By Valerie Erde

I feel really inspired by international students and English language learners (ELLs) who often have to work extra hard to conquer the verbal sections of the ACT or SAT.  As a tutor, I’ve helped students from all over the world prepare for the ACT and SAT grammar and reading sections; I’ve also worked with American students whose parents are non-native English speakers.  And as a lifelong language learner myself, I know that based on the native language we speak, there are common errors we tend to make in the target language (English in this case).

In addition to helping students build a solid foundation in English, I also coach students to recognize and fix the errors they’re most likely to make based on their native language. Below I’ve outlined some of the most common issues that crop up as students code-switch between English and other languages. This is not meant to be an exhaustive survey of all languages, nor all common mistakes, but rather some examples of why and how the ACT and SAT grammar sections may pose some language-specific challenges for international and ELL students.  For starters…..

English Doesn’t Always Follow Clear Rules

There are certain quirks to English that make it tricky when it isn’t your first language. For starters, English has more words than any other modern language, so there’s a lot of vocabulary to learn. It also doesn’t follow its own rules much of the time, and when you learned the rules also affects your ability to spot errors. For example, if a student learns to speak English before learning to read, she/he will have less trouble with verb tenses than the other way around. On the other hand, people are more casual in conversation with plurals and prepositions, so people who learn to read English before speaking it have an advantage in this area.

And if you’ve lived in a household where a different language is spoken, you might make specific, predictable mistakes on the grammar portions of these tests, even if you have spent your whole life in an English-speaking country or school.

That means Spanish speakers may have different tutoring needs than students who speak Chinese as their first language. The same applies to French speakers or even American-born students who primarily speak Japanese at home.

Different Languages Pose Unique Challenges

Asian Languages

In addition to learning a whole new alphabet for English, students from Asian countries also face several challenges when it comes to grammar and syntax. Asian languages share similarities, so the common errors I’ve listed here may resonate with Japanese, Korean, and Chinese speakers. 

• Chinese: Verb Tenses and Subject-Verb Agreement

Two of the biggest challenges with English grammar for native Chinese speakers involve verbs: subject/verb agreement and verb tense (also called verb conjugation). English uses a wide variety of verb tenses, most of which people cannot name but use regularly: past, present progressive, conditional, etc. Each tense can only be used correctly in specific situations.

For example, consider the infinitive verb “to go” in English and how it changes based on its tense:

Past: I went to the store.

Present: I go to the store.

Present Progressive: I am going to the store.

Future: I will go to the store.

And that’s only a few of the tenses we use! In Chinese, however, the verb forms do not change. Instead, meaning comes through context or word order. A Chinese student may want to say something like “Yesterday I go to the store” or “Next month I go to the store” to reflect a more direct translation. Because Chinese verb forms are never altered, it’s easy for native Chinese speakers to make subject-verb agreement errors. In English, we change verb endings to match the subject:

First person: I go to the store.

Third person: He goes to the store.   

These verb ending changes are challenging for Korean and Japanese speakers as well, since none of these languages changes the third-person verb ending the way we do in English. Because verb usage is one of the most commonly tested grammatical concepts on both the ACT and SAT, mastering this will help you raise your verbal section score. 

• Japanese: Articles

In the grammatical sense, articles are tiny words we take for granted: a, an, and the. These point to the noun being discussed and help English speakers differentiate between specific nouns and more generalized concepts. For example, “a dog” refers to dogs in general, or any dog nearby, while the dog references a specific animal. 

Articles just don’t exist in Japanese, so it’s very easy for students to mix up when to use indefinite articles (a or an) and when to use definite articles (the) to convey shades of meaning. It’s also very easy to omit them entirely, which leads to sentences that are incorrect.

• Korean: Word Order and Syntax

English word order is generally subject-verb-object (SVO): for example: The boy hit the ball.

