Amateur's Writing Mistake #1
A lot of common and uncommon mistakes are listed in this article.
If you are here right after reading the heading, then you fall under either of the categories. The first one is on a hunt to read articles and find mistakes in their writing to improve. The second one has already read plenty and wants to see if there is anything that they didn’t know from my list.
I am sure you will find a lot of common mistakes that other articles have already mentioned, but I will also list the least-mentioned mistakes and how to overcome them.
It is my motto to keep my writing short, interesting, and crisp. So, I am going to divide this article into different parts.
I know most of your interest may decline as soon as you learn that the article comes in parts. I would only request that you skim through the list before you choose to stay or leave. I hope you find something new.
Here’s the list of amateur mistakes:
- Tense Switch
- Confusing words
- Punctuations
- Contractions
- Capitalization
- Right verb usage
- Wrong sequence of words
- Dangling Modifiers
- Parallelism
- Gerund
I hope the topics grabbed your attention.
Let’s begin, then.
1. Tense Switch:
I began writing short stories for competitive platforms half a decade ago but always got rejected. I wondered if the plot or storyline was the main problem. But only when I began to take a full-fledged writing course did I understand my main problem wasn't the storyline but the tense switch. This might not be mentioned in your review if you aren’t working with English professionals for feedback. Because very often, family or friends tend to focus on content delivery rather than grammar and punctuation.
Further, I observed that people who speak English as their first language hardly face this issue in their writing. However, people whose first language is not English make this mistake frequently.
Even though you think, speak, and write in English, it won’t be the same as your native language. Another possible reason for the tense switch could be because of the different sentence structures your native language uses when compared to English.
Most of the publication houses or content platforms might not mention this while rejecting your piece, but this could be one of the reasons why your draft isn’t being picked.
To overcome this problem, I would suggest taking a break from your writing. Come back after a break and give it a thorough check. While you quality-check it, read every word slowly, loudly, and clearly. Keep the tense you want the sentence to be in your mind to find out how different it sounds from what you want to present. My second suggestion is to brush up on your tenses now and then.
2. Confusing words:
Many are confused about when to use confirmation and conformation, effect and affect, wear and were, beer and bear, and many more. The meaning could be right in the mind, but if the spelling isn’t right, the sentence might deliver an entirely different meaning or no meaning at all. Which affects the quality of the content. So, this is a problem that needs fixing.
The only way to fix this is to hit that dictionary every time you find any word confusing until you learn it by heart. Many will say it is a waste of time if you keep checking the words often and must know them by heart. But I would call it the right investment of time, as delivering the right quality and content is always the main priority. Another way of learning is to try to create different sentences with confusing words, or even try using them in the same sentence if possible, to see how they work. This method will help you clearly understand their meaning and purpose.
3. Punctuation:
It is always important to check the punctuation. But when you attempt to write a large piece, there will always be something that goes amiss. Although, over the past years, the most commonly struggled punctuation was the colon, semi-colon, and hyphen. The comma is now added to the list. With the Oxford comma coming into the picture very recently, the concept of the comma needed clarity. Grammar tools like Grammarly, QuillBot, and M.S. Word Editor use commas differently. Therefore, these applications aren’t really helpful. Instead, they lead to more ambiguity.
There is only one solution to this problem. Pick those worksheets that once helped you understand the basics.
Do let me know if the information is useful. Do drop a comment if you need more details about any concept.
Also, keep watching this space for part #2.
See you soon.
