tattle

grammar · medium

易错句子She knows many tattle about her colleagues, so be careful what you say.

正确表达She knows a lot of tattle about her colleagues, so be careful what you say.

tattle 表示“闲话、八卦”时是不可数名词，不能用 many 修饰。汉语“很多闲话”不区分可数与不可数，容易照搬 many；不可数名词要用 a lot of、much 等，所以改成 a lot of tattle。

grammar · medium

易错句子After dinner we tattled for an hour about our holiday plans.

正确表达After dinner we chatted for an hour about our holiday plans.

tattle 作动词时指“告状、揭发别人的秘密”，并不表示“闲聊”；把汉语的“闲聊”直接对应成 tattle 是词义混淆。表示随意聊天应用 chat，所以改为 chatted。

grammar · medium

易错句子He is such tattle — he runs to the teacher every time.

正确表达He is such a tattle — he runs to the teacher every time.

tattle 指“告密者”时是可数名词，单数形式前必须有冠词 a；汉语名词前没有冠词，学习者容易漏掉。such 后接单数可数名词时要用 such a + 名词，故补上 a。