Shadowing Practice: Solve this 1 mistake → Solve 34% of English Errors - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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There is only one mistake in this entire text.
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Can you spot it?
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Maybe you can't see any mistakes, or maybe you can see multiple mistakes.
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Advanced English learners will know that there is one big mistake.
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Let me read it to you.
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As I read, listen and read along with me.
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Try to correct the mistake if you know what it is.
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Some of the world's most beloved foods exist thanks to happy accidents.
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In the 1890s, the Kellogg brothers left wheat dough out overnight at their sanatorium.
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Not wanting to waste it, they rolled the stale dough into thin sheets and created cornflakes.
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Worcestershire sauce was born from a failed experiment when two chemists tried to recreate an Indian sauce.
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At first, it smelled foul,
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fishy, sharp, and acrid, but left in a barrel for about 1,5 years, it became delicious.
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It's even used to flavour Bloody Marys.
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Did you spot what the one big mistake is?
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It's incorrect punctuation.
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There are several punctuation mistakes in this text and a couple
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that could be considered quite major they could limit understanding are
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you curious we're going to go through the mistakes in this video but
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if you really want to remember everything you learn i've also
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created a free pdf to go with today's lesson you'll see
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the full text plus explanations of all the punctuation marks
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and of course some activities to really test your understanding
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if you'd like to download that just click on the link in the description box or scan that QR code there.
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You join my mailing list and I'll send the PDF to your email.
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Okay, let's go through the text together sentence by sentence.
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Are there any mistakes here?
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Some of the world's most beloved foods exist thanks to happy accidents.
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Nope, that sentence is fine.
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We have an apostrophe in worlds, world apostrophe s, to show possession.
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A longer form could be the most beloved foods of the people in the world.
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Worlds is much faster to say.
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Next line, in the 1890s,
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with an apostrophe S, the Kellogg brothers left wheat dough out overnight at their sanatorium,
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not wanting to waste comma, they rolled the stale dough into thin sheets and created cornflakes, exclamation mark.
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Okay, there are two mistakes in that part, though the first is a little bit controversial.
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In modern English, most people say that there shouldn't be an apostrophe in 1890s.
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It's a plural s, not a possessive, so we don't use an apostrophe.
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To shorten the decades, like the 90s,
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we use an apostrophe before 90 to indicate that some numbers are missing, but not before the S.
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In the not-too-distant past, it was common to use an apostrophe,
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so people would write 1930s with an apostrophe S, for example.
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For now, especially in exams and formal writing, I recommend not using an apostrophe.
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The second mistake is with the comma between sanatorium and not.
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Those are two independent clauses and we can't join them with a comma.
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We call this mistake a comma splice.
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Commas just aren't strong enough to join two independent clauses so we need something with more muscle.
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Any ideas?
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Well options include a full stop or a semicolon.
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Both can separate independent clauses.
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We could also replace the comma with a conjunction and or but both work in our sentence.
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So comma splices are a no-no in standard English but you'll them used in informal English, in novels, poems and so on.
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Again, I don't recommend joining independent clauses with a comma for now unless you're an author
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or you reach a very high level of English.
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Okay, ready for our next sentence?
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Are there any mistakes?
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Worcestershire sauce was born from a failed experiment when two chemists tried to recreate an Indian sauce.
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No mistakes, this sentence is fine.
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We capitalise Indian as it's an adjective meaning connected with India, the country, just like we capitalise English or Australian.
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We also capitalise Worcestershire because it's the name of a place in England.
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Here it happens to be at the start of a sentence
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and it looks very difficult to pronounce but it's actually quite simple.
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It's usually pronounced with just three syllables.
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Worcestershire, Worcestershire, Worcestershire stresses on the first syllable.
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Okay, next sentence.
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Can you spot the mistakes here?
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There's more than one.
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At first, comma, it smelt foul.
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Square bracket, fishy, comma, sharp, comma, and acrid, close square bracket, comma.
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But left in a barrel for about one, comma, five years, comma, it became delicious.
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Okay, that really doesn't sound very nice, does it?
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And punctuation wise, there is a lot going on.
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First, we have square brackets used in a way that's not standard, though some people might find it acceptable.
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According to most style guides, we should use round brackets to enclose extra information in a sentence or passage.
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Round brackets are often called parentheses in North American English.
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They're just brackets to me here in the UK.
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In speech, we tend to pause slightly before and after reading information in brackets.
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Remove fishy, sharp, and acrid, and the sentence still makes sense grammatically.
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Square brackets are most commonly used in quotations when we add or change a word.
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Let's take our sentence to demonstrate.
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This is the original.
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At first, it smelt foul.
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So what if we think it is unclear and our readers won't know what it is?
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Well, we can use square brackets.
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At first, comma, open square bracket, the source, close square bracket, smelt foul.
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Using the source instead of it would make the reference clear to the readers.
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The square brackets show the reader that the original words have been changed.
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Okay, there's something else inside those brackets.
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fishy, sharp, and acrid.
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Yum.
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In British English, we don't tend to use a comma before and in a list of three or more things.
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It's called the Oxford comma.
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It's used more frequently in North American English, but this isn't a rule, and you will see Brits using it, and you will notice some North American texts do not.
