Studying English

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Common mistakes ‘I’m not strong for…’ v. ‘I’m not good at…’

Friday, January 29th, 2010

Common mistakes ‘I’m not strong for…’ v. ‘I’m not good at…’

To express the idea of skill, use the phrase ‘good at…’ and then add the verb in the ‘ing’ form. For example, ‘I’m not good at cooking, so I eat out every night’. Another example, ‘Even though I’m not very good at singing, my friends make me go to kareoke’.

A common mistake I hear in Japan is ‘strong for/not strong for’ when ‘good at/not good at’ should be used.

The phrase ‘strong for’ appears when we are talking about physical properties, and then it appears with the word ‘enough’. For example, ‘This bridge is not strong enough for a heavy load’ or ‘Paper is not strong enough to use as a rope’.

An interesting sidenote is for when we want to talk about our own skill. We often add a modifier, like ‘pretty’ or ‘quite’ to the phrase ‘good at’. This helps give an impression of modesty. For example, ‘After taking evening classes in Italian cookery, I got pretty good at making pizza’ or ‘I worked in Spain for ten years, so I got quite good at conversing in Spanish’.

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Does English just sound like noise to you?

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

Japanese people doing business in English often find listening to spoken English very difficult. This is often hard for those who have not listened to English since high school. They need to work so hard in the beginning. Often they need to ‘retrain’ their ears; how a native English speaker pronounces English words is different to their Japanese teachers did ten years ago.

Moreover, there are fundamental differences between the different rhythms of English and Japanese. Unlike in Japanese, English stress in a sentence falls much more heavily on the key content, which is normally new information.

For example.

‘I’m Helen, nice to meet you’

Obviously, ‘Helen’ and ‘meet’ are stressed. All the other words, ‘I’m', ‘to’ and ‘you’ are more obvious from the situation, so they unstressed. However, I often hear this mistake: my student stresses the ‘you’, rather than their own name. They are trying to show interest and be polite, but unfortunately the heavy stress on ‘you’ can sound scary! A rough rule is to stress first the verbs and then nouns that carry new information.

Let’s look at the stress in the reply:

‘I’m Asami, nice to meet you, too‘.

As the name is also important information, ‘Asami’ should be stressed. There is new information, ‘you too’. The rule is ’stress new information’.

Therefore, ‘Asami’ and ‘you too’ is said with more emphasis.

When you are listening to English it can sometimes just sound like noise. Very fast noise! It’s frustrating to hear and not understand. I face this problem every time I listen to Japanese. The important thing? Pay attention to the sounds that jump out at you. Look them up in a dictionary or ask the speaker to repeat.

What do you do with the sounds that jump out at you? Expect that these sounds are either words for verbs or key nouns, e.g., new information. This new information gives you a ‘way in’ to understanding a little more. You may not get 100% and you may not get 50%, but you will get a little more, every time you stop saying to yourself ‘I don’t understand’ and say instead ‘What was that sound?’.
and ‘I wonder what it means’.

Finally, I really recommend that you start to listen to English outside your work. Listen to movies, listen to radio, listen to podcasts, listen to music. Anything that gets you used to English conversation, vocabulary, rhythm and helps your brain to process sounds into meaning. I promise that English will start to sound like a language you understand and enjoy.

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‘In case of’ v. ‘in the case of’

Wednesday, October 21st, 2009

Here having ‘the’ changes the meaning completely. The second phrase ‘in case of…’ is used to refer to an emergency or some unexpected plan. For example,

‘In case of fire, exit from this door’.

and

‘I’ll take an umbrella in case it rains’.

On the other hand, ‘in the case of’ is usually used to refer to a situation that the writer has already mentioned. For example,

‘In the case of a customer complaining, we would take action immediately’.

Another example is in reference to a legal case.

‘In the case of Kramer v. Jones, the judge ruled in favor of Jones’.

A common mistake that I see is people using ‘in case of…’ when they mean ‘in the case of’. Once again, ‘in case of’ refers to an unexpected or undesired situation, like rain or an earthquake, and ‘in the case of’ is used to refer back to a previously mentioned situation.

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‘Almost’ v. ‘Almost All’

Friday, August 21st, 2009

Here is a quick explanation of a common error I see in homework assignments.

We use ‘almost’ to stress that something is not identical to something else. The first is used to describe a near miss. Imagine you overslept and had to run to the station to catch your train. You break all the rules and run through the ticket gates and leap onto the train just as the door is closing. Phew! You made it! You would describe this situation by saying

‘I almost missed my train’.

The phrase ‘almost all’ or ‘almost every’ is used to mean ‘the majority’. For example,

‘Almost all pubs in England serve beer at room temperature’.

and

‘Almost all my Japanese friends go to see their family at Obon.’

Many people incorrectly use ‘almost’ to mean ‘the majority’. The funniest example of an incorrect sentence is ‘Almost Japanese people like rice’ – I’ve heard this, or versions of it, several times. See if you can figure out for yourself why it sounds funny in English.

The correct form is, of course, ‘Almost all Japanese people like rice.’

Here the distinction between ‘almost’ and ‘almost all’ one more time:

‘almost’ = something similar or close, but not identical.

‘almost all’ or ‘almost every’ = ‘the majority’.

Trying to explain rules and patterns of vocabulary can help you to remember them. If you would like to tell me why ‘Almost Japanese like rice’ sounds funny, please leave your explanation in a comment!

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