The Top Five Most Common Writing Mistakes

The English language is notoriously difficult to master in writing, particularly when you factor in the seemingly endless grammatical rules we're supposed to follow. In everyday writing it's clearly not essential to know what to do with dangling participles, but taking the time to check your content for even just a few of these common mistakes will make your writing clearer and much easier to read in no time. Unfortunately, these are the kind of mistakes your spell checker will typically pick up, so it's important to do a quick read through to ensure you haven't missed anything.

1. There / Their/They're - This is a mistake that we are all guilty of at some time or another. Remember that "their" is possessive. "There" is an adverb indicating direction. "They're" is of course a contraction for "they are."

examples:

I love that bar with all the beer. Let's go there tonight.

I advise you to not steal any of their beer.

Seriously, they're going to beat you up for stealing beer.

2. Its / It's ­­- My college professors yelled at me endlessly until I learned to do this one, and again, it's an easy one to miss because these words are so commonly used. "Its" is possessive. "It's" is the contraction for it is.

examples:

Associated Content treats its employees so well, I could cry.

Associated Content has so much content, it's crazy!

3. Plural vs. Possessive - Placing an "s" at the end of a word is obviously common. But you may be surprised to learn that usage of that "s" is commonly incorrect. When using the word in a possessive sense, use an apostrophe before the s. When pluralizing a word, an apostrophe should not be used (note: because the English language is so easy to understand, remember that many words have unique plural forms).

examples:

Doctor, this patient's vitals are dropping quickly!

Doctor, there are too many patients to save all of them.

4. Serial Commas - You should always use commas to separate elements in a series or list, but do not use a comma before the conjunction in a series.

example:

In the past 24 hours I have consumed Milk Duds, Skittles and popcorn.

5. Your / You're - The granddaddy of all writing mistakes. The one that I, yes even I, make on several occasions each day. This is yet another case of a possessive form screwing with things. "Your" is possessive. "You're" is a conjunction of "you are."

examples:

Do you mind if I have a drink of your beer?

If you touch anything of mine you're dead.

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These are just five of the most common writing mistakes among many, but by fixing just these few errors every time you write, you'll find that your writing will become cleaner and easier to read instantly.

Sources:

Goldstein, Norm ed. The Associated Press Stylebook. Basic Books: New York, 2007.