IELTS DEMYSTIFIED

In the field of language, morphology means the structure of words, how words are formed, and how the parts fit together. If you get the wrong morpheme (i.e., word part) in the wrong place at the wrong time, you’ve committed a morphological error. These can be of many sub-types-

• Omission of Noun Plural is wrong– 

To our parent   => To our parents
A lot of car       => A lot of car
These journey  => These journeys
Those road      => Those roads

• Addition of Noun Plural –

o For Singular nouns

In this days      => In this day 
Every days      => Everyday 
Next times       => Next time
Each problems => Each problem 

o For double mark plurality

Childrens    => Children is plural word for child
Mens           => Men is plural word for man 
Geeses         => Geese is plural for goose
Mices           => Mice is plural for mouse 

• Plural added to uncountable nouns 
  Informations   => Information
  Furnitures       => Furniture 

• Wrong Formation of Past Form of Irregular Verbs

Leaved     =>  Left
Drinked     => Drank     
Eated        => Ate
Putted       => Put

• Omission of the Possessives (apostrophe)

My brothers car            => My brother's car 
The donkeys voices     => The donkey's voices
In the farmers fields    =>  In the farmer's fields 

• Misuse of Possessive (apostrophe)

The university's degree   => university degree
My literature's teacher     =>  literature teacher
Translation's classes   => Translation classes

• Omission of plural to the 3rd person verb in the present simple tense
  It pollute the air and water.  => It pollutes the air and water.
  She study everyday.             => She studies everyday.

Derivational Morphemes:

• Errors arising from the wrong use of prefixes.

It is unsignificant (insignificant).
It is unpractical (impractical)
He is inhonest (dishonest)  

• Errors Made as a Result of Analogous Use of Certain Suffixes.

They went fastly (fast).
My friends are gossipers (gossips)
The inhabiters were disappointed (inhabitants)
I do hate cheaters.(cheats)
I know that it is insultive.(insulting)
She was calculative.(calculating) 

• Errors in Compounding

Text book (textbook).
Team mate (teammate)
Room mate (roommate)
Black board (blackboard)
Essay going (essay–going)
Good looking (good–looking)
Blue bell (bluebell)
Wide spread (widespread)
Down fall (downfall)  

Writing of words without proper letters can be termed as orthographic errors. Such as :

•  True typographical errors — that is, a word was not misspelled, but a key was accidentally struck, resulting in something like aapple or oran.ge

•  A common noun accidentally capitalized in the middle of a sentence

•  The first letter of a sentence, or a proper noun, is not capitalized

Determiners are used before a noun to help clarify what a noun is referring to and are typically placed before descriptive adjectives. There 4 types of determiners -

• Articles - Articles ‘a’, ‘an’, and ‘the’ are used to identify the noun which the speaker is referring to. Detailed examples are specified in "Missing / Incorrect Use Of Articles" section of this page. 

• Demonstrative pronouns – consisting of ‘this’, ‘that’, ‘these’, and ‘those’. that are used when the noun in question is being pointed to. For example:

- I like this cake 

-  These bananas are very ripe

-  I wanted that slice of pizza

-  I want those shoes

• Quantifiers – Quantifying determiners specifically tell you how much, or what proportion of, the noun is being referred to. Examples of the are all, many, few, some:

·        He ate all the cake 

·        Many people like pizza

·        All of the boys will be there

·        Few children like brussel sprouts

As seen above, ‘all’ can also be used in conjunction with other determiners, such as ‘the’ to specify what proportion of the noun in question is meant.

• Possessive Determiners  – Some nouns can belong to someone or something in particular. When this is the case, possessive pronouns  can be used to identify said ownership. These can include ‘my’, ‘your’, ‘her’, ‘his’, ‘our’, and ‘their’. For example:

·        You are my best friend 

·        This is his car 

·        The dog wagged its tail

·        Where is her phone?

·        Today is our anniversary 

·        Their favorite band was playing 

Note that possessive pronoun is not affected by whether the noun is singular or plural. 

A particle is a word that has a grammatical function but does not fit into the main parts of speech (i.e. noun, verb, adverb). 

Grammatical particles – the infinitive marker "to". 

