An important mistake, let's grab a coffee, understanding native speakers

Hi there,

Welcome back to The English Breakfast — the newsletter for Italian professionals who want to sound more confident and natural in English at work.

I hope you’ve had a great week. A lot of my business courses have finished now, so I’ll finally have time to start some Christmas shopping next week! Leaving it a bit last minute I know 😅 

All right, let’s get started with a very common mistake that even advanced speakers make in English.

Curious to know what it is?

Watch this week’s video to find out — and learn how to avoid making the mistake when you speak.

Here’s a recap of what you heard in the video:

✔️ Use “important” when something has value, meaning, or consequence.

It’s about significance, not size or quantity.

Correct uses of “important”

• “This is an important meeting.” → It matters.

• “It’s an important decision.” → It has serious consequences.

• “She plays an important role in the company.”

• “It’s important to be on time.” → Being on time has value.

👉 Key idea:
Important = meaningful, significant, influential.

❌ Don’t use “important” to talk about size, quantity, or intensity.

In Italian, importante can mean big, heavy, a lot, significant in size.
But in English, important does NOT describe physical size or quantity.

Incorrect uses of “important“ (common Italian mistakes)

• “It was an important meal.” ❌

• “An important amount of money.” ❌

• “An important number of emails.” ❌

• “An important meeting” → correct ONLY if you mean meaningful, not simply long or difficult.

✔️ What to say instead

🍝 Instead of “important meal”:

• a big meal

• a heavy meal

• a rich meal

• a substantial meal (more formal)

💶 Instead of “important amount of money”:

• a lot of money

• a large amount of money

• a significant amount of money (neutral/formal)

• a considerable amount of money (formal)

📧 Instead of “an important number of emails”:

• a lot of emails

• many emails

• a large number of emails

Let’s check your understanding

Do the quiz to see if you’ve understood. Can these 8 sentences be translated using the word important or not?

Let’s listen

No edition of The English Breakfast would be complete without a good cup of something hot. And if coffee is your cup of tea (= something you usually like or enjoy), then this is for you.

Watch the video and decide whether the following sentences are true or false.

👀 Answers are at the bottom of this email.

1. Coffee was first consumed by sheep.

2. People began foraging (= searching for and gathering) for coffee in Ethiopia.

3. The Ottoman Empire introduced coffee to Europe.

4. By 1906 Ethiopia was exporting 80% of the world’s coffee.

5. Scientists are trying to produce a resistant form of coffee.

If you want to finally understand native speakers when you talk to them — or follow films and TV series without subtitles — then this course is for you. Check out the offer below and help me buy some Christmas presents 🤣 

€120 ➡️ €72

40% discount with the coupon code “REALENGLISH”

You'll also receive:​

• A free copy of my e-book "What did you say?" to learn 99 phrases that native speakers use (worth €9.99).​

• 1 month of free conversation sessions with The English Fluency Club (worth €50).

Click here to get the offer and start understanding native speakers today!

👀 Here are the answers

1. Coffee was first consumed by sheep. False - goats

2. People began foraging (= searching for and gathering) for coffee in Ethiopia. True

3. The Ottoman Empire introduced coffee to Europe. True

4. By 1906 Ethiopia was exporting 80% of the world’s coffee. False - Brazil

5. Scientists are trying to produce a resistant form of coffee. True

All right, that’s it for today. I hope you enjoyed today’s edition. Reply to this email and let me know 📧 

😀 It was great!

🙂 It was OK.

❌ There was nothing useful for me.

Have a great week and see you next time.

Dan

#englishlesson #learnenglish #learnenglishforfree #speakenglish #howtospeakenglishfluently #englishconversation #englishgrammar #fluentenglish #businessenglish #ingleseperitaliani #imparainglese #inglese #ingleseperlavoro #pronunciainglese #grammaticainglese #englishteacher #englishcoach #insegnatediinglese

All rights belong to the owners. No copyright infringement intended.