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  • Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Lesson 365.

  • All right. The title of today's lesson is five overlooked English grammar mistakes.

  • Yeah. I corrected a lot of papers in my time as a teacher and very often or

  • there's many, many grammar mistakes and there's a lot more than just these.

  • But these are ones that you kind of surprised that students sometimes

  • made and they just missed it. So these are common ones that appear now. Perhaps

  • each student you may, know some of these not to do this , but I don't know if you

  • know all five. And there's actually two of them here that native speakers

  • I've often caught sometimes make as well. So let's look at the first one. The first one

  • is never leave a grammatical mark at the beginning of a line such as a comma,

  • question mark, period, quotation marks , etc. A native speaker won't do this They'll

  • instinctively know that you should not do this. But I have corrected a lot of

  • papers with students of ESL where they did do this. They didn't realize this. So

  • here is the first example. I need to bring a lot of things from my trip, such

  • as a bathing suit and you see in this case they actually put the comma here at the

  • beginning of the line. You never do that you must put it right at the end here of

  • the other line. And if it really can't fit, like if you're typing it out, it

  • didn't have enough space , you have to move the whole word. You have to

  • move the word bathing suit to the front here and move everything over. That's

  • what you have to do. So you can't put something like this, like this. A comma

  • here or a question mark or a period. You just can't leave it at the beginning of

  • the line. If you can't put it at the end you have to move a whole word over . You can't

  • leave a grammatical mark at the beginning of a line. Okay. Again native

  • speakers wouldn't do this . But I have many students of ESL, I've corrected over

  • the years that have done this. All right let's look at number two. This one I

  • actually did a video on by itself but it's worth repeating here. This is a

  • common one and this is one that native speakers I have caught doing.

  • Never begin a sentence with a number. Okay. I remember when I first

  • started looking at it. Instinctively I said it doesn't seem right. So I had to look

  • it up and check it out and in fact it is a rule. It's a grammar rule. You're not

  • supposed to put a number as the first word in a sentence. So here with the X

  • this is wrong. So you, you can put the word for the number but you can't put

  • the number. So with the X here. 10 years from now, it won't matter. So the way to

  • correct it. Now if it's a small number. It's easy to correct. You just write the word

  • for it. So ten here. Ten is a very short word no problem. Just substitute the word

  • ten and this is okay. Now if you know the numbers later in the sentence doesn't

  • matter you can write the number. But not the first word in the sentence. All right.

  • Here's a second example. That's not as easy. Because it's a big number like five

  • hundred and twenty thousand two hundred and eighty four cases of robbery were

  • reported in that city. All right. That's a really big number. You

  • don't want to write out that whole number. You know. All right. Five hundred

  • and twenty thousand two hundred. Yeah so in this case it's the easier thing to do

  • is to reword the sentence. If you can. So that's why here with the check, that's

  • what we did. In that city, there were 5,284

  • cases of robbery. So just reword the sentence. So that the

  • number doesn't begin at the ... it's not the first word in the sentence. All right. So

  • that's how you solve that problem. This is one that I have seen native speakers

  • write articles and they actually made this mistake and they didn't catch it.

  • All right. Number three. Nowadays always takes an 'S' at the end. Yeah. Native

  • speaker probably wouldn't do that. But I'm surprised at how many times I've

  • corrected papers with students of ESL. They just simply forgot the "S' at the end.

  • And they just say nowaday. That's never right. You so again here with the X

  • this is wrong. So nowaday it is considered to be politically incorrect

  • to say that. No. Of course you have to say with the check here. Nowadays with an

  • "S" at the end. So don't forget that that. That's a simple one. Number four here.

  • Avoid using the pronoun I first when describing that you and

  • another person did something. It is considered impolite. Now this one some

  • people argue about that it may technically not be

  • grammatically incorrect. But most native speakers don't do it. It is considered

  • impolite and it sounds awkward when you do, do it. So let's look at some examples

  • with the X . I and mom are going to a movie later. Yeah

  • most native speakers will never say that. They will say the one with the check

  • here. Mom and I are going to the movie. So you always put yourself second. Never

  • put yourself first. You know, as a pronoun. Okay. And number five here. Stand

  • alone letters should be capitalized. Okay. Yeah. This is one that sometimes I've

  • seen native speakers make a mistake on. I have a black t-shirt. Yes. Sometimes I've

  • seen it written out in articles written by native speakers and they use a small

  • t. You're not supposed to use the small T as a standalone letter. It has to

  • be a capital "T" with T- shirt. That's why " " in English is always capitalized too. It's

  • a standalone letter. So you can't write I the pronoun as a small" I" it always has

  • to be capitalized. It follows this same rule. Okay. he got an A on her test. Yeah.

  • here, you have to do it. Because it would be confusing. If she got an a on her test. So,

  • so you have to write the capital A like a grade in this case. You absolutely must

  • capitalize that. Or X-ray would be another one. I've sometimes seen native

  • speakers write it and you know and of course students of ESL make the same mistake.

  • Whether they write them with a small X. The X must be big in X-ray as well. Okay. Anyway,

  • of course there's a lot more mistakes out than this that students make. And

  • maybe in the future I'll add some of those. But this is enough for this lesson.

  • Anyway, I hope you got it. I hope it was informative. I hope it was helpful. Thank you

  • for your time. Bye-bye.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Lesson 365.

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