3 common mistakes that even advanced speakers make.

Does it really matter? It’s a subject, I’m very torn on. On the one hand, the main thing is that you get the message across. On the other, however, it is grammatically wrong. Is grammatical accuracy a nice to have or must have?

Here are the three common mistakes that even advanced speakers make: 1. Present continuous. The good old ‘ing’ form, which is often overused and misused in cases when the present simple is actually correct. Instead of saying ‘I work for XYZ company’, I often hear ‘I’m working for XYZ company’. In fact, you could actually be saying that you are only there TEMPORARILY !!!!!!!!!

2. Present perfect. In my post ‘renaming the tenses’ a few weeks ago, I renamed this form – the ‘past present’ – because something started in the past and continues until the present e.g. ‘I’ve worked for the company for 10years’ or a past event has an impact on the present e.g. ‘I’ve lost my keys.’ (I can’t get in now).

3. Conditional 2. Most people probably remember the formula: If + past form = would + infinitive form e.g. ‘If I won the lottery, I would buy a Ferrari’ etc. However, the ‘Denglish’ tends to kick in, particularly in spoken English, with the taking over of ‘would + infinitive’ in the ‘If clause’ i.e. ‘If I would win the lottery, I would buy a Ferrari’.

QOTD: How do you guys feel? Is grammatical accuracy a nice to have or must have?

to be torn (on sth) (zerrissen), to overuse (etw übernutzen), to misuse sth (hier: falsch eingesetzen), to kick in (hier: greifen)