Who doesn’t like January 1st?! I personally love it. Not only because it is the first day of the new year and symbolizes new beginnings, but also because it’s a lazy, cozy day after a long night of celebration and no one expects you to do anything else than resting. You don’t even have to […]
English modals: must not vs. don’t have to
I recently saw someone saying “teachers don’t have to make mistakes” while he meant “teachers must not make mistakes.” Although I don’t agree with this statement, I’d like to clarify the difference between must not and don’t have to. Must is one of the modals in the English language. The word “modal” comes from the […]
The unpredictable word stress in English
I sometimes hear nonnative speakers of English with excellent levels of grammar and vocabulary still struggling with word stress. This is because some languages have fixed word stress, which makes pronunciation of words predictable. But in English this is not the case. That is, some words have their primary stress on the first syllable, while […]
Confusing English pronunciation: L vs. W
During my last trip to Bulgaria, I had a conversation with a person who was helping me with some paperwork. At one point, answering one of my questions, he told me that I could find more details about the topic we were discussing “on wine.” Although this sounded odd to me, I immediately knew that […]
10 commonly confusing English phrasal verbs
Prepositions give many nonnative speakers of English a very hard time. And when they are used to form phrasal verbs, they seem even harder. Oftentimes it is challenging to remember what preposition follows a certain verb in order to communicate a particular meaning. According to the Oxford dictionary, a phrasal verb is a verb that […]
10 mistakes Spanish speakers make in English
Commonly confused English words
When I was in college, one day during my math class the teacher was explaining an equation. One of my classmates, an Arabic speaker, raised his hand and asked a question referring to the remainder in the equation as a “reminder.” This slight mispronunciation made our teacher smile and she told him that he was […]
The confusing meaning of double negatives
You have probably heard that double negatives in English are not grammatically correct. A double negative is when you use two negative words in a phrase or a sentence. For example, ✘ “I don’t like nothing” is grammatically incorrect. The correct way to say this sentence in English is ✔ “I don’t like anything” or ✔ “I like nothing.” But there is another […]
Common mistakes Slavic speakers make in English
All languages have unique words and phrases that, if translated literally into English, can cause confusion and even sound comical. For example, the literal translation of “thank you upfront” from Polish to English – “thank you from the mountain” 😂 – is a common joke among Polish speakers. Although this is just a joke and […]
