A Common Grammar Mistake about 'To'

Today, let us have some sentence correction practice with the following seven sentences: 

1. I've been listening his music for five years.
2. I'm always listening the 80s and 90s music.
3. I've just started to listen Post Malone.
4. He came Marty's house from the future to warn him about something. 
5. There are no masks to export other countries.
6. It's my first time to go a concert.
7. I did not reply her message yet. 

What is the common error among all of them? You would be right if you said that they are missing the preposition 'to'.

Let's have the first one:

1. I've been listening his music for five years.

• Correct: I've been listening to his music for five years.

When it comes to the verb [listen], we use 'to' after it when stating an  object. 

• We listen to someone or something. 
• We listen to music. 
• We listen to a speech.

How about you practice using 'listen to...' by answering the following questions:

• What kind of music do you like listening to? How about the kind of music you DO NOT like listening to?
• What kind of topics or lectures do you like listening to? How about the kind of topics you DO NOT like listening to

The second sentence is still about the verb 'listen':
2. I'm always listening 70s and 80s music.

• Correct: I'm always listening to 70s and 80s music. 

To hammer home this point, let's have one more sentence, still using the word 'listen':
3. I've just started listening Post Malone.

• Correct: I've just started listening to Post Malone. 

The fourth sentence is about a movie that is familiar to many: 
4. He came Marty's house from the future to warn him about something. 

• Correct: He came to Marty's house from the future to warn him about something. 

Regarding the verb come, we use a lot of different prepositions with it (for example: come upon, come with, come by, come for, come across, you get the idea), but we would say 'come to' a place when we mean to arrive at that place or to reach that particular place. 

Let's have a few  examples from the book, 'The Hobbit':

At the beginning of the book, the dwarf Gloin says: "In fact, if it had not been for the sign on the door, I should have been sure we had come to the wrong house."

Bilbo answers: "I am quite sure you have come to the wrong house."

Besides that conversation, here is another sentence from the book that uses 'come to':
"The dwarves then noticed that they had come to the edge of a ring where elf-fires had been." 
(On a side note, and in case you are curious, 'dwarfs' was the standard plural form of the word dwarf. It was J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of the book the Hobbit, who popularized the plural form 'dwarves'.)

Let's move on to the fifth sentence:
​5. There are no masks to export other countries.

• Correct: There are no masks to export to other countries.

Note that a company or a country will export products to another country.
For example: 

• The Philippines exports bananas and mangoes to other countries. 
• Italy exports machinery and metal products, as well as clothing, and luxury goods to different countries around the world.

How about you try using 'export to' by answering the question:

• "What does your country export to other countries?

Please feel free to write your sentences in the comment section.

The next sentence shows a very common mistake that it deserves a video of its own:
6. It's my first time to go a concert.

• Correct: It's my first time to go to a concert.

When talking about a specific place or event, we use the preposition 'to' after verbs of movement such as 'go'. 
As mentioned at the beginning, we also use 'to' to state a destination.  
Examples:  
We go to a shopping mall. 
Someone goes to a wedding. 
People will go to the beach.

To practice this pattern, how about answering this question:

• Where do you like to go when you want to relax?

Example answers would be:

• I go to a park near my house.
• I go to my favorite bar after work.
• I go to this lovely cake shop near my office. 

Keep practicing the structure 'go to a specific place'. 

We have reached our 7th and last sentence for today which is this one:
7. I have not replied her message yet. 

• Correct: I have not replied to her message yet.

We reply or respond to a message, a letter, an email and so on. 
We reply to somebody  or something. This means that we are giving a spoken or written answer.

For example: 
Do you reply or respond to emails as soon as you read them?
I sometimes don't because I tend to think too much. How about you? 

Anyway, we also reply or respond to questions, comments, compliments, and criticisms. Practice by answering the following questions: 

• How do you reply to criticisms? 
• How do you reply to compliments?

All right, that's the end of our sentence correction for today. 
Kindly note that 'to' is not the only preposition that we use with these verbs. There are lots of other prepositions used with these same verbs that would definitely change their meaning. We just have to practice a lot to remember which prepositions are used with which verbs. However, below is a short list of common verbs that are used with 'to'. 

 There are more verbs followed by to than what you can see in this list but these are some of the most common ones. We have seen some of these verbs in the sentence corrections above. Let's briefly run through this list and have simple examples for each one. 

Common verbs followed by the preposition to: 

Go to - I go to the gym every weekend. 
Come to  - Will you come to my birthday party?
Drive to - Let me drive you to the airport.
Journey to - The journey to the Arctic was not easy. 
Point to - He pointed to a house across the street.
Turn to - The lady turned to the man on her right. 
Give to - Please give this letter to his assistant.
Offer to - The manager offered the job to someone who deserved it.
Send to - I will send these flowers to my mother. 
Adapt to - The new employee has adapted to the system quickly.
Add to - Do you have anything to add to my proposal?
Belong to - This jacket belongs to the man who just left.
Consent to - The patients have to consent to this procedure first.
Devote to - He devotes his weekends to gardening. 
Happen to - What happened to your car? 
Lead to - This situation often leads to bad customer experiences.
Listen to - I tried talking to him but he won't listen to me. 
Explain to - The mayor explained the new rules to his staff.
Object to - He objected to being called a traitor. 
React to - Everyone reacted to the news with shock.
Refer to - Please refer to page 90 on your manual. 
Reply to - Please reply to this email on or before Friday.
Respond to - How do you want me to respond to their invitation?
Speak to - May I please speak to the manager?
Talk to - I wanted to talk to the staff before the party.
Say to - She always knows what to say to guests to make them comfortable.
Apologize to - You should apologize to that lady.
Agree to - I did not agree to that plan at all. 
Write to - I was told to write to the manager about this complaint.  

I hope these examples have given you some practice material in terms of using the preposition 'to' when it's needed. Repetition is, of course, key to getting grammar structures right.
I will be posting more videos of sentence corrections showing common errors among EFL learners.  If you find these tips useful, please subscribe and hit the notification bell so that you'll get notified if I have a new upload.
​