Basic Grammar Rules

1. Spelling Errors
There is no good excuse for spelling errors in a final draft.
Everyone should use a dictionary or turn on Spell Check. When in doubt, check it out!
2. Run-on Sentences
Run-ons occur when you try to make one sentence do too much. For example:
William gazed across the broad Pacific his heart was filled with dread.
Avoid run-ons by: a. breaking the long sentence into separate sentences:
William gazed across the broad Pacific. His heart was filled with dread.
b. reducing one of the clauses to a subordinate clause and adding a comma:
When William gazed across the broad Pacific, his heart was filled with dread.
c. adding a comma and coordinating conjunction between the two clauses:
William gazed across the broad Pacific, but his heart was filled with dread.
3. Sentence Fragments
Fragments occur when youve written only part of a sentence. For example:
Because there was no other way of escaping the fire.
Fix fragments by making sure your sentence contains both a subject and a verb:
He leaped out of the window because there was no other way of escaping the fire.
4. Subject/Verb Agreement
If the subject is singular, use a singular verb; if the subject is plural, use a plural verb:
The arrival of many friends promises a good time.
Either the principal or the coach usually attends the dance.
Remember: the subject of a sentence is never contained within a prepositional phrase!
5. Pronoun Agreement
Almost everyone makes this mistake: Everyone should get out their books.
A pronoun must agree in number with its antecedent (the word to which the pronoun refers).
Rewrite the sentence using singular pronouns: Everyone should take out his or her book.
Singular pronouns include: each, either, neither, one, everyone, no one, everybody, nobody,
anyone, someone, somebody.
6. Verb Tense
Tense means time. Verbs tell us what action is occurring, and when it is occurring. Verbs change
form to indicate when an action takes place. Your writing should remain in one tense, switching
only when necessary to the meaning. To fix tenses, read your draft looking only for tense
agreement.
7. Plural & Possessive
An s is put at the end of a word for two reasons: to make it plural or to show possession.

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 When you add an s to make a plural, dont use an apostrophe:
Plurals: books, students Possessives: the books pages; the students desk
Possessives for plural nouns: the books pages; all of the students desks
When you add an s to make a plural, dont use an apostrophe.
Possessive pronouns dont use apostrophes: yours, hers, its, ours, theirs.
8. Capitalization
Remember to capitalize proper names, the personal pronoun I, names of cities, states,
countries, and important words in titles such as I Never Promised You a Rose Garden.
Titles that should be underlined (or italicized) include: books, long poems, plays, magazines,
movies, published speeches, TV programs, ships, works of art, long musical works, CDs.
Titles that should be in quotation marks are short stories, songs, short poems, articles in
magazines or newspapers, essays, episodes of a TV program, chapter titles in books.
9. Word Usage = A word used incorrectly. Sentence Usage = a sentence constructed awkwardly.
Frequently confused words:
Its = it is Its = possessive of it To = toward, as far as
Too = also, extremely Two = 2 Your = possessive of you
Youre = you + are Their = possessive of they Theyre = they + are
There = in that place

Improper Contractions
Never use could of, should of, would of. What you mean is could have, should have, would have; correct
contractions are couldve, wouldve, shouldve.
Try not to use contractions at all in formal writing.
Negatives
You should only have one negative word per sentence. Example: I cant do that.
Negatives: not, dont, cant, wont, shouldnt, couldnt, wouldnt, didnt, neither/nor, no, nothing.
Parallel Structure
All items in a series need to follow the same structure:
Incorrect: He stopped, listened a moment, then he locked the door.
Correct: He stopped, listened a moment, then locked the door.
Incorrect: They were singing, dancing, and looked at each other.
Correct: They were singing, dancing, and looking at each other.

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10. Punctuation
A question ends with a question mark [?].
A semi-colon [;] is not a comma. It joins two clauses of a compound sentence:
We were bored with the programs on TV; we decided to go to the library.
A colon [:] introduces a list of items:
Our school has teams for most sports: track, basketball, football, soccer, swimming and tennis.
A hyphen [-] shows that part of a word is carried onto the next line. Break the word between
syllables; you cant divide a one-syllable word.
Quotation marks are used properly as follows:
Craig said, Something is wrong with my hard drive.
I want to go to the Epicentre, she explained. My favorite team is the Quakes.
11. Troublesome Verb Conjugation
There are several troublesome verbs that aren't ordinary, the ones we call irregular verbs because
they don't take their different forms in standard ways. Most writers occasionally have trouble
remembering the basic forms of some of the following irregular verbs:

Verb Past Tense Past Verb Past Tense Past

Bring* Brought Have Brought Ride Rode Have Ridden

Choose Chose Have Chosen Ring Rang Have Rung

Come* Came Have Come Rise Rose Have Risen

Do* Did Have Done Run* Ran Have Run

Drink Drank Have Drunk Seek Sought Have Sought

Drive Drove Have Driven See Saw Have Seen

Eat Ate Have Eaten Sink Sank Have Sunk

Fall Fell Have Fallen Speak Spoke Have Spoken

Fly Flew Have Flown Swim Swam Have Swum

Forget Forgot Have Take Took Have Taken

Know Knew Have Known Write Wrote Have Written

*Especially troublesome verbs