Journal+Common+Mistakes

One common mistake that many people use is they don't correctly modify words when using adjectives. What people do is they add **very** or **extremely** to modify words that cannot be modified. An example is if people use the word unique and try to modify it. Unique means one of a kind so it cannot be compared to other people's Uniqueness, therefore it cannot possibly be modified. Other words like this are absolute, opposite, and dead. These are absolute and cannot be modified. If you remove the rest of the sentence and replace the word being modified with its definition and it doesn't make sense then it is absolute and cannot be modified.

A common mistake I make and I think others make is that I miss use as and like. As in a sentence is a conjunction followed by a clause while like is a preposition. These two are mixed up because both are considered ways to write similes. To recognize these errors what you need to do is know if there is a subject and a verb following like or as. Since like is a preposition it should only be followed by the object or subject you are comparing. As is a clause so it should have a subject and a verb. Correct use would be Erik runs like a gazelle, not Erik runs like a gazelle does. If you take away the subject and the like and there is still a verb there then you need to replace like with as.

A mistake is replacing doesn't with don't and vice versa. Doesn't is used with third person singular pronouns and nouns like he, she, or it. Don't is used for other subjects. Its easy to notice because the sentence will sound awkward. It incorrect to say He don't need glasses, it would be He doesn't need glasses. A way to remember would be to replace the subject with another pronoun or a noun and test to see if it sounds right.

I sometimes make the mistake of not putting in the right verb that pertains to the subject. A way to fix this is to make sure that you put a plural subject with a plural verb and a singular subject with a singular verb. The wrong way of saying it would be, The tree are dying. What was wrong was the verb (are) was a plural verb and the subject (Tree) is singular. The right way to say would be, The tree is dying. I made it so that the verb (is) matched the subject. A way to remember would be to replace the verb for the opposite and see if they sound better.

A mistake I make is that I sometimes end adverbs in