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A Common Mistake or An idiom usage.

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A Common Mistake or An idiom usage.

by magic monkey » Tue Mar 04, 2014 6:03 am
just curious, I've seen a lot on the major media the usage like What you should do is go out and take a breath.

As in SC, I thought it should be what you should do is to go out and take a breath.

Want to be sure whether this is a common mistake among native speakers or something like an idiom. Thanks for any possible illumination!

sorry if it seems too nitpicking.
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by Bill@VeritasPrep » Tue Mar 04, 2014 1:16 pm
I think it's fine without the "to". Why do you think we need the infinitive there?
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by magic monkey » Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:54 am
Hi Bill, I thought it should be a noun phrase following a BE verb. the infinitive "to go out" is a noun phrase but "go out" is not.

It's a basic rule, isn't it?

Why so many native speakers talk without the "to"? Is it grammatically wrong? Or something we could also use in a serious formal writing?

sentences like "What you should do is go out and take a breath."
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by magic monkey » Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:55 am
Bill@VeritasPrep wrote:I think it's fine without the "to". Why do you think we need the infinitive there?
Hi Bill, I thought it should be a noun phrase following a BE verb. the infinitive "to go out" is a noun phrase but "go out" is not.

It's a basic rule, isn't it?

Why so many native speakers talk without the "to"? Is it grammatically wrong? Or something we could also use in a serious formal writing?

sentences like "What you should do is go out and take a breath."
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by lunarpower » Wed Jun 04, 2014 12:14 am
I received a private message about this thread.

First and foremost... this:
Want to be sure whether this is a common mistake among native speakers
This is the biggest mistake here. You're trying to evaluate spoken English by the standards of written English.
You shouldn't do that. Because...

Spoken English and written English are DIFFERENT LANGUAGES.

They have different grammars.
They have different vocabularies.
They have different sentence structures.
Etc.

Constructions that are fundamental building blocks of one of these are often completely absent from the other.
E.g.,
My brother, a sales manager, lives in Texas.
This kind of modifier is a basic building block of written English, but doesn't exist at all in spoken English.

That's just one example, but you get the point. They're different languages. Using your eyes to evaluate spoken English is just as wrong as using your ear to evaluate written English (although only the latter will hurt your gmat score).
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by lunarpower » Wed Jun 04, 2014 12:15 am
magic monkey wrote:just curious, I've seen a lot on the major media the usage like What you should do is go out and take a breath.

As in SC, I thought it should be what you should do is to go out and take a breath.
In writing, neither of these would work.

"Go out" is grammatically verboten. A verb can't act as a noun.

"To go out" would work in terms of pure mechanics, but the meaning isn't right.
"To ____", if used as a noun, should be a reference to the general/abstract/conceptual idea of ____ing. It's not appropriate for an urgent suggestion (as in this example), since such a suggestion isn't a general notion.

If the sentence were a generalization-The best option for many people under stress is to go outside and relax-then, sure.
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by magic monkey » Wed Jun 11, 2014 7:54 am
lunarpower wrote:I received a private message about this thread.

First and foremost... this:
Want to be sure whether this is a common mistake among native speakers
This is the biggest mistake here. You're trying to evaluate spoken English by the standards of written English.
You shouldn't do that. Because...

Spoken English and written English are DIFFERENT LANGUAGES.

They have different grammars.
They have different vocabularies.
They have different sentence structures.
Etc.

Constructions that are fundamental building blocks of one of these are often completely absent from the other.
E.g.,
My brother, a sales manager, lives in Texas.
This kind of modifier is a basic building block of written English, but doesn't exist at all in spoken English.

That's just one example, but you get the point. They're different languages. Using your eyes to evaluate spoken English is just as wrong as using your ear to evaluate written English (although only the latter will hurt your gmat score).
Actually, I never thought of it like that before. It may be quite basic for the native speaker, but I think it's quite eye-opening for me. Thanks Ron!
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by lunarpower » Wed Jun 11, 2014 9:39 pm
magic monkey wrote:Actually, I never thought of it like that before. It may be quite basic for the native speaker, but I think it's quite eye-opening for me. Thanks Ron!
Not "basic"/"obvious" at all for native speakers, actually. In fact, native speakers--excepting only those with unusually deep ability and/or enthusiasm for the written word--have more trouble with the spoken language/written language distinction. After all, they're the ones who have spoken the spoken language for their entire lives!

