Common Sentence Structure, Punctuation and Typing Errors

Many literary professors will tell you that the best way to write correctly is to write as though you were speaking. But if you sometimes utter sentences like, “Get me them sausages on that there counter over yonder,” then you might have some trouble when constructing a formal paragraph.

American English has become so diluted with slang and incorrect speech that many people – students, especially – are lost when it comes to correct grammar. If you say it one way, and write it another, then how can you possibly not be confused? Incorrect sentences often sound correct to the ear, but when written on paper, the mistakes are glaringly obvious from the page.

If you are in need of a quick grammatical tutorial, but don’t want to go to the trouble of reading an entire MLA handbook, then you will benefit from this article. Even those who think that they are on top of their grammatical errors might find something of interest, as the rules of American English are seemingly endless.

Parts of Speech

This is the easy part, but I thought that it should be included because it is the foundation for proper english. If you don’t know the parts of speech, then you cannot possibly string together a coherent sentence without making a few mistakes along the way.

Noun – This used to be classified as a person, place or thing, but ‘quality’ and ‘act’ have recently been included. EX: Alex (person), Boston (place), table (thing), kinship (quality) and execution (act).

Verb – A word or phrase that expresses action, existence, or occurences is a verb. EX: go, be, toss, came, hurtled, ran, left

Adjective – An adjective is defined as anything that describes a noun. EX: ugly, intelligent, peaceful, abundant)

Adverb – Similar to an adjective, an adverb describes (or modifies) a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. Contrary to popular opinion, every adverb does not end in ly. EX: slowly, carefully, often, much)