Smashing Careless Mistakes With Grammarman

Next time a student of my will make a careless mistake (like “Can you learn me how to speak English well?” or “Slovak is a Slovenian language.”) I would show them Grammarman 4:

All kidding next to, (really now), dealing with careless mistakes in class is hard. You often have to know your students well to know if it really is a careless mistake or if it is a “genuine” one.

Perhaps the most widespread careless mistake is - cover your ears - “he don’t” - and I think it’s one of the more dangerous mistake because, in the US at least, a speaker using this often comes across as uneducated.

I’m not a big fan of on the spot correction (and you can read my reasons here in Why I Don’t Do No So Much Corrections?) but of all the potential times on the spot correction can be used, in the case of careless mistakes it is often right on.

By Katie | Permalink

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