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As our lord and savior Ke$ha once said, "If I am honest, I'm just not hooked on your phonics"

I didn't want to be That Guy but I'm gonna be That Guy.

Here are some common grammatical mistakes/confusions that I've been seeing lately and how to avoid them


"Apart" VS "A Part"

➽ If you're Apart from something, you are not involved with it. You're separated from that something. The word is an adverb (a word that modifies a verb) which means "Away from one another" or that indicates distance, separation, and independence.  

Examples of when to use "apart": 

  • "I can't tell my baby cousins apart, they're identical twins."
  • "The old textbook was falling apart and pages began to scatter across the library floor."
  • "We used to spend every minute together, but over time we grew apart. We rarely hang out anymore"

➽ If you're A Part of something, you are involved with it. It is a noun phrase literally meaning one out of many parts. 

Examples of when to use "a part": 

  • "I am a part of the school play, I get to be Tree #4!"
  • "I don't want to be a part of that team, they don't play fair."
  • "Do you want a part of my sandwich?"


"Then" VS "Than"

➽ The word "Then" is used when you're talking about time.

Examples:

  • "I went to get my hair cut, then I went grocery shopping."
  • "First comes love, then comes marriage..."
  • "If I knew then what I knew now, I wouldn't have had my little accident."

➽ The word "than" is used for comparisons.

Examples:

  • "Better late than never."
  • "Two heads are better than one!"
  • "I like the color yellow more than the color red."

"Who's" VS "Whose"

➽ "Who's" is a contraction of "Who Is" or "Who Has."

Examples:

  • "Who's coming to the party tonight?"
  • "Timmy, who's 6 feet tall, plays on the high school basketball team."
  • "Who's got the sunscreen?"

➽ "Whose" indicates possession. It's pretty common to think that adding 's to the end of a word is how you make it possessive, but "whose" is a possessive pronoun. Think of words like his, hers, theirs, its. Those are possessive pronouns, and none of them use an apostrophe.

Examples:

  • "Whose bag is this?"
  • "Whose clues? Blue's clues!"

"Less" VS "Fewer"

➽ "Less" is often used when referring to quantity or amount of a thing, or when a number is measured rather than counted. There are a few exceptions to this rule.

Examples:

  • "I have less time these days than I used to."
  • "Due to his experience and training, it took less effort for him to complete the task."
  • "She had less trouble assembling the furniture after watching the tutorial video."

Examples with the Exceptions:

  • "The textbox allowed 32 characters or less."
  • "In less than three miles, turn right."
  • "After taking out the trash, she had one less worry for the day."

➽ "Fewer" is often used when a number is counted rather than measured

Examples:

  • "He had fewer fries than I did because he ordered a smaller size."
  • "I want fewer options so I can quickly make my decision."
  • "There were fewer people signed up for the math club than there were for the cooking club."

"Would Of," "Should Of," and "Could Of"

➽ The words you're looking for are "would've," "should've" and "could've" which are contractions of "would have," "should have," and "could have" respectively.

Examples:

  • "I would've stopped by if I knew you were working that day!"
  • "You should've known better."
  • "The baby could've choked if their grapes weren't cut into smaller pieces."

[Blog will be updated if more items come to mind]


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