Collocations are important! …but what are they?

Collocations are when words are grouped together for a certain meaning. Sometimes these collocations are not what you might expect! If you don’t use the right collocation, your phrase might sound funny. Here are a few examples of common collocations:

You might make: a phone call; a mistake; an appointment; an exception; believe (“make believe” means pretend)

You might do: paperwork; homework; research; business; your job; something important; the dirty work (“do the dirty work” means to someone else’s undesirable thing)

Or, you may offer: suggestions; ideas; a ride; some money.

Using the right collocations can make a big difference in sounding natural! Can you think of any other examples?