In this sentence, the subject (the boy) comes first, followed by his action (the verb hit). Finally, there’s an object, or the thing that receives the action (i.e. the ball is the thing being hit). In Korean, however, the standard word order is SOV, or subject-object-verb. This means that Korean speakers have to work hard to flip the order of their thoughts around to create English sentences. The position of relative clauses: In contrast to English, relative clauses in Korean come prior to the nouns they modify. Koreans say, "I really want to meet whom the artist" instead of "Picasso is the  artist whom I really want to meet." This word order difference also leads Korean speakers to prefer writing two simple sentences instead of one long one, because knowing where to add the extra information gets confusing.

Romance/Latinate Languages

• Verb Usage: Confusion With To Be and To Have

The two omnipresent verbs of English are to be and to have. Their meanings are similar and hard to explain, as they don’t show action so much as a state of being. In French and other Romance languages (languages that come from Latin), some of the usages of these verbs are different. For example:

French: J’ai 18 ans. Spanish: Tengo 18 años.  (both translate as “I have 18 years.)

English: I am 18 years old. We use the verb “to be” in this situation.

Both verbs can seem correct, especially when used in more complex tenses and idiomatic expressions, which can lead to problems. The nuances of auxiliary verbs (to be or to have) are difficult. Long after a student is successful at understanding content and producing work, correctly using verbs can be a stumbling block.

• False Cognates 

  There is one problem common to all speakers of Latin-based languages, whether that be Italian, Spanish, French, or Romanian. This is called false cognates or, more poetically, false friends. These are words that sound similar, but mean different things. Here’s a French language example. False cognates can give students a false sense of security and lead to confusion in reading comprehension as well in writing, so it’s worth spending the time to master these specifics. 

• Noun-Adjective Order

A key difference between Spanish and English that I notice immediately in student writing has to do with word order. In English, an adjective typically comes before the noun it modifies, but the opposite is true in Spanish. For example:

Spanish: Alma tiene un gato blanco. (This translates as “Alma has a cat white.” )

English: Alma has a white cat. 

Getting the word order right is crucial on for modification questions on the ACT English or SAT Writing sections.

Universal English Grammar Challenges

Prepositions 

No matter what your language of origin, the correct use of directional prepositions (e.g., in, at, on, to, into) is often difficult for non-native English speakers to master. For example:

She got a job in California.

She got a job at Google.

She got a job on television.

These sentences are very similar, but in English we use different prepositions for different purposes. This part of speech is especially problematic for Chinese speakers because there isn't such a strong distinction between different prepositions in the Chinese language.

And whereas, in English, we say “to be interested in something or someone.  In French, for example, they use the preposition “à”  which translates as “to” or “at.” Here’s an example:

Ce professeur de la musique m’a intéressé à la piano translates literally as 

That music teacher got me interested to the piano  

Long Sentences With Multiple Clauses

For English language learners from any background, long sentences are a killer. The more clauses that get strung together, the easier it is to get lost along the way. Agreement between number of the subject (singular or plural) and the verb, or agreement between different verbs in a sentence is assessed multiple times throughout the SAT Writing and ACT English sections. Learning to break down complex sentences will be a crucial skill for you to develop in order to succeed on these tests.

Improve Your Grammar for ACT/SAT & College Success

Understanding common missteps can help make every student more successful on the ACT English or SAT Writing sections. But learning grammar isn’t just about mastering a college entrance test: remember, once a student gets into college, there will be a world of reading and writing still to do. Erica Meltzer’s How to Write for Class: A Student’s Guide to Grammar, Punctuation, and Style is a powerful resource to provide a strong basis for all students. As a former tutor herself, she knows how to explain complex concepts in a way that’s easy to follow and to apply. 

Are you an international student?  You may have extra challenges on the ACT and SAT grammar sections. That’s why tutors who have studied other languages and who are aware of the specific pitfalls of certain language types make the best English tutors. Be certain to ask any potential tutor about their experience in this area to ensure you get the expert help you need.

Additional Note For U.S.-based English Language Learners

Both the College Board and the ACT Corp. offer a range of accommodations and support for students who are enrolled in their school’s ESL programs such as directions translated into various languages, foreign-language glossaries, and extended time.  Check the College Board and ACT ESL Learners’ website pages as for specifics and to see if you qualify.

*TESOL = Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages