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.