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Even Monkeys Fall
From Trees
“Pride … Precision … Progress”
Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar
Reminders for students (and teachers!) ... A Summary
Spelling
Students should be reminded of correct spelling. Below are some common types
of spelling errors to focus on:
1. Consonant + y = ies For example, “country”goes to “countries”
2. Double the consonant after a short vowel e.g. “stop” goes to “stopped”
3. Check homophones
Students should also be reminded of the different strategies they can use to
write and check words. It would be good to share some of your own.
Punctuation – Full Stops and Capital Letters
Definition of a sentence: A sentence is a unit of thought that makes sense on its
own.
Encourage students to recognise where their sentences don’t make sense.
Remind them of the need for full stops and other end-of-sentence punctuation.
Remind them of the need for proper nouns (names) to have capital letters.
Commas
Remind students of the need to for commas in the following situations:
1. Between clauses when the subordinate clause precedes the independent
clause.
2. As serving a similar function to brackets
3. After discourse markers
Apostrophes
Remind students of the need to use apostrophes in the following situations:
1. To signal possession
2. To signal a missing letter or letters in contractions (In formal writing,
contractions should be avoided)
Paragraphs
Students should organise their writing into paragraphs. The basic rule is: New
Topic = New Paragraph.
A Common Language to Discuss Spelling, Punctuation and
Grammar
Spelling
Below are some common spelling errors with the rules and techniques
that students need to apply in order to correct them:
Doubling the Consonant after a Short Vowel
Put simply, there are two kinds of vowels in the English language – short
and long. Below is a table:
Short Vowel
Long Vowel
a as in mad
a as in gave
e as in red
e as in seed
i as in sit
i as in spite
o as in hop
o as in hope
u as in bud
u as in lute
A word like red ends with a short vowel + a consonant. When you want to
add a suffix to these kinds of words, the final consonant needs to double
e.g.
Mad – maddest
Red – redder
Sit – Sitting
Hop – hopped
Bud – budded
With the words ending in a long vowel + consonant or long vowel +
consonant + e, the prefix is just added and nothing changes with the
original word.
Consonant + Y goes to – ies
This is another common error and students are often unaware that there
is a simple rule for this.
- If the word ends in a vowel + y, then you just add an s e.g.
monkeys, bays, buoys
- If the word ends in a consonant + s, the y changes to an i and you
add es e.g. try – tries; fly – flies; country – countries
Homophones
These are words that sound the same, but are spelt differently e.g.
their and their; practice and practise.
Draw attention to these errors and help correct.
Spelling Strategies
Below are some ways we can remember spellings. We should be aware of
some of them, but it’s good to remind ourselves of them and apply them
in different subject areas.
 Break into sounds (d-i-a-r-y)
 Break into syllables (re-mem-ber)
 Break into affixes (dis+appear)
 Use a mnemomic (necessary – one collar, two sleeves)
 Word families (sign – signature; muscle - muscular)
 Say it as it sounds (Wed-nes-day)
 Words within words (Iron – I + ron)
 Refer to etymology (photo+graph = light+writing)
 Use analogy (light/night/bright)
Also you can create a story: A light at night is bright.
I measured the height and weight of eight people.
 Use a key word (solution – soluble)
 Apply spelling rules (Consonant +Y at the end of word changes to
“i + es” e.g. “Try” goes to “tried”
 Learn by sight and memory (Look – cover – write – check)
Punctuation and Grammar
Students often make the following errors when constructing sentences:
1. Constructing sentences without a finite verb. For our purposes, this
is a verb that signals a specific tense or time. If a sentence lacks
this, you don’t know whether the event being described is
happening in the past, present or future. For example:
Seeing the ships come in.
If this has a finite verb, it will read any of the following ways:
He
He
He
He
saw the ships come in.
sees the ships coming in.
is seeing the ships come in.
will see the ships come in.
2. Writing sentences that are too long with the word and linking
section after section.
3. Sentences that simply don’t make sense.
When helping students with their sentence structure, it’s worth keeping in
mind the following definition:
A sentence is a unit of thought that makes sense on its own.
