Writing Complete Sentences

Goal Avoid the two most common sentence mistakes -- fragments and run-ons. A COMPLETE SENTENCE needs a subject (who/what) and a verb (action/state), and it must make sense on its own. - The bus arrived late. (subject: The bus, verb: arrived)

MISTAKE 1 THE FRAGMENT (an incomplete sentence)

"Because I missed the bus." -- Because what? It doesn't finish the idea.
Fix: "I was late because I missed the bus."

MISTAKE 2 THE RUN-ON (two sentences joined with nothing or just a comma)

"I love basketball, I play every Saturday."

Three fixes:

Full stop: "I love basketball. I play every Saturday."
Joining word: "I love basketball, so I play every Saturday."
Semicolon: "I love basketball; I play every Saturday."

JOINING WORDS (conjunctions) -- remember FANBOYS:
for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so

PRACTICE

Write F (fragment), R (run-on) or C (correct):

Running to the canteen before the bell.
The test was hard, I studied all week.
Although it rained, we still played.
My sister likes maths she wants to be an engineer.

Show answers

F 2. R 3. C 4. R

Fix for 4: "My sister likes maths, and she wants to be an engineer."

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