Always put a comma after them.Įxample: On the long drive home, they concluded the meaning of life is indeed 42. Introductory elements can be used at the beginning of a sentence to modify or provide background for the main part of the sentence. Incorrect: The inventor, Leonardo da Vinci, was multitalented. Incorrect: Earth’s oldest tree Methuselah is over 4,800 years old.Ĭorrect: The inventor Leonardo da Vinci was multitalented. Step 2: Scan the lists below for the symbol you. Typically, the Alt keys are located on either side of your spacebar. If an explanatory element is nonessential (i.e., it doesn’t change the meaning of a sentence if you leave it out), set it apart with commas.Ĭorrect: Earth’s oldest tree, Methuselah, is over 4,800 years old. Step 1: Open your word processor and locate either Alt key on your keyboard. Example: They asked, “Is cereal considered soup?” 4. Always use quotation marks, brackets, braces, and parentheses in pairs. Question marks and exclamation marks sometimes go inside and sometimes stay outside.ģ. Commas and periods always go inside quotation marks in American English dashes, colons, and semicolons almost always go outside. All sentences must end in a period, a question mark, an exclamation point, or, if followed by a closely related sentence, a semicolon.Ģ.

There are plenty of important punctuation rules, but here are five you should know:ġ.

Grammatical keyboard