Okay, now you have an almost complete writing project: you have done it all, from determining an audience and purpose to editing for style, organization, sentences, and everything else! It’s time to look for errors. Rethinking on a micro level means looking for common grammatical errors, and for capitalization errors, spelling errors, etc. This is sometimes called editing or proofreading.

Of course, there are many technological tools at your disposal to help with this process. In fact, you might be using a word processing program like Microsoft Word or Google Docs that point errors out to you as you’re drafting (thanks for the distraction, right?). You can also use software like Grammarly to help. However, when you are overly-reliant on these tools, you’re not learning, and these tools aren’t going to be available for you in all writing situations. No one is perfect in their writing, and no tool is perfect, either. Combining your own expertise with the tools can lead to your best possible writing.

So, let’s get into it by heading back to the beginning: the simple sentence. Don’t worry. We’ll try to make this as painless as possible.

The simple sentence

You’ve been writing sentences for years. Children learn how to make sentences early on when they speak by saying things like, “I want cookie,” and “No!” (Yes, that’s a complete sentence!) Do you know what makes a complete sentence, though? There are three things:

A complete sentence might also be referred to as an “independent clause.” A “clause” (not Claus, as in Santa) is a group of words that may make up a complete sentence. This means that there are “dependent” clauses, too, that have a subject or verb but do not have a complete thought and therefore cannot be complete sentences, but that’s a discussion for later.

Check out the following sentence that has three independent clauses, or complete sentences, in it:

All complete sentences have at least one independent clause. You can identify an independent clause by reading it on its own and looking for the subject and the verb and making sure it has a complete thought.

Each of these has a subject (bold), and a verb (underlined).

Let’s look at an example of an independent clause, which is a clause that can stand alone by itself without the reader thinking “something else is needed for this to be completed and make sense.” Again, an independent clause is also called a complete sentence:

That’s a complete thought. No reader will think “there is something missing here.”

Now, these are examples of clauses that are not independent:

So, we have a sense of what makes a complete sentence. Now, let’s break it down even further. Don’t worry…you’ve got this!

Subjects

When you read a sentence, you may first look for the subject, or what the sentence is about. The subject usually appears at the beginning of a sentence as a noun or a pronoun. A noun is a word that identifies a person, place, thing, or idea. A pronoun is a word that replaces, or stands in for, a noun. Common pronouns are I, he, she, it, you, they, and we. In the following sentences, the subject is bolded.

Verbs

Once you locate the subject of a sentence, you can move on to the next part of a complete sentence: the verb. A verb is often an action word that shows what the subject is doing. A verb can also link the subject to a describing word. There are three types of verbs that we see in sentences: action verbs, linking verbs, and helping verbs. Action verbs and linking verbs can be the main verbs of a sentence. Helping verbs are not.

Action verbs

A verb that connects the subject to an action is called an action verb. An action verb answers the question, “What is the subject doing?” In the following sentences, the subject is bolded and the verb is underlined.

Linking verbs

A verb can often connect the subject of the sentence to a describing word. This type of verb is called a linking verb because it links the subject to a describing word. In the following sentences, the subject is bolded and the verb is underlined.

If you have trouble telling the difference between action verbs and linking verbs, remember that an action verb shows that the subject is doing something, whereas a linking verb simply connects the subject to another word that describes or modifies the subject. A few verbs can be used as either action verbs or linking verbs.

Although both sentences use the same verb, the two sentences have completely different meanings. In the first sentence, the verb describes the boy’s action. The verb, in this case, takes an object, which in this sentence is “glove.” Some verbs take objects. Some verbs do not. In the second sentence, the verb describes the boy’s appearance. It says, in essence, boy = ___. Since “tired” is not an actual object, the verb doesn’t take it—it just links to it.

Helping verbs

A third type of verb you may use as you write is a helping verb. Helping verbs are used with the main verb to indicate a mood or tense. They are usually a form of be, do, or have. The word can is also used as a helping verb. In the following sentences, the subject is bolded, the helping verb is underlined, and the verb is underlined.

