Have you ever said or thought that? Or how about "Spanish is so confusing! That sentence doesn't make sense to me". I have heard statements such as these made by students over the years. One response I have for this is "If you think Spanish is hard and confusing, you should try learning English as a second language!" We are blessed to have English as our native language. Learning to read, write, and speak English as a second language is harder than you think! Let's take a look at a few example of just how confusing English can be. As you read, imagine being a native speaker of another language and trying to learn some of these concepts for the first time.
Learning Vocabulary and Phrases
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren’t invented in England or French fries in France. Quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig. If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn’t the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and wise guy are opposites? Why do we say that your house can burn up as it burns down or that you fill in a form by filling it out? In the English language, why does an alarm clock goes off by coming on? Why is it said that people recite lines at a play and play at a recital? Why do we ship by truck and send cargo by ship, have noses that run and feet that smell, and park on driveways and drive on parkways?
Analyzing Sentences
1 ) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2 ) The farm was used to produce produce.
3 ) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4 ) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5 ) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
6 ) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
7 ) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
8.) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
