Language Lunch: Common Mistakes & False Friends

The Language Lunch series is a fun and time-saving opportunity to improve your English-language competence over a light buffet lunch which will be provided free of charge. In the winter semester, the series continues with three workshops: (1) Common Mistakes & False Friends, (2) Talking About Planning and Projects, and (3) How to Make Your English Writing Sound Less German. You are welcome to book one, two or all three workshops, but in any case please make sure that you register separately for each Language Lunch.

Content

I am at WU since two years …. I’ll shortly explain why … let’s now look on the actual figures … it’s unsure whether this will work …

Do these sound familiar? All are examples of so-called ‘false friends’ or other errors typically made by speakers whose native language is German. Yet such errors can be avoided if one knows why they occur, and how they can be put right.

Avoiding avoidable mistakes: That’s essentially what this brief workshop is about. Of course, not all such errors lead directly to misunderstandings. But many do. And, just as importantly, repeated errors can give the impression of a more general lack of competence, and thus undermine the message a speaker wishes to convey.

Workshop Method

On the basis of authentic examples (i.e., errors that other learners have made in the past) we’ll discuss mistakes with the help of the FACE approach: FIND – ANALYSE – CORRECT – EXPLAIN.

• Avoiding avoidable mistakes
• Discussing common mistakes with the help of the FACE approach: FIND – ANALYSE – CORRECT – EXPLAIN