Eg:  'to fly' is an example of a particle, although it can also act as a preposition, E.g. 'I'm going to Spain next week'.

Adverb particles 

• Adverbial particles such as above, about, in, out, up, down, before, across, off, on, below, behind etc. can be used a verb to show position, direction of movement, etc. to form phrasal verbs (such as break down, put off, work out, give up, throw up, rule out etc.). These boost your band score. 

• Note that words like in, out, up, down etc., are not always prepositions.
  In the expressions ‘down the street’, ‘up the stairs’ and ‘in the room’, the words down, up and in are prepositions. Prepositions are always followed by nouns which act as their objects. For example, in the sequence ‘down the street’, the noun 'street' is the object of the preposition 'down'.
  In the expressions ‘sit down’, ‘she is not up’ and ‘come in’, the words down, up and in have no objects. They are adverbs and not prepositions.
  
  

• Adverbs and adverb phrases indicating frequency don’t usually go after the verb phrase. They usually go in mid position. E.g. We don’t often put always, usually, never, etc. at the beginning of a sentence or clause:
  Correct : She was always comparing herself to other people.
  Wrong:   Always she was comparing herself to other people.

• Adverbs and adverb phrases indicating time usually go in end position. 
  Correct : I’ll post the CDs to you tomorrow.
  Wrong:   I’ll post tomorrow the CDs to you.

Discourse particles
Discourse markers (essentially "linking words") are very important to structure text or speech, to connect sentences in a meaningful and logical way. They are used to express contrast, reason, purpose, result, etc. In the context of IELTS test, it is best to avoid the informal ones such as "you know", "actually", "basically", "I mean", "okay" etc.

Negative particle – the word "not".

• Though sentences with double negatives are conventionally used in some dialects of English, they are considered grammatically incorrect in standard English. They are confusing as well, because double negatives cancel each other out and make a positive resulting in conveying the exact opposite of what you mean.
  E.g. I will not bake no cake  => Actual intention : I will not bake any cake.
   

• Sometimes there are negative forms of nouns — such as “nowhere,” “nothing,” and “no one” — that are used. If these are in a sentence, it is important that the verb in the sentence is not negated.
  Correct : He’s going nowhere.      
  Wrong :  He’s not going nowhere.  

Incorrect positioning of a word in the sentence categorizes as a word order error. 

• Correct : I was shopping in Leipzig.
  Wrong: I was in Leipzig shopping.

• Correct : He played football yesterday. OR Yesterday he played football.
  Wrong: He played yesterday football .

• Correct : Dan rode his bike carefully.
  Wrong: Dan rode carefully his bike.

• Correct : He often reads books.
  Wrong: He reads often books.

• Correct : He Is always late.
  Wrong: He always is late.

Watch out for below prepositional errors in your writing - 

1. From Morning to Night (In vs. At)
With “in” and “at,” the correct term may depend on the time of day! For example, in English we use “in the” with “morning,” “afternoon,” and “evening.” But we usually use “at” when talking about the night:

Helen goes running in the morning.
Tim goes running in the afternoon.
Shirley goes running in the evening.
Bob goes running at night.

2. Arrivals (In and At vs. To)

You can use the preposition “to” for discussing journeys (e.g., “I’m going to Tasmania”). But with the word “arrive,” we use “in” or “at” to describe reaching a destination. For instance:

She arrived in Tasmania just after lunch.
He arrived at the restaurant five minutes late.

Whether to use “in” or “at” typically depends on the destination:
Use “in” for cities, countries or other large areas.
Use “at” for specific places (e.g., a library, a bar, or someone’s house).

3. Time, Days, Months, and Years (At, On, and In)

When referring to a time or date, we use different prepositions depending on the situation. If you’re talking about a time of day, the correct term is “at”:

The party starts at 9pm.

For a specific day or date, meanwhile, we use “on”:

The party is on Saturday.

And for a month or year, the correct preposition is “in”:

We’re having a party in April.

4. For vs. Since
When talking about how long something has been happening, we use “for” when referring to a length of time (e.g., a period of hours, days, or months):

I’ve been writing for six hours.

But if we’re using a specific time as a point of reference, we use “since”:

I’ve been writing since breakfast.

