Confusing English Grammar: “MOST”, “MOST OF”, or “ALMOST”?

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My name is Emma, and today we will talk about "most" and "almost".

Many learners make mistakes with these words, so

first of all, I want to show you some mistakes,

and I want you to ask yourself, are you making these mistakes?

Then, I will teach you how to use "most", "most of", "almost", "all", and "almost"

how to use these words correctly.

So let's get started by looking at some common mistakes I see.

Most of people like movies.

Is this sentence correct?

So you have "most", "most of", "most of people".

This is not correct.

You might be surprised.

Why is this not correct?

If you have "most of", you either need to say "the" or, even better for this example,

"most people", just say "most people", and I'll explain the difference between "most

of the people" and "most people" in a moment.

But yeah, "most people like movies."

Okay, what about the next sentence?

Do you make a mistake like this?

Almost friends live here.

Almost friends live here.

So this is a mistake.

We need more here.

We could say "almost all of my friends live here", so that's one possibility.

There's different possibilities on how to fix

this, but yeah, if you said "almost friends

live here", that would be a mistake.

It's not grammatically correct.

And again, we'll talk about "almost all" in a moment.

What about this one?

Most cat don't like dogs.

I think that's true, but from a grammar perspective, there's a mistake.

What's the mistake?

So "most", if you're dealing with countable

nouns like "cats", you need it to be plural.

So I'll talk a little bit about countable and

uncountable nouns with "most" in a moment.

So the most important thing for you to know

right now is that it's easy to make mistakes

with "most" and "almost", so be careful.

So let's start with "most".

What does "most" mean?

Well, "most" is when you're talking about the largest part of something.

It's the majority of something.

We can even say it's like 50% to 99% of something.

So it's not 100%, but it's the majority.

So let's look at an example.

Most cats like to sleep.

So, I want to first point out that most cats like to sleep.

What does this mean?

Well, it means that the majority of cats like to sleep.

There's probably one or two cats who don't.

I don't know, I'm not a cat expert, but the majority of cats like to sleep.

We could even say maybe 50% to 99% of cats like to sleep.

So, we use "most" with nouns.

So, not with verbs, we use "most" with nouns,

and those nouns can be countable nouns or

uncountable nouns.

It's okay if you don't know the difference between countable or uncountable.

I'll explain the difference between the two.

Here's a sentence with a countable noun.

When we have a countable noun, we often have

to do something to make it into the plural

So, I have one book, two books, three books, four books.

So, in this case, we add an "s" to the word

"book", and we can, you know, we call it countable

when we need to add an "s" or make something plural when we're using it.

So, some nouns are called countable nouns.

So, most books are available online.

This means the majority of books, so between

50% to 99% of all books, are available online.

We can also use "most" with uncountable nouns.

So, for example, "music" is an uncountable noun.

We don't add an "s" to it.

I don't say one music, two music, three music, four music.

I just say "music".

So, we consider it an uncountable noun, and so

I can say most music is available on Spotify.

What does this mean?

It means the majority of music, or 50% to 99% of music is available on Spotify.

So, if you're using a countable noun, you need to turn the noun into the plural form

with "most", so in this case, "books".

If you're using an uncountable noun, like "love", you don't need to add an "s".

You can say "most love is hard to find", maybe, or something like that.

Okay, so another thing I just wanted to point

out here is that we don't use "of" in this

Notice there's no "of" here.

I'm not saying "most of cats", "most of books", "most of music".

We're talking generally, and I...

You'll see what I mean by this in a moment, but we just have "most" and the noun.

There's nothing between those two things.

Most noun, most noun, most noun.

So, now let's talk about "almost all", because

"most" and "almost all" are very similar.

I've even kept almost everything the same here to show you how similar they are.

The difference between "most" and "almost all"

is when we use "almost all", we're talking

about, like, the majority, but, like, 90% plus.

So, remember I said "most" was, like, 50% to 99.9%?

"Almost all" is when you're really focusing on close to 100%.

So, when we say "almost all", we're emphasizing that it's just about 100%.

It's nearly 100%.

But the grammar's the same.

So, for example, before I said "most cats like to sleep", I can also say "almost all

cats like to sleep".

In this case, I'm just really stressing it's, like, almost 100%.

Here we have another sentence.

"Almost all books are available online",

and then I used it with the second sentence.

"Almost all music is available on Spotify."

So, "almost all" is followed by a noun, just

like "most", and the noun can be countable

or uncountable.

So, "most" and "almost all" are very similar.

So, how is "most of the" something different than "most"?

Well, first of all, we never say "most of".

