5 Speaking Mistakes to AVOID in English

Oh man, you look so boring. Oh no. Please do not  say this in English. This is extremely rude. Hi,  

I'm Vanessa from SpeakEnglishwithVanessa.com.  Today I want to help you avoid these five common  

speaking mistakes. Yes, mistakes are an essential  part of learning anything new and you shouldn't be  

embarrassed that you make mistakes sometimes,  but part of getting better is avoiding common  

mistakes, and that's what I'd like to help you  with today. I've created for you a free PDF  

worksheet with all five of these common speaking  mistakes, what the mistakes are and how to avoid  

them. You want to make sure that you get that  part correct. You can click on the link in the  

description to download that free PDF worksheet  and also answer Vanessa's challenge question  

at the bottom of the worksheet so that you never  forget what you've learned. All right, let's get  

started with the first common speaking mistake. The first common speaking mistake is the one  

you just heard, boring versus bored. It's  understandable that these words are a common  

mistake because they both have a similar meaning.  They talk about something or someone that's not  

interesting, but the difference comes in how  we use them grammatically. The word boring is  

for something or someone that's not interesting.  "That movie was boring." "I went on a date with  

him and he was so boring. He just talked about  sports the whole time." It's not a compliment.  

But the word bored refers to the feeling you  have when you watch that boring movie or when  

you go on that boring date, you feel bored. So at the beginning of this lesson when I said,  

"Oh man, you look so boring." Oh no, that's not  nice. It means you're not interesting. Instead,  

I should have said, "Oh man, you look so bored."  It means you're not doing anything fun. You feel  

like you need some more fun in your life? "I feel  bored." Let's look at a couple sample sentences.  

"This documentary about sand is boring. I feel  so bored. Can we please watch something else?"  

"I was so bored during that  lecture. To me, physics is  

just boring." Sorry, people who like physics. So now I have a little quiz for you. I want you  

to choose, is the word boring or bored the best  fit for this sentence? "Vanessa's lessons are not.  

I never feel." What's the correct answer  here? I'll give you three seconds. Three, two,  

one. "Vanessa's lessons are not boring. I  never feel bored." Oh, I hope that's true. 

Common speaking mistake number two is one that  native English speakers make. Two. It is well  

versus good. Have you ever heard someone say,  "Ugh, I don't feel good." You know what? That's  

a mistake. Instead, it should be, "I don't  feel well." What's the difference? Let me  

tell you. The word well is an adverb. That means  it adds something to the verb. So when you say,  

"I don't feel well," well is talking about  how you feel? "I don't feel well. I have a  

headache. I have a stomach ache. I need to go  lie down." If you said, "I don't feel good,"  

this means that my sense of touch is not  good. Maybe you burned your fingers. "Ah,  

yeah, I just don't feel good anymore." It's  a very unusual thing to say. So instead,  

when you're talking about your health, you can  use this correctly and say, "I don't feel well." 

What about the word good? Well, the word good is  an adjective, so it needs to describe a noun. You  

might say, "Wow, Vanessa, this is a really  good lesson." Good is describing lesson. Or  

you could say, "Ugh, I really need a good grade  in this class, or I'm going to fail." I do want  

to tell you of an exception in spoken English, I  mentioned that sometimes native English speakers  

use this incorrectly, but there is one case when  we use it incorrectly, and I actually recommend  

using it like that so you don't seem too snobby. Let me tell you about it. If someone asks you the  

common greeting question, "How are you doing?" And  you want to answer with grammatical correctness,  

you would need to say, "I'm doing well. And you?"  You know what? If you said this, someone might  

think, "Oh, did you come from the 16th century?  Are you an English professor?" Maybe you are.  

But in this case, it's grammatically correct, but  it is not commonly used and it feels a little bit  

weird in just daily conversation. So what should  you say instead? Well, here you have it. Your  

English teacher telling you to make a mistake  on purpose, and that is if someone says, "How  

are you doing?" You could say, "Pretty good and  you?" Good is actually the most common response,  

even though it's not technically grammatically  correct. Who knew, you should make mistakes? 

So now it's time for a little test. Can you  choose which word fits in which blank? Good  

or well. "I need to do on that test because I  need a grade." I'll give you three seconds. 3,  

2, 1. "I need to do well on that test  because I need a good grade." Great work. 

