okay? We can't just let it hang like

  • that, the word "before". So the correct answer here is "ago".

  • Number nine: "I know you will succeed." or "I know you will success." Which is right?

  • Okay. Again,

  • this is the verb: "succeed", and this: "success" is the noun. So you don't

  • want the noun in this case, you want the verb. All right? Also be very careful of the spelling

  • of this word. This is one of the most commonly misspelled words in the English language. Okay?

  • S-u-c-c-e-e-d, s-u-c-c-e-s-s.

  • Okay? Make sure that you really know how to spell that word

  • if you're going to use it on an exam or a test because many people get that wrong.

  • And the last one: "Sylvia drives slow." or "Sylvia drives slowly." Which one is right according to you?

  • Okay. So, again, what you're looking for is the adverb that describes how

  • she drives. Okay? So, "slowly", most adverbs have an l-y at the end, that's how we know

  • that they're adverbs very often. And this is really in adjectives, like:

  • "She's a slow driver." Okay?

  • Now, those were 10 basic errors in English. If you got them all right, congratulations,

  • that's super. In case you got even one wrong, it's really a good idea to correct that mistake

  • because these are pretty basic errors. And luckily there's actually a video that I had

  • recorded for each and every one of these, so if you go to our website at www.engvid.com,

  • you can find a lesson on each and every one of these. So if you got something wrong, like

  • let's say you got this one wrong, just go, go to the website, look for this one, and

  • we'll have some links there that you can follow, and you'll be able to watch a full video just

  • on that point. Okay? So that you really understand it and you don't make that mistake ever again.

  • Okay? So, good luck with your English and see you later.

  • Bye for now.

Hi. I'm Rebecca from engVid. Do you think you speak good English?

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it