How to Avoid Common Mistakes in ENGLISH | What are Fossilized Mistakes?

Hey have you ever said something like my  sister has 21 years but immediately thereafter  

you remember that in English we say someone's  age with the verb to be so you self-correct and  

you say it again this time my sister is 21 years  good excellent let's move on with the conversation  

but wait you have a feeling that there's  still something wrong with how you said it  

you keep thinking about it now you've  disengaged from the conversation  

you're so focused on what you said that you  even stopped listening to the other person  

oh right i remember i'm not supposed to  just say years after the age it is years old  

but now it's no good the other person has just  asked you sorry are you listening inside you are  

kicking yourself why do i keep making the  same mistake over and over even though i  

know it's incorrect don't beat yourself up  this happens to all of us language learners  

it's a problem that is really hard to  shake off. Linguists call this fossilization

puzzlization refers to the process in which  incorrect language becomes a bad habit and  

cannot easily be corrected it happens to  me all the time maybe like in your language  

in Spanish nouns have genders but this does not  exist in English so it can be quite tricky for me  

like how I instinctively want to say la problema  because problema ends with an a but in fact  

it is masculine and should be el problema I know  for me these kinds of little mistakes that I

know i'm making deteriorate my confidence i'm sure  that you feel the same when it happens to you in  

English especially if you're already in an  advanced level it is so frustrating right most  

times these mistakes don't hurt communication  if you're speaking with a native they might not  

even notice them and they certainly won't care  about them but you know that they are there that  

said i'm here to tell you that you can definitely  recognize these mistakes you can learn from them  

and finally overcome them in this lesson i'll  teach you why you keep making the same mistakes  

over and over again and how to erase them from  your speaking so that you can feel confident  

before I teach you these strategies though if you  like what we're doing here at RealLife and you  

want to take your fluency beyond the classroom  and into the real world which is to understand  

fast speaking natives to speak confidently  with anyone and to connect to the world  

then i invite you to join the real life movement  by clicking on the subscribe button and down  

below so that you don't miss out just like your  fellow learner Jamg who says that our lessons are  

helping them to overcome their fear and speak  confidently alright so if you watch until the  

end you will learn what fossilized language is  why you keep making the same mistakes over and  

over again how you can finally fix your mistakes  some common mistakes you are probably making  

so grab a pen and paper or note-taking app and  let's get to it as i said before fossilization  

refers to the process in which incorrect language  becomes a bad habit and cannot easily be corrected  

what are some common mistakes that tend to become  fossilized in learners for example speakers of  

latin languages like spanish and portuguese often  struggle with the simple difference between said  

and tell they'll say she said me something when  it should be she told me something this is a  

vocabulary and grammar fossilized mistake because  if you said it should be she said something  

to me pronunciation also features many  fossilized mistakes the voiceless th sound  

tends to be a problem for most learners  so many will say think as zinc or sink  

let's do a little test can you spot the  mistake in each of these sentences it's raining  

he gave me an advice explain me i have a doubt  the people is crazy i hurt my feet stick around  

till the end of the video where i'm going to  explain what's wrong with each of these sentences

so these common mistakes are usually because of  what we call interference this happens when you  

use structures forms words and also sound ones  from your native language and apply them to  

english resulting in words phrases sentences and  sounds that are incorrect or just sound unnatural  

an extreme case of interference is what we  call spanglish or portugal for example this  

is when someone who has spanish as their first  language overuses elements of that language and  

transfers them to English or to Portuguese so  they'll basically speak in Spanish with a few  

english words here and there now transferring  elements from your native language to english  

isn't always bad there's a thing called positive  transfer this is when english and your native  

language have some elements in common this is  great because it means that you don't need to  

make an extra effort to learn something in English  as it already exists in your native language if  

you speak german or french as your native language  you will benefit from a lot of positive transfer  

as english historically derived largely from  the same roots as these languages for example  

in German a non-romance language herz is  heart and licht is light so as you can see  

these words are very similar for a german speaking  english learner it is not so difficult to learn  

these words he's already halfway there on the  other hand negative transfer also known as the  

interference that i mentioned before is when this  transfer results in incorrect or unnatural english  

false friends or false cognates as you may have  heard it is one type of interference so an example  

