The top mistake of non-native speakers of English is with articles (a, an, and the). English learners tend to either use the wrong article, omit a needed article, or put an article where it’s not needed. By far, omitting a needed article is the most common mistake out of the three, as many languages do not have articles to begin with. A research paper showed that omitting a needed article is responsible for 66% of grammar errors related to articles among English learners. It can be difficult to remember to add an article in your English writing when your mother tongue never involves articles of any sort.
Here are some examples of mistakes non-native speakers make with articles:
- My brother is football player. → My brother is a football player.
This is a typical case of a missing article. Typically, if a noun is singular, countable, and not a proper noun, then you should precede it with an article regardless of whether it has an adjective or adjectives in front of it. In this case, football is an adjective describing player in this sentence, and the noun player hits all the requirements; it is singular, countable, and not a proper noun, so don’t forget to put an article.
- A cats are great pets. → Cats are great pets.
In this sentence, the noun cats is plural, yet the writer used a, an article for singular nouns. Therefore, putting a here is incorrect. Because the sentence is referring to cats in general, we would not use the either since the would show that the writer is talking about a specific group of cats. The correct move here would be to not use an article at all for the plural cats.
Here is a simple chart you can refer to when trying to figure out if your noun needs an article.
| Countable | Uncountable | |
| Singular | needs a, an, or the | no article or the (if not a general reference) |
| Plural | no article or the (if not a general reference) (but never a or an) | no article or the (if not a general reference) |
- I cracked a egg into the bowl. → I cracked an egg into the bowl.
This is a case of using the wrong article. If a word starts with a vowel sound (egg starts with an e sound), then you should use the article an instead of a.
- He handed in a homework that was due last Tuesday late. → He handed in the homework that was due last Tuesday late.
The protagonist of this sentence turned in a specific homework assignment (that was actually due last Tuesday) late. Because the homework in question is a specific homework assignment, we would use the instead of a.
Here’s some other examples you can check out:
- I commute to office by bus. → I commute to the office by bus.
- She takes freeway to work every day. → She takes the freeway to work every day.
- Please send email to your manager. → Please send an/the email to your manager.
- Don’t pick up phone. → Don’t pick up the phone.
- He bought birthday cake for his daughter. → He bought a birthday cake for his daughter.
Still having trouble with articles? Check out Engram to proofread your sentences for any incorrect articles.
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