Playbook
Spotting Errors — Articles, pronouns, and mixed
43 q bundled: Articles+Determiners+Pronouns (14), No Error (14), Mixed Error Detection (15). The 'No Error' subtopic at 14% HARD is the bank's only Errors trap with real difficulty.
- questions in the bank
- 43
- tagged HARD
- 5%
- subtopic(s) covered
- 3
- worked examples
- 0
When you’ll see it
Article (a/an/the) misuse, pronoun-antecedent mismatch, or a mixed-error sentence with no single rule signature.
How this question type works
43 q across three thin subtopics — Articles+Determiners+Pronouns (14), No Error (14), Mixed Error Detection (15). Articles errors are mostly 'omitted the definite article' or 'used a/an before a vowel-sound noun' (an hour, not a hour). Pronoun errors are mostly antecedent-ambiguity or case errors (between you and I → me).
The 'No Error' subtopic at 14% HARD is the bank's only Errors trap with real difficulty — and it's a calibration play. You can ONLY get good at it by also drilling the rule-positive subtopics, because the skill is 'recognise the absence of every error pattern'.
Mixed Error Detection means the error isn't from a named rule category. Often these are register errors (using contractions in formal writing), punctuation errors (semi-colon vs colon), or weird parallelism breaks. Drill last — they reward general fluency more than rule recognition.
The sub-skills
The rules and habits that decide whether you get this question right.
Articles: a vs an vs the vs zero
a before consonant sound, an before vowel sound (an hour, a university). 'The' for specific reference; zero article for abstract/general nouns (love, education).
Pronoun cases: I/me, who/whom, between you and ___
Subject vs object cases. 'Between you and me' (object of preposition). 'Who is at the door' (subject) vs 'To whom were you speaking' (object).
Pronoun-antecedent agreement
If 'the team' is the antecedent, the pronoun is 'it' (singular collective in BrE) — not 'they'. Match the verb you'd use.
Traps to expect
Distractor shapes specific to this playbook. The page-wide Traps section covers the bank-level patterns.
Sentence with no error
Don't force an error if you can't find one. 14 of 115 Errors questions have no error; if 3 segments look fine to you, the 4th probably is too.
Double underline distractor
Two segments look slightly off but only one is actually grammatical — focus on which one breaks a *named* rule, not which one 'sounds slightly informal'.
Drill every spotting errors — articles, pronouns, and mixed question
43 questions from the bank, scoped to 3 bundled subtopics.
Related playbooks
Often paired with this one — drill these next if you found the worked examples above tractable.