All throughout my school years, English has been my primary language, but even so I still make mistakes. One can never truly master a language, but with continuous practice one can improve their skills. The reason why I was enrolled into EG1471 was because of my inadequate knowledge of English grammar. Three of the most common grammar mistakes I tend to make are transitions, prepositions and run-on sentences.
I sometimes mix-up between which transitions I should use when connecting sentences. An example includes:
The scientists argued that the prototype was not ready and the boss refused to listen.
This sentence should be:
The scientists argued that the prototype was not ready but the boss refused to listen.
The reason why ‘but’ should be replaced by ‘and’ is because we are not adding information here but rather showing contrast.
I also find prepositions tricky when trying to describe positions of objects relative to other objects. An example of such:
The boy was leaning by the wall.
This sentence should read:
The boy was leaning against the wall.
Here we are not referring to whether the boy is standing beside the wall. We are saying that the boy is leaning on to the wall, with his body in contact with the wall.
The most common error I usually make out of the three has to be run-on sentences. I usually mix up between using commas and semi-colons. An example of the following is:
The professor looked at his watch, and it was time for the exam.
The sentence should read:
The professor looked at his watch; it was time for the exam.
We should not put a comma and the word ‘and’ because if you use one it is not grammatically correct to use the other. Furthermore, these are two different sentences that should be separated.
Hopefully by the time I finish (and I pray) pass my EG1471 course; the practice would have increased my skills in English grammar substantially. It is just like how the saying goes: “Practice makes perfect!”
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For your first paragraph about transitions, I have the same problem too. Your example is quite clear cut but sometimes I believe there may be some difficulty about deciding whether to use "and" or "but". For example, the stock index increases but/and the bond market index decreases. I feel that in this case, using "and" and "but" may depend on what kind of perspective you are looking from.
ReplyDeleteFor your preposition part, I know that using word 'by' here is not appropriate here but i still can't understand why the correct prepositon is 'against' and is not 'on'.
ReplyDeleteI think the phrase 'lean against' is always used to describe the action that stand or sit using a support.'lean on' means put pressure on somebody to act in a certain way. But I am also not quite sure.
ReplyDeleteIt is not on because it is not condsidered a horizontal surface or you are not switching on a device. You would use 'on' in a sentence like: "I placed my mobile phone on the desk" or "I switched on the lights"
ReplyDeleteA wall is a vertical surface and is not a device that can be switched on. That's how I think about it.
If you lean against someone or something, you rest against them so that they partly support your weight. If you lean an object against something, you place the object so that it is partly supported by that thing.
ReplyDeleteIf you lean on someone, you depend on that person for encouragement or advice.