Writing

1. FRAGMENTS,
COMMA SPLICES,
AND RUN-ON
SENTENCES
THE MAJOR MISTAKES
IN ENGLISH GRAMMAR!
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2. FRAGMENTS
• Fragments are “incomplete” sentences. They have a
subject and a verb but no complete thought.
• Fragments look like sentences; sometimes they are
even punctuated like sentences. Don’t let them fool
you! Don’t let them give you a bad grade!
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3. EXAMPLES OF FRAGMENTS
• When the party started.
• As soon as they get here.
• Whenever the traffic gets heavy.
• To find a job in another city.
• Running laps every day.
• Over the hill and around the corner.
• Because Sandra is feeling ill.
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4. 4. HOW TO FIX FRAGMENTS:
MAKE A COMPLETE SENTENCE / ADD A COMPLETE THOUGHT
• When the party started.
• As soon as they get here.
• Whenever the traffic gets heavy.
• To find a job in another city.
• Running laps every day.
• Over the hill and around the
corner.
• Because Sandra is feeling ill.
• When the party started,
everybody was dancing.
• As soon as they get here, we will
go out to eat.
• Whenever the traffic gets heavy,
I get frustrated.
• To find a job in another city is
very difficult.
• Running laps every day is good
for your health.
• Her house is over the hill and
around the corner.
• Because Sandra is feeling ill, she
won’t be able to play in the game
tonight.

5. COMMA SPLICES
• A comma splice is a comma that joins two
independent clauses.
• Many students seem to think that a comma splice is a
misplaced comma. Other students believe that a
comma splice is a sentence with too many commas.
This is not always true!
• A comma has many jobs; however, one job that the
comma is NOT responsible for is to combine two
independent clauses.
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6. EXAMPLES OF COMMA SPLICES
• Pat wanted to go to Mi
Pueblo, Celeste wanted
to go to Pancho’s.
• Matt is excited, he and
his wife are having a
baby.
• Robin is the chair of the
English department,
she is the person to ask
if you have any
questions.
See how the comma joins
two independent clauses
in these examples?
These
are comma catastrophes.
Don’t do this.
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7. HOW TO FIX THOSE COMMA
SPLICES
Since you have a comma joining two
independent
clauses, you can do the following things:
• Add a coordinating conjunction after the
comma.
• Add a subordinating conjunction in the
beginning of the first independent clause.
• Take away the comma and replace it with a
period.
• Take away the comma and replace it with a
semicolon.
• Take away the comma and replace it with a
subordinating conjunction.
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8. FIXING THE ERRORS
Bad sentences:
• Pat wanted to go to Mi
Pueblo, Celeste wanted
to go to Pancho’s.
• Matt is excited, he and
his wife are having a
baby.
• Robin is the chair of the
English department,
she is the person to ask
if you have any
questions
Good sentences:
• Pat wanted to go to Mi Pueblo,
but Celeste wanted to go to
Panchos.
• Matt is excited. He and his
wife are having a baby.
• Since Robin is the chair of the
English department, she is the
person to ask if you have any
questions.
Note: There are many ways to
correct a sentence.
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9. FUSED SENTENCES (KNOWN AS RUN-ON
SENTENCES)
• If you join TWO independent clauses with NO punctuation mark or
connecting idea, you have created a fused/run-on sentence.
• Fused/run-on sentences cause great confusion to your readers.
• This error generally occurs when the writer tries to cram too many
ideas into one sentence.
• Organize your thoughts so that this error does not happen!
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10. EXAMPLES OF FUSED/RUN-
ON SENTENCES
• Louise didn’t feel like
coming to work she
called Robin pretending
to be sick.
• Geoff is a Hokie Matt is
a Tiger.
• Pat and Celeste teach
English 101 they read
hundreds of papers a
semester.
Notice how these
sentences have two ideas
crammed into one?
While having many ideas
in one sentence is great,
it
is NOT great to combine
sentences this way.
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11. HOW TO FIX FUSED/RUN-ON
SENTENCES
• Add a period between the two independent
clauses.
• Add a semi-colon between the two independent
clauses.
• Add a comma and a coordinating conjunction
between the two independent clauses.
• Add a subordinating conjunction between the
two independent clauses.
• Add a subordinating conjunction in the
beginning of the sentence, and add a comma
between the two independent clauses.
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12. FIXING THE ERRORS
Bad Sentences
• Louise didn’t feel like
coming to work she
called Robin pretending
to be sick.
• Geoff is a Hokie Matt is a
Tiger.
• Pat and Celeste teach
English 101 they read
hundreds of papers a
semester.
Good Sentences
• Since Louise didn’t feel like
coming to work, she called
Robin pretending to be sick.
• Geoff is a Hokie, and Matt is
a Tiger.
• Pat and Celeste teach
English 101; they read
hundreds of papers a
semester.
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13. DILEMMA?!
Do you NOT know how to tell if you made these
monstrous errors? This is what you can do:
PROOFREAD!
1) Do all of your sentences have
subject/verbs/complete thoughts?
2)Look at your commas. Are they all in the right
place? Do they, at ANY TIME, combine TWO
sentences?
3) Do your sentences make sense? Are they
jumbled together?
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14. THE IMPORTANCE OF
FINDING THESE MISTAKES
• Fragments, comma splices, and fused/run-on sentences can
COST you good grades.
• Many of these mistakes are careless, but is carelessness and
laziness WORTH a bad grade?
• Each of these errors is basically worth a letter grade. Watch
yourself!
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