Adjective and nouns Nouns and verbs Chapter II compounds and idioms

Conclusion
If you have been studying English even for a short time, chances are you have already heard or read hundreds of collocations.
A collocation is a group of two or more words that is almost always used together. Here are a few examples:

• 
  heavy rain
  
• 
  big decision
  
• 
  break a habit
  
• 
  make a mistake
  

It would sound strange if someone said, “huge rain” “large decision” “finish a habit” or “do a mistake.” Most people would understand the meaning, but native English speakers would never combine words in that way. We would not say, for instance, “I’m hoping to hear about the large decision later today.”
The point is that some words go together in English and some do not. There is no grammatical reason why. And that sometimes makes collocations difficult for English learners. If you don’t know, for example, that “big decision” is a collocation, it is not so easy to guess.
Another thing that can make these things tricky is that many English words have several collocations. For instance, the word “decision” can be used in “difficult decision,” “final decision” and many others.
Today on Everyday Grammar, we will give you three practice exercises on collocations. Improving your use of collocations will help your English sound more natural, which will make you more easily understood.
One of the best ways to look for collocations is to read and listen to many things in English. This will help you start to recognize them when you see and hear them.
In this first exercise, you will hear a short story with several collocations. Most in the story begin with common verbs such as have, get, make and take. But note that collocations can be made of any part of speech, not just verbs, but also nouns, adverbs and adjectives.
Earlier, I told you that some English words have many collocations. So let’s take a few words from the story and see what I mean. You can find a few good collocation dictionaries online, such as freecollocation.com.*
Now, try looking up the word “make” and find two collocations that were not in the story. Then, look up the word “time” and find two collocations that were not in the story.
For “make,” you might for example find “make an effort” and “make money.” For “time,” you might for example find “free time” and “take your time.”
Again, there are many possibilities for each word. These are just a few.
Using a collocation dictionary can be helpful, but do not attempt to make long lists and memorize them. Instead, note just a few collocations every time and write a sentence or two for each that relates to your own life. For example, for “free time,” you might write “I wish I had more free time during the week” or “I will finally have free time when I go home for the holiday.”