One subject that I have recently been discussing with one of my coworkers on a somewhat regular basis is usage of words in English. He has been consulting with me frequently in order to check word usage, which is something that non-native English speakers can sometimes have difficulty with. Some of my students have also struggled with this, so I think I’d like to talk about my recent discussions about the topic.

I have noticed that many students tend to make the same mistakes. For example, some students have a tendency to use words that are not commonly used in English, causing their essays to read rather unnaturally. The disparity between their word choice and their overall level of vocabulary makes me think that they used a dictionary, or perhaps some sort of electronic translator, to help them translate from Japanese to English. These tools can be very helpful, but using them correctly is important. When using tools like dictionaries to learn words, I think it is important for the user to do some research to learn whether or not the word or words that they learned are in use today, as it comes across as very awkward when I read rather simple sentences with mostly simple words but then suddenly face a word that I myself have never even heard of or understand. Words that a native speaker, such as myself, do not use in regular speech might not be the best choice in many situations, not only because it sounds quite strange, but also because such words typically don’t match the user’s vocabulary level, as mentioned before, causing it to look even more suspicious. For this reason, I highly recommend being careful with word choice.

Writing in a way that reads naturally is a somewhat related topic, and it is tied to word choice to some extent. Many of my students attempt to create more complex sentences, but they end up reading quite awkwardly. One example of this is that many students tend to start sentences with “besides”, although “additionally” or “in addition” would be better choices. Some students also have trouble with identifying when to use singular or plural forms of words, especially verbs. While writing complex sentences is preferable to writing many simple sentences, it’s still important for these more complex sentences to read in a natural manner.

Overall, I do think that both of these problems can be overcome with practice, but being able to identify mistakes is perhaps the most important skill to have. If you can recognize mistakes in your writing, you are already capable of becoming able to fix them.