We always have either an article "the" or we

can have a possessive pronoun, like "your",

"my", "his", "her", "their", "are", so there

always needs to be something between "of" and

the noun, which I'll show you in a moment.

But remember, it's "most of the" or "most of my", "most of her", "most of their", so

it's not just "most of".

So, "most of the" means the largest part or the majority of something, like 50-99%.

So it has almost the same meaning as "most",

but with one important difference, and that's

we are talking about a specific group.

"Most" is used for general; "most of the" is used for specific.

So, let me show you some examples so you can understand this.

"Most presidents are men."

So I'm talking generally.

I'm talking if you think about the world in general, most presidents are men.

But now, imagine I want to be specific.

What presidents?

Well, the presidents in the USA.

"In the USA" makes it specific.

Which presidents?

Oh, the presidents in the USA.

Most of the presidents in the USA have been Republican.

So most presidents are men, talking generally in the world.

Most of the presidents in the USA have been Republican.

General, specific.

And, again, notice when we are being specific,

we add "of" and either "the" or we can add

"my", "his", "her", but we need to add something after "of".

Let's look at another example.

"Most friends will talk every year."

So this is a general statement.

Who are these friends?

Friends in general.

Your friends, his friends, her friends, all friends.

So we're talking generally.

Friends in the world.

Most friends will talk every year.

Now, if I want to make this specific, I could say most of my friends.

Now it's a specific group.

It's not general, it's specific.

Most of my friends live in other countries.

So that's a specific sentence.

And again, you will notice we have "of", but "of" needs something right after it.

Again, it could be "the", "my", "your", "his", "her".

There needs to be something here.

I should also mention that there are some

expressions in English which will follow most

An example is "most of the time".

Most of the time, we use it this way, so you won't see "most time".

It's an expression you can memorize.

Most of the time.

Most of the time, I spend watching dramas and romances.

Most of the time, I feel cold.

That's why I have a nice, warm sweater on today.

Even though I'm Canadian, I don't like the cold, which that's our secret.

So now, let's look at some other examples of

this so you really understand the difference

between "most" and "most of the".

We have "Most Canadians like winter."

This is not 100%.

I don't like winter, so...

And I'm Canadian, but most Canadians like winter.

We're talking very generally.

We're not talking about a specific group of

Canadians; we're talking about Canadians generally,

so we can use "most".

Now, compare this to the next sentence.

"Most of the people in my class are nice."

So in this case, I'm talking about the people

in my class, so it's a very specific group,

so I can use "most of the people", and again,

it's important you have "of", but after "of",

you need something.

It can either be "the", "my", "your", "his",

"her", or some sort of possessive pronoun

like that, but you need something there.

It can't just be "most of people".

All right, well, let's look at the next example.

"Most of movies I watch are dramas."

Is this sentence correct?

I hope you said no, it's not correct, because you could...

Oh, actually, sorry, you could say "of", "of the".

So "Most of the movies I watch are dramas."

So you see, if you just say "Most of movies

I watch are dramas", that's "eh", incorrect,

but if you say "Most of the movies I watch are dramas", that's a great sentence.

Okay, what about the next one?

"Most students like English."

I think there's a problem here.

Any ideas what it is?

Well, let's think about the verb...

Or, sorry, the noun "student".

Can we count "student"?

Is it a countable noun?

One student, two students, three students, four students.

Okay, so it's a noun that needs an "s", it's countable, so should have an "s".

Most students like English.

I hope that's true.

I don't think that's true, but I hope that's true.

Okay, so those are some examples.

One other thing I just wanted to mention is "almost all" again.

So I mentioned "almost all" can be used just

like "most", but where "most" is talking about

the majority, meaning 50-99%, "almost all" is really emphasizing it's nearly 100%.

It's so close to 100%.

So "most" is here, "almost all" is here.

It's more than "most".

We can use "almost all of the" something

just like we can use "most of the" something.

So I could even change this to "Almost all of the movies I watch are dramas."

That would be correct.

I can change this one to "Almost all of the people in my class are nice."

So we use it from a grammar perspective in a very similar way.

The difference is that if you're using "almost

all of the" versus "most of the", "most of

the" means the majority, like 50-99%, "almost

all" means, like, you're so close to 100%.

"Almost all of the" means you're very close to 100% in a specific situation.

So here's another example.

"Almost all of the people in my class are nice."

And I'm using "of the" because we're talking about a specific group.

Okay, so we've covered "most", "most of

the", "almost all", and "almost all of the".

So the best way to learn something is to

practice, especially grammar items like this.

I recommend you check out our quiz at www.engvid.com,

and there you can practice lots of questions

to make sure you really understand these concepts.

So thank you so much for watching, and until next time, take care.