Most Common Mistakes in English.

Berlin: Jakub Marian, 2014. — 124 p.

Did you know that the plural of "sheep" is "sheep" (not "sheeps")? Some mistakes in English are incredibly common, even among advanced learners: irregular plurals, using "have done" instead of "did", incorrect prepositions ("arrive to" instead of "arrive at"), placing commas where they shouldn't be and omitting them when they are necessary... This book will teach you how to avoid some of the most common grammar and vocabulary mistakes English learners make. If you are interested in the most common pronunciation mistakes, the author of the book has written a separate book on the topic entitled Improve your English pronunciation and learn over 500 commonly mispronounced words

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Table of Contents
Foreword 9
Introduction 10
Mistakes with articles, nouns, and pronouns 11
Nouns with identical singular and plural forms 11
Irregular plural patterns 13
Singular nouns ending in У 14
Nouns that only exist in the plural 16
Are things he, she, or it? 18
United States is/are 19
Several thousand(s) of 20
Dot, period, full stop, point 21
A couple (of) 22
In/on (the) I/internet 23
Sub(s)tract 24
You and I/me 25
All/anything/everything but 26
Information(s) is/are 27
Names of numbers above 1000 28
Collective nouns 29
A couple of... are/is 30
People are/is 31
A lot of... are/is 32
Many, much, a lot of, and lots of 33
Is a doctor he or she? 35
Each other's or each others' 37
Matter/question of time 37
In (the) case of 38
Ton or tonne 39
On (the) one hand 39
Advice(s) is/are 40
Money is/are 40
The person who/that 41
Economics or economy 42
10 dollars is/are 42
Mistakes with verbs and tenses 44
Word order in subordinate clauses 44
Present perfect with specific time 45
Aren't I, amn't I 47
Use to do 48
Haven't/Don't have 49
Lend or borrow 50
Boring or bored 51
Make someone (to) do something 52
Learn someone to do something 53
'Will' in time clauses 53
He wants that I do 55
Present subjunctive 56
Sequence of tenses in indirect speech 57
The conditional 61
Wish + would 66
Could/couldn't care less 67
Continue doing/to do 67
Learnt or learned 68
Effect or affect 69
I cut, you cut, he cut 70
Would of 72
I already/never/just have done 73
How/what does it look like 74
How/what is it called 75
Questions about the subject 75
Look forward to hear(ing) from you 76
Stay or stand 77
So don't I/Neither do I 77
Put/take off one's hat 78
Stay/be left 79
Mistakes with adjectives, adverbs, and determiners .. 80
Fast, fastly, but not furiously 80
(A) little, (a) few 81
Second or other 82
All that, all what, all which 83
Both and either 84
Freeer or freer 85
Classic or classical 86
"Sympathic" 87
Many/some/few (of) 88
So/as fast as 90
Like more/better/most/best 90
Look/smell/feel good/well 91
A lot of/much/longtime ago 93
More better 93
Yet or already 94
Mistakes with prepositions 96
Get off, get out of, take off, exit 96
Arrive at/in/to 97
To be good at/in 98
Different from/than/to 99
On/in the photo 99
Suited for/to 100
Married to/with 101
Time prepositions 101
Call (to) someone 103
I've been here for/since/during time 103
Mistakes with commas 105
Comma before a dependent clause 105
Comma before conjunctions between independent clauses 106
Comma between independent clauses 108
Comma after introductory phrase 109
Comma and 'if Ill
Comma before 'because' 112
Serial (Oxford) comma 113
Comma around 'etc' 114
Online tools 116
Final remarks 120
Alphabetical Index 121

Before we move on to the mistakes, there is one important thing you should realize: Each language is different, and what may be readily expressible in your mother tongue may be hard to express in English and vice versa. When you read about the mistakes, do not try to understand the English construction through translation into your mother tongue. If you make a mistake subconsciously, the corresponding construction in your mother tongue probably doesn't agree with the English one, and trying to understand it using translation may only confuse you further.
You should develop an intuition for what sounds natural, and what does not. For example, as we will see later in the book, we never use the present perfect with a specific time in the past (e.g. "I have done it yesterday"), which may be surprising because such usage would be correct in most European languages. You should just try to remember that "I have done it yesterday" does not sound natural in English, while "I did it yesterday" does, without any need for translation.

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