Making mistakes in English is not new and if you want to avoid these mistakes, the following easy rules will allow you to do just that.

• Every sentence’s first letter is capital and there is a full stop or a period at its end. If the sentence is a question then it will end with a question mark and with an exclamation mark depending on the nature of the sentence. 

• My name is James.
• How are you feeling today?
• That was an awesome hit!

• Every basic positive sentence will have this order.

Subject-Verb-Objective

(A negative sentence or a question sentence can have a different order.)

• James drives a car.
• They were watching a movie in the theater.

• Every sentence has a verb and a subject. The object in a sentence is optional. It is important to understand that a sentence that is imperative can only have a verb, however, the subject (the meaning of the sentence) is understood.

• James teaches.
• James teaches English.
• Listen! (i.e You listen!)

• A singular subject will need to have a singular verb and plural subjects will need to have a plural verb. 

• James teaches in Dublin.
• The sun rises once a day.
• James and Wilma live in Manchester.
• Most people drink 4 glasses of water a day.

•  Use a singular verb whenever two singular objects get connected by or, nor, either, and neither.

• James or Wilma is singing tonight.
• Either tea or coffee is fine.
• Neither James nor Wilma was late.

• If a verb is not separating the adjective from a noun, then adjectives will usually come before the noun in a sentence.

• I have a small cat.
• He killed a beautiful dog.
• His wife is dead.

• If more than one adjective are used together in a sentence then follow this order.

Opinion-Adjective + (Fact-Adjective) + Noun

• I saw a scary Italian movie.
• That was a lovely French cuisine.

• Collective Nouns can be treated as singular or plural, based on the type of English you are using.

British English treats collective nouns as plural with a plural pronoun and verb.

American English treats collective nouns as singular with a singular pronoun and verb.

(Board of directors, company, committee. These are examples of collective nouns)

    British English

• The committee are planning a visit today. Then they might leave for London.
• The BMW have decided to stay with their logo.

    American English

• My family is going for a picnic.
• GM motors is going to compete with Tesla.

• The word “Its” has a different meaning than “It’s”

• The silly cat broke its foot.
• He believes it’s raining outside.

• The word “Your” has a different meaning than “You’re”.

• I like your car. (something belonging to you)
• You’re looking very handsome in that coat. (It means “You are”)

• There is a different meaning for “There”, “They’re”, and “Their”.

• There is a lot of noise in the room. (mentioning a place)
• He is in their new office. (something belonging to them)
• I think they’re not returning today. (It means “they are”)

• “She’s” is a contraction that can mean “she is” and it can also mean “she has”. This rule applies to “He’s”, “it’s” and “James’s” as well.

• He is finished.

  She’s finished.

  James has finished.

• “He’d” is a contraction that can mean “he had” and it can also mean “he would”. This rule applies to “They’d” as well.

• He had done his job.

  She’d done his job.

  They would do their job.

• Every proper noun starts with a capital letter. It can be the name of anything, for example, James, France, Austin Martin, etc.

• Can you find India on the map?
• Sometimes I like to speak French.
• I wonder where James went.

• Every proper adjective will also start with a capital letter every time. Proper adjectives are can be made out of proper nouns. For example, from the proper noun of China, you get Chinese. 

• Are the Pakistani players in the field?
• I like to travel on French trains.
• Germans are famous for their technology.

• Indefinite articles (“a” and “an”) are used for nouns that can be counted in general. Uncountable nouns and specific countable nouns get the definite article of “The”.

• I saw the American flag. A bird was sitting on its pole. 
• All the water entered my room last night.
• Is there a Chinese restaurant nearby?

• Words starting with a vowel sound use the article of “an” and other words that start with a consonant sound use the article of “a”.

• A dog, a game of football, a big achievement, a Frenchman.
• An element, an orange, an unexpected guest, an ant, an inkpot.

• Uncountable nouns use “little, a lot, or much”. Using “Many or few” for countable nouns is appropriate.

• How many dollars does it cost?
• You are asking too much money for this car.
• There were only a few people boys left in the hall.
• There was a little traffic near my office.

• To express the possession of a singular subject, make use of an apostrophe before “s”.

To express the possession of a plural subject, make use of an apostrophe after “s”.

• The girl’s bag was pink. (single girl)
• The dogs’ tails were brown. (more than one dog)

• Prefer using the active voice in general (Dogs drink water) over the use of passive voice in general (Water is drunk by dogs).

• We eat apples at lunch.

   Apples
  are eaten by us at lunch. 

• He drives a car.

   a car
  is driven by him.