Common speaking mistake number three is another  pair of similar words, and that is job versus  

work. These both mean your career, something that  you do generally to make money, but they function  

differently grammatically in a sentence. The  word work can be both, a verb, "`I work." Or  

it can be a noun, "My work is as a teacher." And  the word job can only be a noun. So let's take a  

look at a couple sentences. "My job is to manage  my team." This is a noun and it's talking about  

your career. "My job is to manage my team." Or you  could say, "I work on the marketing team. This is  

as a verb. What if we put these together in a  sentence? You could say, "I work with a lot of  

interesting people at my new job." Ooh. I do want to teach you two things to be  

careful of with these two phrases. One is  a fixed phrase that you will use often,  

and that is, "At work." This is talking about  the place where you work. "Where were you at  

six o'clock tonight? We were waiting for you at  dinner." You might say, "Sorry, I was at work. I  

had to do something extra before I left." Or you  could say, "I was so busy at work today." Yes,  

it's talking about the place, but this is a fixed  phrase that you can use to talk about where you  

were. "I was at work." "I was busy at work today." Earlier I mentioned that the word work can be  

used as a verb or a noun, and the word job  can be used as a noun. So can they be used  

interchangeably at all? Take a look at this. You  could say, "I love my job." Or you could say,  

"I love my work." But be careful, there is a  nuanced difference between these two. If you say,  

"I love my job." Cool, it just means what you  said, I like what I do to make money. But when  

you say, "I love my work," this feels like there's  a deeper significance to what you do at your job. 

For example, maybe you help homeless people to  find a home, or you're helping people who are in a  

domestic violence situation get a better life. You  are really changing people's lives, kind of with  

a deeper significance. So if you say, "I love my  work," this has the underlying idea that you are  

changing the world or at least changing someone's  world. It's a very deep feeling. All right,  

now it's time for a little test. Can you choose  which blank needs the word job, and which blank  

needs the word work? "For my, I need to late  hours." I'll give you three seconds. Two, one.  

"For my job, I need to work  late hours." Great work. 

The next common speaking mistake are two similar  words, again, in and at. Oh my, I received many  

questions from English students asking, "Vanessa,  how can I remember when to use in and when to use  

at?" Well, let me give you some ideas. This  is tricky because we use both at and in when  

we're talking about time. But we use the word  at specifically for specific times. For example,  

"At midnight, at five o'clock at noon." This is  at specifically that time. But the word in is  

used more generally. Take a look at this. "In  the morning, in the evening, in five minutes,  

in six hours." You didn't, say at 3:30 PM." You  said, "No, we'll have a meeting in the morning,  

in the evening, in five minutes, in six days." Let's take a look at some sentences. "Can you  

meet me at noon? I know that that's only in 30  minutes, but can you make it?" So I'm asking you,  

"Hey, I know this is last minute notice, but can  you make it? Can you meet me at noon this specific  

time? In the duration of time in 30 minutes?"  Let's take a look at another one. "You're  

invited to my birthday party! The party is in 10  days and it starts at seven o'clock." Wonderful.  

Are you ready for a little test? I want you to  decide which blank needs the word in and which  

blank needs the word at. Take a look. "Three days  when my vacation starts, I won't need to wake up  

6:00 AM anymore." Phew, I can sleep in. All  right, I'll give you three seconds to decide.  

"In three days when my vacation starts,  I won't need to wake up at 6:00 AM  

anymore." It's so nice on vacation to sleep in. If you would like to dive deeper into this topic,  

I made another video comparing in, on, and  at and over half a million people have found  

clarity with his video. You can click on the  link up here to watch that in more detail. 

Our fifth and final common speaking mistake is  to talk with someone or to talk to someone. I  

want to show you two sentences, and I want  you to guess which one is the best. "I'm  

talking with my friend" or "I'm talking to my  friend." Which one do you think is better? I'll  

give you three seconds. Let's do our quiz now.  3, 2, 1. Well, you know what? This is a trick  

question because both of these are equally  acceptable In spoken English conversations. 

I have heard that some people say when you use,  "Talk to someone," it has the sense that there's  

an authority. "I'm talking to someone who's has  less authority than me. I talked to my employees,  

I talked to my child." But really in daily spoken  English, in the US we use both of these phrases  

interchangeably. You could say, "I talked to my  boss about the important meeting next week. I  

talked to my child. I talked to my friend." Or you  could say, "I talked with my friend, I talked with  

my boss." You can use these interchangeably  in spoken English and it's not a problem. 

So if you are one of those English learners  that has ever wondered, "Should I say talk to  

or talk with?" You know what? You can just  take that concern and throw it out of your  

brain. It doesn't matter. Well, congratulations  on learning these five common speaking mistakes  

so that you don't make them the next time that  you have a wonderful English conversation. 

Well, I have a question for you now. Let me know  in the comments, what is your job? Use this word  

correctly and I can't wait to see what you do.  Don't forget to download the free PDF worksheet.  

This is an important one because it will outline  all of these common speaking mistakes and how to  

fix them, including sample sentences so that  you can level up your English-speaking skills.  

You can click on the link in the description  to download that free PDF worksheet today. 

Well, thank you so much for learning English  with me, and I'll see you again next Friday  

for a new lesson here on my YouTube channel  bye. But wait, do you want more? I recommend  

watching this video next where you will  learn five more common speaking mistakes,  

including a common mistake that English learners  make when they're telling what time it is. Make  

sure that you watch that video and don't make  that mistake yourself. I'll see you there.