Subtitles section Play video Print subtitles Hello my name is Emmelda. Welcome back to my lesson. I have a very interesting topic for all the English learners. I know your'e gonna say this is a very old dialogue Emmelda . Yes it is, why because you've got so many things to learn. So what are we going to learn today? We are going to learn today all the silly mistakes English learners make. Stay tuned till the end, because all the points are very important. So let's get started with first one. Unnecessary usage of to. Iv'e seen, Iv'e noticed a lot of English students of mine used the word to, too many times. What do I mean? Tell to him, could you tell to him that I want this, no. Tell to is wrong English. You say, Tell him similarly they would say, Give it to him. No just say, Give him. So avoid using the word to unnecessarily, because this actually will lead to a lot of grammatical errors, so tell to him, give to him, give to him may sound right at some places. But generally, it's usually wrong. Give him, tell him. The next one is, Tell him this verses Tell this to him. What do I mean tell this to him? Again unnecessary usage of to, but now you have this as well. Tell this to him. Can you please tell this to him that I love him. No, can you please tell him this that I love him. Tell him this and not tell this to him. Similar expressions. Can you pass him some chocolates or pass him this. Can you pass him this or pass him some chocolates. You will not say, Pass this to him, no pass him this. unnecessary words avoid redundancy, so pass him this or give him this. Give him this, Can you give him this gift, pass him this, give him this, tell him this, ask him this. So these are the different phrases where you don't use to neither do you combine this in to and bring them between the two words. Pass him this, give him this, tell him this, ask him this, order him this. So is that clear? Can I move on to the next one? So sure. Many verses lot. A lot of people have the confusion when they are using many verses lot, which one should I use? Well, first things first many is actually used in formal English more often then not. Again it's more often then not, so don't take my word, word by word. Many is usually used informal, however lots is usually used in informal English. While many is for countable nouns like many pen or many sticks. Lots is for uncountable or collective noun, however I'm sure you would have noticed a lot of people use, lot or lots with countable noun. Let me give you an example, Iv'e got lots of dresses and many of which is in white in color. Lots of, Iv'e got lots of dresses. Well, you can say, Hey Emmelda I can count dresses, It's one dress, two dress, thousand dress, yes I know you can count. But am I know exactly how many dresses do I have? No I don't so when I'm collecting all those thoughts and I'm thinking maybe I have twenty thousand five hundred and thirty. I wouldn't know, I really cannot count. By the way I don't have twenty thousand dresses. So yeah stop talking about that, lots of dresses, why because I'm not aware of how many dresses do I have? So I'm gonna collect it and say, Iv'e got lot of dresses. Many of which, now here I'm taking a reasonable portion of this lots, so many of which where I can count. Maybe out of the twenty thousand dresses, I have ten dresses which are white in color or fifteen dresses, which are white in color. So many of which, lots of dresses many of which are white in color or there are lots of people, who believe that music is a best way of bringing peace. Many of them love rock music, so lots of people, lots of dresses, lots of countries, lots of money. Many people, many countries. You have to identify, how are you using those collective nouns or those countable nouns,when your'e using lot, so we'll have to be very careful. I know this might be confusing right now, but my tip would be try and read as much as you can and try to watch English movies, they actually combine, they have lot of dialogues where they have, they use the words lots verses many. Lots of dresses many of which. The forth silly mistake absolutely silly is put verses keep. What do you even mean by put verses keep? Keep means to maintain position by the way, oxford dictionary. Not possession actually, It's possession. Sorry my bad, It's keep means to maintain possession that means, I have this marker, I'm gonna keep it with me. So usually it's very personal, I'm gonna keep it with me. So maintain possession or maintain condition, keep it low, keep it low. Keep it low or I'm gonna keep this with me. That's when you use keep. If your'e maintaining a possession or condition. But when do you use put? When your'e saying put this marker on the table, you don't say keep this marker on the table or can keep you keep the glass on the corner. No you say, Put the glass on the corner or keep the marker on the table. Better words to use for put is store. Specially if you are actually storing something, so you say, Store the casserole or store these books on the rack, put verses keep. This means maintain possession or condition. So never use put this marker on the table. I'm sorry never use keep this marker on the table. You would say, Put this marker on the table, put the glass of water on the dining table. The last but the most important is, State of verbs verses Action verbs. What are action verbs? That you do, going is action or singing is an action. But what are state of verbs. State of verbs are those verbs, which do not have a definite point of starting or ending. For example, Love, MC Donald's, very bad. People say, people are now saying, I'm loving it, yes It's their slogan, but love is a state of verb. The right way of pronouncing or using the word is , I love it, you won't say, I'm loving it now and I'm loving it the next second and I'm loving the third second, no you would say, I love it or I use to love it, because you don't know, When did you start? Which exact moment did you start liking it? So I love it. I feel, I can feel it. It's not that I'm feeling like I'm, I feel it this second, I feel it the next second. I'm gonna feel it for the next thirty seconds. You feel it as a thought, It's actually very abstract. So you have abstract feelings or abstract verbs, Love, Feel, Think. Okay word of caution. Think and actually be state or action verb. I think your'e right, this becomes state verb. When you say, I think I'm gonna have, I think this answer is correct, that means you think at this moment the answer is correct. Maybe the next moment you don't think so. So think can be used as state or as action verb. Another verb is have. For example, when I say, I have a car. It doesn't mean I have a car at this second and I have a car at next second, I have a car following second. I have a car, It means I don't know, I know when I got it but I don't know how long am I gonna use it, Have but if your'e using have as an action verb. You say, I'm having breakfast, Why? Because you know when you started it and you know when your'e gonna end it, so have can be used as state and action together. You have to be really careful, when your'e using these words and how your'e using these words, because what matters most is, What context are you using these words for? Have, think, love, feel. All these words are action verses state of words. Again going to be very confusing best way to do is read, watch news, watch movies. They will help you a lot. So I come to or we have come to the end of this lesson. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you got some of the ideas very clear, if your'e not sure you can write comments and I'll be more the happy to help you with it. I'll be back with another lesson until then good bye. Have fun and keep learning English. Good bye.
A2 UK marker possession pass action state table Silly mistakes made by English learners while speaking English - Improve your English 1231 78 Coby posted on 2016/12/23 More Share Save Report Video vocabulary