You might wonder why you should care about understanding these three types of verbs. First, it enhances your understanding of what makes up the building blocks of our ideas in writing. Second, it helps you figure out what elements of a sentence you have and what might be missing. This is really important when you’re correcting errors later, especially run-on and fragment sentences. Do you need to fully understand all three types? Not really, but you need to know that there is, in fact, a verb in every sentence.

Prepositional phrases

Sometimes prepositional phrases will throw off your hunt for subjects and verbs when you’re trying to determine if a sentence is complete. A prepositional phrase begins with prepositions, like in, on, under, near, by, with, and about, and they often include nouns (remember: a noun is a person, place, thing, or idea). For example, the following phrases have their prepositions bolded:

When you’re looking for the subject or verb in a sentence, you won’t find it in a prepositional phrase. Check out the following sentence:

This sentence has three prepositional phrases:

Whew! So, if you cross out all those prepositional phrases in the sentence, finding the subject and verb is easy:

Remember how we just mentioned run-ons and fragments? Let’s talk about them.

Run-ons, Comma Splices, and Fragments

As we discussed, complete sentences, or independent clauses, contain a subject, a verb, and form complete a thought:

The subject is “cow,” the verb is “walked.” The other words modify or give more information about other words. Sometimes, when we’re writing, we write sentences that are incomplete (fragments) or connect more than one complete sentence (independent clause) incorrectly (run-ons and comma splices). These are very common errors, and the only way to fix them is to learn to recognize when they’re happening. How do you do that? By knowing where the complete sentences are, regardless of where you put punctuation marks like periods and commas. Let’s talk about it.

What is a sentence fragment?

Fragments occur when the sentence is missing the subject and/or verb and/or it’s an incomplete thought:

There is no subject in this group of words. What or who walked? Notice that the word “rabbit” is a noun and can, in its own sentence, be the subject. But in this case, “rabbit” is part of the prepositional phrase that tells that the subject (that’s missing) is walking towards the rabbit. Thus, “rabbit” cannot be the subject, even though it is a noun.

Here’s another example of a fragment:

The addition of the subordinating conjunction “because” creates an incomplete thought. When you read it out loud and with expression, you can likely hear that it feels unfinished. That’s because it is.

In the above instance, “Because” is a subordinating conjunction. If you start a sentence with one of these, you know there’s going to be another complete sentence after it to complete the thought (and there will be comma between the two!).

Other common subordinating conjunctions are listed at the end of this section.

How do you fix these errors?

You need to either add the missing words or hook the fragment onto a sentence that comes before OR after it in the paragraph. In the following examples, the original fragment is in bold, the subject is underlined, and the verb is in italics.

What is a run-on sentence?

Run-on sentences happen when two complete sentences (independent clauses) are put together incorrectly:

“I walked down to the store” is a perfectly fine sentence. “The heat was getting to me” is another great sentence. Put them together, though, without proper punctuation, and you have a run-on.

If you separate these two complete sentences with a comma, you have a type of run-on called a comma splice:

The comma isn’t strong enough to hold two sentences together. Commas are meant as pauses between dependent ideas, not independent ideas or clauses.

How to fix a run-on sentence

So, if you do have a run-on sentence, which is basically a sentence that doesn’t easily make sense, how do you fix it? There are several great options.

One of the most common run-on sentences is this type:

It’s a run-on because it starts with a subordinating conjunction (again, words like because, since, when, and if) and does not have a comma separating out the two sentences. It should look like this:

Some instructors will also call the clause, “As I walked down to the store” an introductory phrase that needs a comma after it. Whatever the instructor calls it, the comma needs to be there.

Chart of Conjunctions

Verb tense

In English, our verbs, or actions, have tenses: Past, Present, and Future.

We usually understand tense fairly well, but sometimes an error creeps up into our writing when we switch verb tenses. Consider this example and see if you can see when the switch happens:

Did you spot it? The tense switch moves from past to present in the sentence that starts with “Something catches his eye.” It might not have been overtly distracting for you, but it is something that is more of an irritation, a small pebble in the shoe that doesn’t stop you from walking, but you know it’s there. When you pick a verb tense, stick with it.

