Common Mistakes You Will Make When Writing In A New Language

Writing in a new language is difficult and we will all make mistakes, they can’t be avoided.

You will also find that the same mistakes are common across many languages. I will go through some of the most common and while knowing what they are can help you avoid them, they are still probably going to happen.

All you need to know is that this isn’t a bad thing and if you keep practicing your writing, you will overcome them.

Keep putting the effort in and these mistakes will be nothing to worry about.    

Spelling

Spelling is of course the most obvious mistake that we will make when writing and is also probably the most common mistake we make in our own language, so it’s no surprise we will do this in a language we are learning.

If the language is similar to your own, such as French and English, you will make a lot of mistakes. Simple words may sound and look very similar, but when you have to write them, you will start to notice the differences. 

I have misspelled passeport so many times. I always forget the extra e, simply because it is so close to the English version.

However, you will even notice you are making spelling mistakes in a language that has a different alphabet; in fact it’s probably more common.

You are probably still not that comfortable with the new letters and you will get them confused very easily, resulting in a spelling mistake. I have found this a lot when trying to write in Japanese. In my head I have spelled the word correctly, but I have selected the wrong letter as such, which can be quite frustrating.

Grammar

It doesn’t matter how you use the language, grammar is always going to show up and cause you problems. You are always going to see grammatical errors when writing and these types of mistakes can be seen in a number of different ways:

Conjugation

Most languages have some sort of conjugation and you are going to mess it up. You could argue this is a spelling mistake, which sometimes it is, but usually it’s because you get the grammar wrong and use the wrong form of the word.

This can be extremely frustrating and as a lot of conjugation can be ever so slightly different and it needs to be perfect when writing. Often when you speak a language you can get away with a little more.

For example in French a lot of the conjugation sounds identical when spoken, but very different when written. This little difference can make a huge change on your accuracy of the language when you compare your written and spoken abilities.    

Punctuation

Punctuation can also trip you up in some languages. We can easily assume that it is going to be the same as our own language, but subtle differences are what matters.

If we look at French again, they place a space between their last word and a question mark. If you don’t do this, and just stick it directly on to the last letter, you have made a mistake.

Of course writing “quoi?” instead of “quoi ?” don’t change the meaning, everyone will still understand, but it’s still a mistake and it’s little things like that make you stand out as being non-native.

You could probably get away with ignoring these punctuation mistakes for a while, but really they are very simple, so you could easily fix them early on and just form good habits from the beginning.    

General Grammar Errors

The real problem with grammar is going to be all the small rules that you just don’t know or don’t fully understand yet. These are going to be things like getting the word order wrong or using the wrong tense in the wrong place.

These types of mistakes are just going to appear in your writing for some time and really the only way to get past them is to always try and identify what you did wrong and keep practicing. Eventually you will iron them out.  

(You can read more about – How Does Writing In A Second Language Differ From Writing In Your Native Language?)

Keeping It Too Simple

Keeping your writing simple is both a blessing and a curse.

Initially this is exactly what you should be doing. Keep things simple and get them right so that you can start to master what you know.

The problem comes when you get too comfortable with this and don’t try and progress. It is hard for me to say exactly when you should be looking to push out of your comfort zone, as this is something you will need to work out on your own, but really you can’t keep things simple forever.

You will reach a point where you realise you are just writing the same type of thing over and over, you might even realise you are using the same word many times within a single text conversation and you might even feel like you sound like an infant.

If this happens, you need to learn some new words; basically synonyms are going to be what fixes things and is going to allow your writing to really expand outwards and become more complex. 

(You can read more about – Writing Resources For Language Learning)

Slang

Slang is something we probably use in our own language daily, especially in texts between friends. This is fine, but it’s not quite the same in your new language. 

Many of us want to write in slang as it can make us seem more native and like we are at a better level than we are, but the reality is that we can get tripped up very easily.

As much as it is tempting to try and slip in some slang we have heard, it is best to avoid it and just try and stick to the more standard form of the language. I know that is boring, but you will make less mistakes when you are writing in this standard form.

Eventually you can start to introduce slang into your writing, but I would wait until you are at a quite advanced level.

(You can read more about – Frequently Asked Questions About – Writing In Your New Language)

Conclusion

Really I have only touched the tip of the iceberg here, if you look at each language individually you will many more mistakes that are commonly made when you are writing.

However, as you can see here there is nothing really to worry about. Most of the mistakes are small and annoying. They only happen as you are not fully used to writing in the language and are just not aware of the little nuanced differences between your own language and the one you are learning.

Just keep practicing and you will get there, writing does get easier the more you do.  

(You can read more about – How To Improve Your Writing Skills In A Foreign Language)