Understanding Clauses and Sentence Structure

This page introduces the concept of clauses and their importance in sentence construction. It focuses on independent and dependent clauses, providing definitions and examples to illustrate their differences.

A clause is defined as a group of related words in a sentence that contains both a subject and a verb. This distinguishes it from a phrase, which lacks either a subject or a verb or both. The page emphasizes the importance of identifying subjects and verbs in clauses to determine sentence types and improve writing quality.

Definition: A clause is a group of related words in a sentence that always contains a subject and a verb.

Example: "The five monkeys at the zoo eat bananas." This is an example of an independent clause, also known as a main clause.

The document explains that independent clauses express a complete thought and can stand alone as a simple sentence. It provides the formula: SUBJECT + VERB = complete thought.

Example: "She was happy." and "He drew a snowflake." are examples of independent clauses.

In contrast, dependent clauses are introduced. While they also contain a subject and verb, they do not express a complete thought and cannot stand alone as sentences. Dependent clauses are typically indicated by marker words such as "while," "after," "before," etc.

Example: "While we held the door" is a dependent clause.

The page also touches on sentence fragments and run-on sentences, providing brief examples to illustrate these common writing errors.

Highlight: Understanding the difference between independent and dependent clauses is crucial for identifying and correcting sentence fragments and run-on sentences.

Exploring Sentence Fragments and Run-On Sentences

This page delves deeper into the concepts of sentence fragments and run-on sentences, providing more detailed explanations and examples.

Sentence fragments are incomplete sentences that lack either a subject or a full predicate. The page notes some exceptions, such as imperative sentences, which are commands or polite requests where the subject is implied.

Example: "Stop!" and "Please help your father." are valid imperative sentences, not fragments.

The document provides several examples of sentence fragments to help students identify these errors in their own writing:

Example: "I ran to the." and "Sam running into town." are sentence fragments.

It's emphasized that even long sentences can be fragments if they lack a complete thought.

Example: "After her father helped her so much last week and she improved with each passing game." is a long sentence fragment.

Run-on sentences are defined as two or more complete thoughts joined together without correct punctuation. The page introduces the concept of comma splices, a common type of run-on sentence where two independent clauses are incorrectly separated by just a comma.

Definition: A comma splice occurs when two complete thoughts are separated by a comma instead of using proper punctuation or conjunctions.

The document provides examples of run-on sentences and comma splices, along with their corrected versions:

Example: "I like hotdog, Becky likes hamburgers." (Incorrect) Correction: "I like hot dogs and Becky likes hamburgers."

Example: "It is nearly past five, we cannot reach town before dark." (Incorrect) Correction: "It is nearly past five; we cannot reach town before dark."

Highlight: Understanding how to identify and correct sentence fragments and run-on sentences is crucial for improving writing clarity and coherence.