E.g.,
In SPOKEN English, "which" only seldom refers to nouns. It's normally used to describe entire clauses (e.g., My sister crashed the car, which really made my dad mad).
"¢ Before native English speakers can absorb the proper written usage of "which" (in which the sentence above is nonsense), they must actively un-learn (or, more accurately, quarantine) the spoken-language instinct.
"¢ Non-native speakers face no such obstacle; they simply must learn the correct written usage.

in fact, GMAC tests forms that clash with their spoken usage (or that simply don't exist in the spoken language) quite often, for the express purpose of making the test more fair for non-native English speakers.
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by magic monkey » Thu Jun 12, 2014 8:27 pm
lunarpower wrote:
magic monkey wrote:Actually, I never thought of it like that before. It may be quite basic for the native speaker, but I think it's quite eye-opening for me. Thanks Ron!
Not "basic"/"obvious" at all for native speakers, actually. In fact, native speakers--excepting only those with unusually deep ability and/or enthusiasm for the written word--have more trouble with the spoken language/written language distinction. After all, they're the ones who have spoken the spoken language for their entire lives!

E.g.,
In SPOKEN English, "which" only seldom refers to nouns. It's normally used to describe entire clauses (e.g., My sister crashed the car, which really made my dad mad).
"¢ Before native English speakers can absorb the proper written usage of "which" (in which the sentence above is nonsense), they must actively un-learn (or, more accurately, quarantine) the spoken-language instinct.
"¢ Non-native speakers face no such obstacle; they simply must learn the correct written usage.

in fact, GMAC tests forms that clash with their spoken usage (or that simply don't exist in the spoken language) quite often, for the express purpose of making the test more fair for non-native English speakers.
that's right, the different usages of Which Clause! It was like the first confusing point when I started learning GMAT.
Cool I'll keep that. :P
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by lunarpower » Thu Jun 26, 2014 5:04 am
magic monkey wrote:that's right, the different usages of Which Clause! It was like the first confusing point when I started learning GMAT.
Cool I'll keep that. :P
If you notice any constructions that are used in contradictory / opposite / significantly different ways in the two languages (spoken and written English), you should pay more than the usual amount of attention to them.

(As another example, consider pronouns.
In SPOKEN English, they're not really "pronouns"; they're more like "pro-whatever you want".
E.g.,
In Colombia, they eat a lot of potatoes.
In written English, this sentence is incorrect, since "they" doesn't stand for anyone. In the spoken language it's ok; it's understood to mean people in Colombia.
("A lot" is also inappropriate in the written language, unless you are talking about a literal "lot", e.g., I bought 10 lots of this product to sell in my store. Same for "a bunch", "a ton", and many other informal words that have specific literal meanings in the formal written language.)
Or
My sister crashed the car; my dad was furious when he found out about it.
Wrong in written English; fine in spoken English. ("it" is trying to stand for the entire idea that my sister crashed the car.)

GMAC will test such constructions more heavily than most others. Much more heavily, in fact, because they represent one of GMAC's most powerful ways of making the test more fair for non-native vs. native English speakers.
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by magic monkey » Sat Jun 28, 2014 9:35 am
lunarpower wrote:
magic monkey wrote:that's right, the different usages of Which Clause! It was like the first confusing point when I started learning GMAT.
Cool I'll keep that. :P
If you notice any constructions that are used in contradictory / opposite / significantly different ways in the two languages (spoken and written English), you should pay more than the usual amount of attention to them.

(As another example, consider pronouns.
In SPOKEN English, they're not really "pronouns"; they're more like "pro-whatever you want".
E.g.,
In Colombia, they eat a lot of potatoes.
In written English, this sentence is incorrect, since "they" doesn't stand for anyone. In the spoken language it's ok; it's understood to mean people in Colombia.
("A lot" is also inappropriate in the written language, unless you are talking about a literal "lot", e.g., I bought 10 lots of this product to sell in my store. Same for "a bunch", "a ton", and many other informal words that have specific literal meanings in the formal written language.)
Or
My sister crashed the car; my dad was furious when he found out about it.
Wrong in written English; fine in spoken English. ("it" is trying to stand for the entire idea that my sister crashed the car.)

GMAC will test such constructions more heavily than most others. Much more heavily, in fact, because they represent one of GMAC's most powerful ways of making the test more fair for non-native vs. native English speakers.
LOVE your extension on it! Thanks!
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by lunarpower » Sun Jun 29, 2014 5:37 am
You're welcome.

You should always ask "Why?" about every type of question on this test. If you understand what is emphasized (and what isn't) on this exam-in terms of both content and skills-you'll find the whole experience much more circumscribed, and much less daunting.
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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Pueden hacerle preguntas a Ron en castellano
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On peut poser des questions à Ron en français
Voit esittää kysymyksiä Ron:lle myös suomeksi

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Yves Saint-Laurent

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