Pronoun/antecedent agreement

As we talked about earlier, a pronoun takes the place of another noun that has already been named in the sentence. Common pronouns are he, she, they, it, and we, among many others. If we are writing about Frank, we do not keep using his name, saying “Frank skipped dinner, and then Frank shook the dice.” We write:

You might wonder what an antecedent is. In the previous example, it’s Frank. The antecedent is whatever the pronoun is referring to.

One of the most common writing errors is not having your pronoun match the number of the antecedent (thing referred to). In other words, if the antecedent is singular, use a singular pronoun. If the antecedent is plural, use a plural pronoun.

*Please note: Some people use “they” and “them” pronouns. If that is the case, use those pronouns. If you know the pronouns of the person you are referring to, use those. For example,  if Kheena uses they/them pronouns, then the above example (On Thursdays, Kheena* does math, and then they eat) would be correct.

The most common error in pronoun/antecedent agreement is with the pronouns “they” and “their.” For example:

In this case, it’s possible that “a student” could use he, she, they, or some other pronoun. Since we don’t know, the easiest fix is to make “students” plural.

Passive and active voice

When writing sentences, there are basically two ways to show action: passively and actively.

Both sentences are complete and convey an action with the verb; however, the first sentence, the passive sentence, almost seems to be missing something. If you try to picture the action, you might see a baseball coming out of nowhere, hurtling toward a girl at second base. In the active sentence, the picture is more complete: you can see who threw the ball.

Active voice is almost always more effective.

Construct your sentences so that someone or something is doing something—not just something being done. Look for “to be” verbs like is, are, was, were. These are often a sign of passive voice. How about this example?

Mistakes were made.

Hmmmm…sounds like someone is trying to get out of taking responsibility for making a mistake, doesn’t it? It’s much better to hear someone say:

I made a mistake.

Thank you, unknown human, for confessing.

Sometimes passive voice is used purposely. As in the above example, if you want to deemphasize the subject or avoid responsibility, passive voice is the way to go. For example, a car company that had a major mechanical issue with their airbags and had to recall millions of cars is probably not going to admit total fault.

This is a useful application of passive voice. If the sentence were active, the company might actually be legally more liable.

NO! Don’t say that. We’ll get sued!

Modifier errors caused by passive voice

Another problem with using passive voice is that it can cause grammatical errors like dangling or misplaced modifiers. A modifier is a descriptive word or phrase that often comes as a dependent clause at the start of a sentence.

The phrase “with pinpoint accuracy” is a modifier, describing how Reeza threw the ball. Now, try that same phrase with the passive sentence.

Now what is the phrase describing? From the structure of the sentence, the ball is throwing itself with pinpoint accuracy. In fact, the person who threw with accuracy isn’t even in the sentence, so this is a dangling modifier. Even if Reeza was in the sentence and the sentence was still passive, there would still be a logic problem.

Now, Reeza is there, but the sentence still almost makes it sound like the ball was throwing itself. This is a misplaced modifier.

More resources on passive and active voice and modifier errors:

“Active and passive verbs,” Oxford Dictionaries. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/grammar/active-and-passive-verbs.

“Active vs Passive Voice,” Howcast. https://youtu.be/cOhUmttkt90

“Misplaced and Dangling Modifiers,” Tamu Writing Center, https://youtu.be/RHWyN1xGFdc

Comma Rules Simplified

One of the most common errors in writing involves a single punctuation mark: the comma. First, there are many rules involving commas, and people find learning those rules to be overwhelming. Second, they think they know how to use commas because they add them in where it feels like they should be a pause. Though this is sometimes correct, it’s often not. It’s better to learn the rules, but worry not! We will simplify them for you.

Major Comma Rules

First: Use commas in between items in a series:

Do you need the comma before “and” in the list (also called an Oxford comma)? Do as your instructor says. Generally, you are better off adding the comma especially if the items in the list will be at all confusing for the reader without it.

Second: Use commas to separate out extra information from the rest of the sentence (commas with introductory phrases, transitional expressions, parentheticals, appositives, nonrestrictive clauses). This is information that, if removed, will not change the basic meaning of the sentence. In the sentences below, the extra information is in bold.

Third: Use commas in between complete sentences that are separated out by a coordinating conjunction:

Fourth: Use commas after the dependent clause when followed by an independent clause.

Wait, what?

