Helpful Hints, Tips, and Tricks

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Hey guys! Today, we are going to have a grammar lesson. Just a little disclaimer before we move on to the lesson: we are, by no means, grammar experts. We are still in high school, so we're still learning about grammar. We just want to tell you all the basics on grammar that we know so you all can have amazing books!

Okay, onto the lesson. First things first, we need to know the basics of sentence structure. We're not sure if we already talked about this before or not, but we need to go over it if we want to learn grammar. The things you need in a sentence are nouns, verbs, and the thing it is doing. For example: Ally went to the store. If you want to do a sentence where a character is speaking, there are a couple of different ways to do it. The first way is like this: "I'd like to go to the store," Ally said. The second way is like this: "I'd like to go to the store." Ally smiled at her friends. "I'll see you guys later." And the last way is like this: "I'd like to go to the store," Ally said, "so, I'll see you guys later." 

Easy enough, right? Not really. We have seen many people not do that, which is alright for beginners. Our advice for this is to read plenty of books. They show you all how to do the right things with speaking. 

Next, we're going to go over run-ons and fragments. One of our best friends is really bad with run-ons, and she knows it lol. An example of a run-on is: Ally went to the store she ate a muffin she bought her boyfriend a gift. So, that's not the best run-on example we could come up with, but it's an example nonetheless. A run-on is where more than one independent clause is in the same sentence. That's not a good thing, unless you combine the two independent clauses with a fanboy (for, and, but, nor, or, yet, etc). You could also put commas in there, or a semicolon. 

The total opposite of a run-on sentence is a fragment. An example of this is: Because Ally ate dinner. To fix a fragment, you have to add the rest of the sentence. The example is a dependent clause, which most fragments are. To fix a dependent clause, you have to add an independent clause. 

Let's look at your and you're. We've seen people mess up with these before, and that's okay. Sometimes, it's hard to choose which one you need to use. Your is used when you want to say that an object is something to belongs to someone. An example is: Is that your book? Your is only used for that type of things. You're is a contraction, and is combing the two words you and are. If you want to use you're, you will be describing someone. An example is: You're an awesome person. If you also want to thank someone, you have to use you're, not your. 

One last thing. Capitalization is key in sentences. If you have a proper noun (person, place thing, etc.), you have to capitalize it. Examples of things you need to capitalize: London, Ashley, I, Disney, FBI, The Grand Canyon. Also, when you start new sentences, you have to capitalize the first letter of the first word.

And that's the basics of correct grammar (at least, we hope it's grammar lol). If we need to add anything else about grammar, we will add it here. We hope this helps you all!