of a false friend between spanish and english is  carpetta and carpet which as you can see are two  

very different things carpet translate to folder  or how a friend of mine got in trouble in brazil  

because he told the girl that she looked quite  exquisite this is quite the compliment in english  

but she misunderstood it because exquisita in  portuguese means weird as you can see interference  

is one of the main reasons we fossilize mistakes  have you made any of the mistakes like the ones  

that i've mentioned so far i'd love to hear about  them so tell me down in the comments below and  

also see what other learners have said so another  mistake fossilization is something that is both  

good and bad some communication strategies  that you might be using what exactly is this  

well it varies from person to person a common  one that you'd use in real life situations  

is paraphrasing when you don't know a word or  you simply can't recall it you can explain it  

now paraphrasing is actually a good thing it's a  skill that you can develop to help you carry on in  

conversation in english so you don't freeze  by the way if you ever freeze when you get  

in a conversation then i highly recommend that  you don't miss this recent lesson that we made  

i'll link it at the top and down the description  below so that you can watch that next however if  

you get too reliant on paraphrasing it can also be  a bad thing as it might prevent you from learning  

the word phrase or structure that you could be  using so at first you could say you know the thing  

that you use to drive the car but eventually you  should learn the word that you want to say is the  

steering wheel another common strategy is what we  call avoidance which is obviously to avoid saying  

the word phrase or structure altogether so as to  not make a mistake for example one avoidance that  

i was making recently was the word for storage  in catalan i found this word so difficult to say  

that i would usually just resort to paraphrasing  you know the place where you keep things instead  

of saying the word but eventually i realized it  would be good to actually develop my pronunciation  

if i mastered this word so i practiced over  and over and now i can say it no problem

oftentimes avoidance is caused by not having  enough vocabulary you are missing a word or  

saying the wrong one that you need in order  to continue with the flow of the conversation  

so if you want to greatly increase your vocabulary  then i highly recommend that you learn more about  

our real life native immersion course now in this  course you will learn and never forget the words  

that we natives really use with real life  conversations plus you'll have so much fun  

the best part you can try it for free right  now with our power learning mini course  

learn more and sign up by clicking up  here or down in the description box below

after taking some time to reflect about  possible solutions to this problem  

our team came up with the following  framework recognize reflect unlearn relearn  

the first challenge is actually recognizing  what the problem is becoming aware of the  

mistake so imagine that you went about your life  always saying i have 29 years until someone was  

kind enough to point that error out to you you'd  think have i been saying this wrong all this time  

now of course the problem isn't making mistakes  mistakes are your best ally in learning english  

as long as you use them to take action and to  fix them so now this i am x years old is a basic  

sentence that you have probably mastered already  however there might be other mistakes whether  

having to do with vocabulary grammar pronunciation  or even pragmatics how you actually use language  

and how you interact with another culture that  you might be unaware of when that's the case  

the obvious question is how can i know what the  mistake is if i don't even know that i'm making it  

frankly the absolute best way to overcome this  is by getting a good teacher or possibly a mentor  

someone who can guide you and give you advice  now you pay a teacher to identify these mistakes  

and help you to overcome them i learned catalan  all on my own by watching tv series listening to  

music and podcasts and speaking with friends i was  able to get really fluent by doing this however  

the problem is that native friends usually will  not correct you as long as they can understand  

you so i decided to sign up for the c1 exam  and get an experienced private teacher this was  

pivotal because she was able to identify all sorts  of mistakes that i had no idea that i was making  

for example if you want to say there is  in catalan it is if there were plural  

i used to conjugate the verb for the plural eon  however my teacher pointed out to me that there  

are doesn't really exist in catalan it should  always be in the singular so this is why a teacher  

is so helpful i've been making this mistake for  years without any of my friends correcting me  

now if you can't afford a teacher right now that's  okay i recommend you watch a lot of tv in english  

you read as much as possible and obviously if it  is possible engage in conversations in english  

once you're exposed to the language in that way  pay attention compare the samples of the language  

that you hear or read with your own and come to  your own conclusions it will require hard work  

and a lot of self-awareness consider  this as a takeaway from this lesson  

recognizing the problem puts you halfway there  to the solution in other words knowing what the  

problem is is fifty percent of the solution the  next say ten percent comes with reflection so  