Remember those subordinating conjunctions we talked about earlier (Because, Since, When, If…) and how, when they start a sentence, they create a dependent clause, and we need to then hook it to an independent clause (complete sentence)? Yep, you need a comma in there to separate the two out. Here’s an example:

See? It’s that simple. Let’s look at another:

Now, if you read the sentence out loud, you can feel that there is a natural pause after the end of the dependent clause.

When the wind blows through the trees…

This is one instance where your “sense” that there should be a pause does, in fact, mean that there should be a comma. It’s better, though to simply know the rule.

Smaller Comma Rules

ONE: Use commas to separate out two adjectives that describe the same noun:

Important note: silly and fun are of the same “weight” or importance and are therefore coordinating. You could easily say “He is a fun, silly kid” and the sentence makes sense—that’s how you know they’re coordinating and need a comma between them.

You wouldn’t say, “That clown ridiculous nose…” This means that “ridiculous” and “clown” are of different weight, so the adjectives need to be presented in that order in the sentence, thus making them non-coordinating.

TWO: Use commas after a city and the state in a sentence:

THREE: Use commas to separate items in a date:

FOUR: Use commas to separate items in an address:

FIVE: Use commas when you need one to make your ideas clear (or commas save lives!)

Semicolons, once and for all

The rule for using a semicolon is easy: use it in place of a period. Yay! Easy!

Well, there is one other thing…the sentences you’re going to connect with a semicolon need to be related in some way.

Here’s another rule for semicolons: use them instead of commas to separate items in a list if the items in the list have commas in them.

What?

Here’s an example:

This is a fairly uncommon use for semicolons, but now you know the rules! Try it out, but be careful not to use them too often in your writing; as they are not the most common punctuation marks, it starts to look strange to the reader when they see them all over the place.

Colons: Use them right

Colons can be used in a sentence to replace words like, “for example” or “namely.” Check it out:

Colons can also be used to separate out titles with their subtitles, as was done for this chapter’s section title.

Apostrophes

In brief, an apostrophe shows possession.

Other uses for apostrophes

Spelling

If you spell a word incorrectly, you may cause your audience to pause and scratch their heads, stopping everything to try to decide how to solve this rule problem rather than continuing on to learn about the point you’re making. You not only get fewer “ethos points,” or reliability and credibility points, when you make spelling errors, you also cause problems in meaning.

Thus, you should make every effort to keep your audience in the space of what you are trying to tell them of or persuade them of, rather than throw them into a soup of senselessness where they have to try to figure out the fundamentals of language and logic.

Basically, use words correctly so your reader doesn’t have to think about why you didn’t.

Of course, there are a variety of things to concern yourself with when it comes to spelling. Some errors are simple and clear.

Usually, if you have your spell checker on and you’re typing, those errors will be caught. Some spelling errors, however, happen that are NOT caught by a spell check, and those are misused words.

One of these errors are what are called homophones. These are words that, in English, sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings.

Examples of common homophones

The word “homophone” just means “same sound.” So these sound the same. But they have different meanings. What if you wrote:

Eye did not see, I to I.

Your audience would perhaps think you were trying to write a riddle or a grand philosophical commentary on the nature of being and selfhood. Or, they would think you simply did not know that you should have written it:

I did not see eye to eye.

Usually, people have what are called patterns of error, or words they frequently mix up. One of the authors of this book was in college before she finally got a handle on “it’s” and “its” after a professor told her she needed to figure it out, and NOW. It wasn’t that she didn’t know the difference; she simply didn’t take the time to carefully proofread. As an English major, she was embarrassed, but guess what? After it being pointed out to her, she actively used the correct one from then on.

Figure out your patterns, and you can be correct, too.

A final note on proofreading:

Let’s stop this overview of proofreading here—those are a lot of rules! We covered the main things to consider for proofreading, or copy editing. Remember that having a clean, proofread copy of your final draft is important. Your audience expects it.

You gain credibility (ethos points) by following the standard rules of English in most contexts.

Remember also that you can proofread while you write, or while you rethink/revise, but you should not let this get in the way of getting good ideas down—don’t “edit as you go” if this freezes you up, because all of the perfect proofreading in the world is not going to help a paper with bad ideas and incoherent content.