Tips:
Encourage students to read back through their sentences. Ask
them: Does this make sense? Is this a complete unit of thought or
does it need some more words to complete it?
- With students who write long sentences, encourage them to break
down their points. A clear sentence in non-fiction writing does not
need more than two clauses usually. This will force the students to
break down their ideas and think carefully about how to structure
their thinking. Another suggestion is to state that they should avoid
more than one “and” in a single sentence.
- If students construct a sentence without a finite verb, ask them
when the action they are describing is supposed to be happening.
The Comma
Essentially, the comma works in three ways:
1. To separate off “chunks of meaning” in a sentence (clauses)
2. As brackets
3. To separate off discourse markers
1.Commas to separate off chunks of meaning
1. A complex sentence made of two (or more) chunks of meaning or
clauses. For example:
When he won the race, he ran up to his mother.
2. The first clause (underlined) doesn’t make sense on its own. This is
called a subordinate clause.
3. The second clause does make sense on its own. This is called the
main or independent clause.
4. If a sentence begins with a subordinate clause, a comma should
separate the two clauses.
5. If the comma begins with an independent clause, there is no need
for a comma.
Examples (subordinate clauses are underlined)
a/ If a pregnant lady smokes, her baby may be damaged.
b/ When the earthquake strikes, you should crouch under a table.
c/ It will only catch fire after oxygen is added.
6. A comma is often used before “but” and “ because”
2. Commas as “brackets”
1. The following sentences have additional information inserted into
them.
a/ Highcliffe, a town on the south-coast of England, has two schools.
b/ The atomic bomb, which was first dropped in 1945, destroyed
Hiroshima.
2. This information is separated off by commas. Students will often put
in the first comma and forget the second.
3. Commas being used like brackets can also feature in the following
sentences:
a/ The man, 43, was arrested.
b/ The prime minister at the time, Tony Blair, urged Britain to fight.
4.Watch out for sentences like these:
a/ The students who had finished the exam went home.
b/ The students, who had finished the exam, went home.
What is the difference in meaning?
a/ means only those students who had finished the exam went home.
This is known as defining relative clause, because it defines a specific
group.
b/ means all the students went home. This is known as non-defining
relative clause, because it doesn’t specify a group.
3.Commas to mark off discourse markers and sentence adverbials
I use the term discourse markers loosely to cover those words which
help lead a reader through a piece of writing.
Sentence adverbials are adverbs used to demonstrate an attitude to the
content of the sentence. The most famous example is: Frankly, my dear, I
don’t give a damn. “Frankly” is the sentence adverbial.
Below are some examples:
a/ However, there are some problems.
b/ There are, however, some problems.
c/ On the one hand, ..... On the other hand, ....
d/ According to research, ...
e/ Firstly, there is the issue of cost.
f/ Furthermore, insufficient money is available for the project.
g/ Unfortunately, the project will not be able to go ahead.
The Apostrophe
Students should understand that this has two functions:
1. To signal possession
2. To signal that a word is missing
The Apostrophe of Possession
1. Students should be reminded that the apostrophe follows the object
or person doing the owning e.g.
- The experiment’s results were valid.
- The soldiers’ equipment was sub-standard.
2. If the student is unclear ask them: What object or person is doing
the owning? Once you’ve got an answer, then ask them where the
apostrophe goes or point out that the apostrophe immediately
follows it.
The Apostrophe of Omission
1. Students should be reminded that words with missing letters need
an apostrophe to signal this e.g. You’re; won’t. These are called
contractions. In formal writing students shouldn’t be using
contractions anyway. They should be using the full forms.
2. They should be reminded that It’s = It is and Its = possession.
The Colon
This is useful for introducing a list e.g.
1. There are three problems with this:
1. The cost
2. The timing
3. The place
2. For a successful experiment we will need the following: a test tube, a
bunsen burner and magnesium.
Paragraphing
Students should organise their writing into paragraphs. The general rule
is: New topic = New Paragraph.
“Pride …. Precision … Progress”