Grammar

Punctuation, Capitalization, and Run-on Sentences

Capitalization: People

Names of people Ex.) Joanna, Matty

Professional people Doctor (Dr.) Stevens, Professor James

Capitalize family relationships only when they are used as part of a person’s title Ex.) Aunt Claire, Tío Angelo

Names of political, racial, social, national, civic, and athletic groups Ex.) Native-Americans, Democrats, Chicago White Sox

Places, Languages, and Races

Always capitalize cities, countries, street names, schools, cyber places and landmarks. Ex.) Chicago, France, 55th Street, Hernandez Middle School,

Google, Sears Tower Languages

Ex.) Italian, Spanish, English, French Race/Ethnicity

Ex.) Asian, Black, White/Chinese, French, Mexican

Date (ex. Tuesday December 15, 2015) Month (ex. January) Day (Tuesday) Important/historical events (World War I) Holidays (Christmas)

Dates, Events, Holidays

Always capitalize the titles of articles, books, magazines, songs, albums, television shows, plays, etc. Ex.) “Is Technology Killing Our Friendships?”

Always capitalize famous brands or products Ex.) Nike, Pepsi, Air Jordan

Titles of Works/Famous Products

First Words and “I”

First word of a sentence should be capitalized.

When quoting something from an article, you need to capitalize the first word in the quote.

The word “I” should always be capitalized.

The dog chewed on its bone.

In the article, it states, “Obesity in American has increased 10% each year since 2005.”

My mom, my brother, and I went to the Philippines

Quotation mark (“”): used to show dialogue or to show that the idea is not your own work.

Quoting words that are not your ownEx.) The newspaper states, “A suburban school in Chicago will start school at 9:00AM.”DialogueEx.) Sarah screamed, “You broke my phone!!!” She cried many tears in front of her friend.

Punctuation: Quotation Mark

You use commas when…

Connecting two complete sentences with a conjunctionEx.) She went to the party, but I did not.

Note: For, And, Neither/Nor, But, Or, Yet, and So are conjuctions

Separating items into listsEx.)I know how to speak French, Italian, and Portuguese.

Marking the start of dialogue or quoteJamie told his sister, “Please leave my computer alone.”The article believes, “Not all social media is bad.”

Punctuation: Comma

Period (.): used to end a complete idea, thought, or statement that are in the form of sentences. Ex.) On the weekends, people like to spend

time with family or to do their housework. Can be used to shorten and correct run-on

sentences.

Punctuation: Period

Run-on sentence: two or more sentences that are joined together without a conjunction (and, but, so, for, or, neither/nor, yet)or proper punctuation.

You can separate run-on sentences with conjunctions or punctuation marks.

Run-on Sentence

Using a period Incorrect: I like to watch TV I like to play ball I

like to eat. Correct:

Using a conjunction Incorrect: I like to watch TV I like to play ball I

like to eat. Correct:

Separating Run-on Sentences

You have to INDENT for each new paragraph. If you need to, put a SPACE between the

paragraphs. Do not make your paper into one huge

paragraph.

Quick word on paragraph form