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SAT Prep

SAT Prep

5 Commonly Mistaken "A" words

Photo 2668Mistaken grammar and spelling is alright and even accepted in some contexts like instant messenger or notes to friends, but don't let it seep into your vocabulary for academic related instances.

The writing portion of the SATs includes a 25 minute essay in which you critically respond to a text or passage. In order to come off as a clever and intellectual individual, one must first be aware of the commonly mistaken grammatical errors. By being aware of these common mistakes, you can be sure to use the right (not write) tenses, spellings and punctuations in your essay. 

Interestingly, we use many of these words on a regular basis and may not even realize we are spelling them incorrectly. Be aware especially to the context in which you are using the word in order to come to a conclusion into how it should properly be used.

The following five examples gives you an introductory look on commonly misspelled and sometimes misinterpreted words and their usages from the "As". Hopefully, with the information provided, you will be able to learn a thing or too and incorporate these new skills into your vocab. If you already have these tricky words figured out, great!



1. A lot

    A lot >> correct (meaning a large portion of something)

    Alot > Incorrect
    Allot  > Used as a verb to assign, give or provide possession to something or someone

* Key to Remembering: When referring to much of something using "a lot", think of the "a" in being important to describing the large amount. Therefore, it would not be connected to the next word. If you're a kinesetic learner, you can think of taking a deep breath before heaving the large amount. Making it "A *breath* lot.

2.  A Versus An

    A very simple concept, however it is easily confused and mistakenly used. A or an refer to something, depending on the first letter of the word following it.

    A >> Used when following a word starting with a consonant (B,C,D,F,G....etc)
    An >> Used when following a word starting with a vowel (A,E,I,O,U and sometimes Y)

3. Accept Versus Except

Accept >> Meaning to receive
Except >> Meaning to leave out, similar to "but"

Examples: I accept your apology.
                I want everything on my pizza except pepperoni.

                You should have excepted your offer >> could mean you should NOT have taken the offer
                                                               
whereas

You should have accepted your offer >> would mean you should have taken the offer.

Therefore it is important to make sure that the usage of each word is correct in order to make sure you're getting the correct message out.


4. Affect Versus Effect

Affect >> Having an influence on (a-FECT)

Effect >> As a noun, meaning to create (Trying to effect change by conserving energy).
              Showing a result (When I turned off the lights, I effected my energy consumption).
              Other expressions of this include being effective, personal effects

This is a bit confusing yes, but if you think of the word "effect" as a resulting word, you can put it into context easier.

These words are commonly confused, and the rules given to tell them apart are often wrong. Affect means "to influence" or "to produce an effect in." Effect means "consequence" or "that which is produced by an agent or cause."

Many try to differentiate between the two by saying that affect is a verb, while effect is a noun. Unfortunately, it's not so simple. The word affect can also serve as a noun, meaning "observed or expressed emotional response," and the word effect can also serve as a verb, meaning "to become operative" or "to carry out," as in, "to effect changes."


5. Accommodate

Remember the double "c" and the double "m" and you'll be on your way to great spelling and grammar!
Andrew Brown
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Andrew Brown said:

Can you also you use a-lot with a hyphen like I just did?

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
acrosstheuniverse
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acrosstheuniverse said in response to:
Andrew Brown
Andrew Brown’s post:
Citation Body

Can you also you use a-lot with a hyphen like I just did?

Hi Andrew,

I looked into it and I’m thinking that the proper usage would be without the hyphen. However it is often used in combination with other words. For example build-a-lot or mix-a-lot. For formal writing, the hyphen can remind one that there is a space in between as well. Hope this helps!

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
geof
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geof said:

“You should have excepted your offer.” I had to go to my Oxford dictionary for this one. I have never seen nor used “except” as a verb, but you can.

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
acrosstheuniverse
  • Authority 610
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acrosstheuniverse said:

Yes, it is very uncommon. The word almost functions like “exempt” in that sentence. We have other ways of saying it, such as “you should have rejected your offer” which makes it easier to understand and distinguish.

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
derekeb
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derekeb said:

thanks for the refresher course. always good to review these rules from time to time.

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
RobotGrrl
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RobotGrrl said:

Another idea when trying to use ‘a lot’ is to simply use a synonym. Chances are, you’ll get that one right and it will sound more profound! _ I use this technique in abundance. (<—synonym for a lot, hehe)

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  • Posted 3 months ago.
egocentrique
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egocentrique said:

Im hot, didn’t you know? HOT HOT HOT

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  • Posted 2 months ago.
arjun7391
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arjun7391 said:

YA THESE R COMMON ERRORS…. do keep on chnging words>>>

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  • Posted 2 months ago.
Angel_
  • Authority 76
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Angel_ said:

I usually do mess up with these words! But your thing really helped…

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  • Posted about 1 month ago.
manu_urfriend2000
  • Authority 16
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manu_urfriend2000 said in response to:
Andrew Brown
Andrew Brown’s post:
Citation Body

Can you also you use a-lot with a hyphen like I just did?

no dude you cant hypen is only ued with words which have a combined meaning usually

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  • Posted 27 days ago.
acrosstheuniverse
  • Authority 610
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acrosstheuniverse said in response to:
arjun7391
arjun7391’s post:
Citation Body

YA THESE R COMMON ERRORS…. do keep on chnging words>>>

Hey Arjun,

Check out our new lesson on Mistaken B Words for a list of 5 more words that commonly show some errors.

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  • Posted 23 days ago.
satrohit
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satrohit said:

are their any more topics to be noted on ‘A’?

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  • Posted 18 days ago.
acrosstheuniverse
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acrosstheuniverse said in response to:
satrohit
satrohit’s post:
Citation Body

are their any more topics to be noted on ‘A’?

If I’m correct in guessing what you mean by topics, then you mean other problems that people may have with other associated “A” letters. There are many tricky words in the dictionary to look over, and to cover them all would be crazy! But these five I have picked because they seem to be the most often confused.

More topics or common problems that I can think of off the top of my head would be:

  • all ready vs. already

All ready means everything is complete and ready to go, whereas already is used as an adjective such as “the box is already there” where as all ready would be used as a verb connection like “the box was all ready”.

  • associate, allocation, alleviate, alienate, alliteration, apposition

All of these words have some confusion in spelling and usage.

Hope these little tips help!

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  • Posted 16 days ago.
poojakarki
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poojakarki said in response to:
Andrew Brown
Andrew Brown’s post:
Citation Body

Can you also you use a-lot with a hyphen like I just did?

Really good Points

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  • Posted 3 days ago.
sumit270
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sumit270 said in response to:
poojakarki
poojakarki’s post:
Citation Body

Really good Points

I agree

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  • Posted 2 days ago.
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