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In general, you can do whatever you feel natural.
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but there was actually a court case in the US that hinged on a missing Oxford comma.
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It cost a company millions of dollars who said the punctuation wasn't important.
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What I think is important for you is that you choose whether to use it or not.
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You choose a style and you're consistent with it.
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We're not finished with that sentence yet.
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There is another mistake.
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left in a barrel for about one comma five years.
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We don't use a comma to show decimals in English.
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Do you know what we use instead?
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A decimal point, which looks exactly the same as a full stop.
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And don't quote me on the 1.5 year timeline, by the way.
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I saw that they left it for anywhere from a few months to two years.
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Anyway, back to the decimal point.
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When talking about halves and quarters, we tend to say one and a half or seven and a quarter and so on.
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But you can say 1.5.
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And when we have a number like this one here, that would usually be 3.14.
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Lovely number.
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We do use commas in numbers, sometimes in English.
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We tend to place a comma before every three digits.
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So 100,000 would have a comma in the middle.
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It makes big numbers easier to read.
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Now, I know that a lot of countries do it the other way around, using a point to separate hundreds and a comma for decimals.
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If you're asked to pay 5,321 in the UK,
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that's £5,000, not £5 and some confusing pennies.
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Okay, in our last sentence, we have another mistake.
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Can you see it?
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It's even used to flavour Bloody Mary's.
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We need an apostrophe in its, I-T apostrophe S, to indicate a missing letter.
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It is becomes it apostrophe S, its.
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So many people make mistakes with this, including native speakers.
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And you can understand why.
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Look here.
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Worcestershire sauce gets its umami flavour from the fermentation process.
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there, its, I-T-S, is a possessive adjective like his, and we don't use an apostrophe.
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It's, it is, very confusing.
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And on that note, I think we're ready to end the video.
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Don't forget to download the PDF that goes with this lesson.
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The link is in the description box, or you can scan that QR code there.
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You have a little bit of homework.
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I would love for you to write in the comments about similar food stories or just accidental inventions in general.
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Try to use some of the punctuation we've covered today.
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I will see you in the next video.
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Bye.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 137 sentences and 1456 words to shadow. The speech runs for 10:38. The speaker talks at a steady 137 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 78% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 less common words from the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
- bracket /ˈbɹækɪt/ (noun) — A fixture attached to a wall to hold up a shelf.
- sharp /ʃɑɹp/ (adjective) — Terminating in a point or edge, especially one that can cut or pierce easily; not dull, obtuse, or rounded.
- foul /faʊl/ (adjective) — Covered with, or containing unclean matter; dirty.
- clause /klɔːz/ (noun) — A group of words that contains a subject and a verb; it may be part of a sentence or may constitute the whole sentence, depending on the syntax in each…
- dough /doʊ/ (noun) — A thick, malleable substance made by mixing flour with other ingredients such as water, eggs, or butter, that is made into a particular form and then baked.
- reader /ˈɹi.dɚ/ (noun) — A person who reads.
- barrel /ˈbæɹəl/ (noun) — A round (cylindrical) vessel, such as a cask, of greater length than breadth, and bulging in the middle, made of staves bound with hoops, and having flat ends…
- beloved /bɪˈlʌvd/ (adjective) — Much loved, dearly loved.
- flavour (noun) — British standard spelling of flavor.
- lesson /ˈlɛs.ən/ (noun) — A section of learning or teaching into which a wider learning content is divided.
- thin /ˈθɪn/ (adjective) — Having little thickness or extent from one surface to its opposite.
- sheet /ʃit/ (noun) — A thin bed cloth used as a covering for a mattress or as a layer over the sleeper.
- experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/ (noun) — A test under controlled conditions made to either demonstrate a known truth, examine the validity of a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of…
- indicate /ˈɪndɪˌkeɪt/ (verb) — To point out; to discover; to direct to a knowledge of; to show; to make known.
- delicious /dɪˈlɪ.ʃəs/ (adjective) — Pleasing to the sense of taste; tasty.
Phrasal verbs you will hear
- go through (verb) — To travel from one end of something to the other.
- go with (verb) — To choose or accept (a suggestion).
- finish with (verb) — To put aside, break all relations with, or reject finally.
- go on /ˈɡoʊˌɒn/ (verb) — To continue in extent.
- line in (verb) — To finish a sketch or outline by using a permanent marker, pencil, etc. to trace over lines made with a softer implement.
- talk about (verb) — Used to draw attention to the speaker's characterization of someone or something.
- work in (verb) — To find time or space for, amid other things.
- write in (verb) — To write a letter to, e.g. a publication.
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 28 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, we're, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: thin /ˈθɪn/, parenthesis /pəˈɹɛn.θə.sɪs/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: sharp /ʃɑɹp/, sheet /ʃit/, delicious /dɪˈlɪ.ʃəs/, explanation /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/, possession /pəˈzɛʃn̩/
- Long words — get the stress right: experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, explanation /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/, acceptable /əkˈsɛp.tə.bəl/, controversial /ˌkɑn.tɹəˈvɝ.ʃəl/, apostrophe /əˈpɑs.tɹə.fi/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like bracket, sharp, foul.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | was born · could be considered · are often called |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have been changed · we've covered |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.