The difference here is that the first refers to a measure of time, while the second refers to a fixed point in the past when the activity began.

5. Talking About and Discussing
“Talking” and “discussing” are similar activities, so people often treat these words as interchangeable. However, you should only use the preposition “about” after “talking.” For example:

Correct : We’re talking about extreme sports.  OR We’re discussing extreme sports.
Wrong: We’re discussing about extreme sports. 

6. Married to
If we want to describe someone’s marital status, it will be correct to say that one person is married to another.
Examples:
    John is married with Katy.   ✗
    John is married to Katy.      √ 

7. Prefer - to / over / than / rather than 

• When you want to express that you like something more than something else, ‘prefer to’ is always a safer choice. The use of “prefer over” in place of “prefer to” is less common and many native speakers consider it unnatural, so use it only at your own peril. 

• ‘Prefer than’ is strictly unacceptable.

Below are some examples: 

My sister prefers dogs to cats.                   √              

My sister prefers dogs over cats.               √      

My sister prefers dogs rather than cats.   √          

My sister prefers dogs than cats.              ✗

I prefer to drink tea rather than drink coffee.  √  

I prefer tea to coffee                                     √  

I prefer to drink tea than to drink coffee.        ✗

She’d prefer not to drive at night.                  √  

Would you prefer a quieter restaurant?            √  

• Don’t use ‘prefer to’ when comparing two verbs. Instead, use ‘rather than’ or rephrase the whole sentence. 

She would prefer to die rather than (to) go to her ex.     √        

She would prefer dying to going to her ex.    √  

She would prefer to die to going to her ex.   ✗

• ‘If’ is used in conditional sense. ‘Whether’ is used in uncertainty.

If he does not return the book, he will not be awarded the certificate.
I do not know whether he was present.

• ‘Both’ is complimented by ‘and’, not by ‘as well as’.

Both Bimal and Kamal are good at English.

• ‘So …. As’ is used in negative sentences, whereas ‘as …. As’ is used in affirmative sentences.

He is not so tall as his brother.

• ‘Because’ denote reason. ‘In order’ that denotes purpose.

He went to the doctor because he was ill.
He went to Delhi in order that he might see Mr. Bose.

• ‘Lest’ is negative so should not be followed by ‘not’; it is followed by ‘should’.

Work hard lest you should fail.

• When a negative expression comes at the beginning of a sentence, we use an inverted word order. That means the auxiliary verb comes before the subject. Note that only the auxiliary verb is inverted. The rest of the verb goes after the subject. 

Incorrect: No sooner we reached the station, the train left.

    Correct: No sooner did we reach the station, than the train left.

    Incorrect: Not only he abused me but also beat me.
    Correct: Not only did he abuse me but he also beat me.

 A subject/verb agreement error occurs when the subject and verb of a sentence do not agree in number. 

1. Collective Nouns 

Collective nouns such as crowd and herd refer to a collection of multiple entities that (usually) acts as a single entity. For example : 

The crowd are becoming increasingly unruly by the moment.   ✗

The crowd is becoming increasingly unruly by the moment.              √ 

2. Interruptive Prepositional Phrases

In the below sentence, the writer may assume that people and the verb that follows it must agree, but the verb is associated not with the immediately preceding noun but with the subject noun, "manner" which is singular.  

The manner in which you spoke to those people are disrespectful.    ✗

The manner in which you spoke to those people is disrespectful.      √ 

3. Summation Plurals

A summation plural is a word (such as scissors, tights etc.) that is singular in meaning but plural in construction. For this reason, these words are grammatically treated in plural form.

 The scissors is in the top drawer.       ✗

The scissors are in the top drawer.            √ 

4. Statistical Proportion

In below example, writers often assume that the verb should agree with organizations, but the subject is one (with the implied subject “one organization”) .  However, if any other number is substituted for one, report is correct, and many people do not recognize the subtle distinction. 

One in four organizations report using this type of software. ✗

One in four organizations reports using this type of software. √ 

Two out of the four organizations report using this type of software. √ 

5. Neither and Either, and Subjects with Nor and Or

Neither and either, when used as pronouns, imply that two entities are being discussed, but the words represent one entity at a time

Neither were very good. ✗

Neither was very good. √