once you recognize the problem take some time to  reflect on it think what about this mistake makes  

it especially hard for me to overcome even when  it might seem so simple and easy on the surface  

it might be a negative transfer from your first  language it might be an over generalization of a  

rule this is actually precisely what i was talking  about with a brazilian friend of mine the other  

day so he always pronounced said as said which  makes sense because in the present tense it's say  

so it is only logical that for the past form  you just need to add a d sound and say say it  

that's a case of over-generalizing that rule  or failing to know the exception to said rule i  

recommended that he listen with a keen ear when  he's listening to a podcast or watching a tv  

series and not depends so much on his eyes let's  now move on to what i mean by unlearn and relearn  

it just so happens that with fossilized mistakes  chances are that you've been using an incorrect  

structure word or mispronunciation for a long time  so it really takes a lot of energy to learn to say  

something in the correct way automatically so  again use the power of reflection as the pathway  

out of the problem and to a new level of language  proficiency imagine you're learning the correct  

structure for the first time maybe even write down  on a piece of paper that incorrect word phrase or  

whatever then make that piece of paper into a  ball and throw it away another important thing  

is to also not always try to look for parallels of  english in your first language because that might  

trick you into bringing in structures and words  from your native language into english if you're  

able to learn to communicate in english without  translating from your native language you'll be  

achieving a breakthrough moment which is  what everybody calls thinking in english

so now let's summarize the key main ideas that  will help you in fossilization reduction so get  

as much exposure to english as possible through  watching reading and or conversing pay attention  

to the samples of language that you get compare  them with your own and recognize the mistakes  

then reflect about why they're difficult for you  finally forget about translating or looking for  

parallels in your native language do what it takes  to unlearn and then to relearn the correct way of  

saying or pronouncing something fossilization is  an inevitable part of second language acquisition  

so you're always going to be battling against it  it's okay to make mistakes when you do laughing  

them off is the best thing that you can do  but then again use them to your advantage  

by making them your allies in your english  learning journey which means learn from them  

so now let's bring back those typical  mistakes that maybe you're still doing  

or you might have overcome by now either way  taking a look at them will probably put you on  

the right track to fix other mistakes as well this  is a very common one i've also heard friends say  

is good or is normal the thing is we pretty much  always have to use the subject in english in some  

languages the subject can be implied but not in  english the funny thing with it when we say it  

is raining is that it doesn't refer to anything in  particular when we say it is rainy though we could  

say that it refers to the day how do you say this  in your native language and can you say it like  

two advices for example if you can it means that  it is the countable noun in your native language  

however it is uncountable in english so the  correct way to say it is a piece of advice  

similarly we say a piece or slice of bread or  a piece of software that's right another common  

mistake that i've heard is i've installed the  software but you should say a piece of software  

a sentence like he explained the solution is an  extremely common mistake the thing to remember  

here is that explain is always followed by two  so i'm explaining to you the right way to use  

this word in a sentence believe me this is a big  one the dictionary defined doubt as a feeling of  

being not sure whether something is true or right  and you could use it like i have some doubts  

about whether the plan is going to work however  i've seen learners confuse doubt for question  

so instead of saying something like i have a doubt  how can i cook this say i have a question how  

can i cook this there are two typical errors here  first when we refer to people in general we don't  

use the article the second people is plural  despite the fact that it doesn't have an s  

so one person two people many people the word  persons does exist but it's only used in very  

specific contexts same thing with saying peoples  the other thing about the article is that you can  

use it when you talk about a very specific group  of people you could say the people of this town  

are very nice the difficulty here is also the  plural just remember that feet means you're two  

feet but if you want to talk about one it's foot  same with the difference between teeth and tooth  

whoever invented this language probably thought  that it'd be pretty funny to make it a bit  

confusing so what are the common mistakes that  you always make tell me down in the comments below  

and that's it for today's lesson but if you  haven't yet remember to subscribe so that every  

week we can continue helping you to overcome your  biggest mistakes and now it's time to go beyond  

the classroom and live your english ah yeah  this means that learning new words to describe  

your english is a good idea don't you think so  rather than just using the usual words like good  

bad beginner intermediate and advanced today  we're going to learn some more colorful language  

and vocabulary that's going to help you to  describe your english and the english of