English sentences are shaped by various rules and conventions; for example, they start with a capital letter and end with a full stop. As an adult you will have learned many of these rules and conventions over your lifetime. You might think that your punctuation, grammar, spelling and vocabulary are not very good, but you have a great deal of existing knowledge and experience on which you can draw to make the small improvements needed to pass your assignments. This chapter offers advice and guidance on making these small improvements.

If you are really concerned about your ability to write well enough, think about seeking extra help from a Study Support Unit (see Chapter 18). However, most adults find that any problems they face are more to do with a lack of confidence in their own ability, and once they have practised writing and received positive feedback, the process becomes a lot easier.

IMPROVING PUNCTUATION AND GRAMMAR

Punctuation is used to help the writer to get their message across in a clear and concise manner. When we speak we make the meaning clear by pausing, expressing words in different ways and adding facial and hand gestures. We cannot do this in writing, so instead we use punctuation to give our sentences a clear meaning.

If you find that concentrating on your punctuation and grammar distracts you from what you are writing, try writing down all your ideas first without thinking too much about the punctuation and grammar. Once your ideas are written on paper, you can go over your work and add commas and semi-colons, check tenses and so on. Although many tutors require you to construct your sentences and punctuate properly, they are most interested in the ideas and arguments that you express in your work.

For your first few assignments you might find it useful to have your work checked over by a fellow student who can point out any problems before you hand in the assignment. Some tutors might be willing to look over a draft assignment if they have time, but check first whether this is the case.

It is not possible to discuss all aspects of punctuation and grammar within this book. However, the following points help to address the most common problems faced by adult students.

Capital Letters

There are seven rules to follow when using capital letters:

• You always start a sentence with a capital letter.
• The pronoun T is always written as a capital letter.
• Proper nouns, such as names of people and names of places, begin with a capital letter.
• Capital letters are used to begin the first word and the other main words in the title of a book, e.g. Learning How to Study Again.
• When you are referring to a particular month or a particular day of the week you use a capital letter.
• Capital letters are used at the beginning of a passage of direct speech, even if it is not the beginning of a sentence, e.g. she said, ‘When will he arrive?’
• Capital letters are used in abbreviations only if capital letters are used for the full word or title, e.g. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals – RSPCA.

The Comma

Commas indicate the shortest pause in a sentence. They can be used in six different ways:

• To divide the items in a list, although a comma is not used to divide the last two words if they are separated by ‘and’, e.g. carpets, curtains, lampshades and furniture.
• To separate two or more adjectives connected to a noun, e.g. she was a shy, modest woman.
• If you want to insert an extra phrase into a sentence, you separate it from the main sentence by using commas. To check that you have put the commas in the right place, read the sentence without the inserted phrase and see if it still makes sense, e.g. focus groups, although criticised by some people, are a useful method of data collection.
• If you use the adverbs however, therefore or nevertheless in mid-sentence, you would separate these by commas, e.g. focus groups, therefore, were the best method to use in this research.
• If you wish to add a phrase on to your main sentence you would use a comma to separate the phrase, e.g. she decided to use focus groups in her research, even though she had no experience of the data collection technique.
• Direct speech is preceded by a comma, e.g. she said, ‘I will enjoy using focus groups.’

The Semi-Colon

The semi-colon indicates a pause slightly longer than a comma. It is used in three ways:

• The semi-colon should be used when dividing the items of a list when additional information about each item is supplied, e.g. carpets, which were red; curtains that had faded in the light; lampshades too numerous to mention and various items of furniture.
• Semi-colons can be used to join two closely connected sentences, e.g. the focus group ran smoothly; she had been a good facilitator.
• Semi-colons can be used in front of an adverb to indicate a slightly longer pause than a comma, e.g. the focus group finished after two hours of intensive discussion; so she was happy and went home.

The Colon

The colon indicates a slightly longer pause than the semicolon but a slightly shorter pause than a full stop. Colons are used for two purposes:

• To indicate the start of a list.
• To indicate the start of a long quotation.

Brackets

Brackets are useful punctuation marks for students. They are used in three main ways:

• To reference a piece of material in your written text, e.g. (Dawson, 2003:34).
• To add an extra piece of information to your sentence, e.g. the course fees are £2,300 (inclusive of field trips and materials).
• To add information after a person’s name e.g. Thomas Hardy (author).

The Apostrophe

Apostrophes are one of the punctuation marks that students often get wrong. The most common mistake is that they are used when they are not needed. In fact, they are used only in two ways:

• To show where a letter has been missed out, e.g. it’s (it is), don’t (do not) and can’t (cannot).
• To show ownership, e.g. my mother’s books (the books of my mother). In this example the books belong to one person so the apostrophe is written before the ‘s’. However, if the books belong to several people, the apostrophe appears after the ‘s’ to denote ownership, e.g. our mothers’ books (the books of our mothers).

The Dash

The dash is used to lengthen the pause between words and can be used in two main ways:

• It can be used instead of commas or brackets when you want to insert extra information into a sentence, e.g. the focus group was attended by eight people – three men and five women – and was a complete success.
• You can use it in the middle of a sentence when you wish to change the thought or idea being expressed, but don’t want a full stop, e.g. I found essays really hard going – but that has improved now.

The Hyphen

A hyphen is used to shorten the pause between words. It can be used in four main ways:

• To link two or more words together to form a word that has a different meaning, e.g. daughter-in-law, well-known.
• To link prefixes, e.g. pre-war, ex-champion.
• To show that vowels are pronounced separately, e.g. co-operative.
• To make the meaning of a sentence clearer, e.g. we expect you to attend for two hour-long lectures.

IMPROVING SPELLING

Spelling is a skill you learn by reading and writing. If you do not read and write regularly your spelling will not improve. Also spelling is a visual skill – with the experience that you have gained over your lifetime, you will find that you have learned to recognise when words look right. You will find that with practice this skill continues with academic words or technical jargon with which you are presently unfamiliar. When you come to proofread your work, you will find that you notice when words look wrong.

English words can be very hard to spell because many of them do not follow a regular pattern. If you think your spelling is bad, you are not alone. The first thing you need to do is to get hold of a good dictionary and then use it – it will help you with the spelling, the meaning and the proper use of the word. The more you use a dictionary, the more your spelling will improve. Don’t rely completely on the spell-check facility on your computer – it will pick up some words that have been spelt incorrectly, but it will miss many others and it won’t aid your comprehension of the word.

The following tips address the areas with which adult learners tend to struggle. However, these are general rules and there are always exceptions. If in doubt about any spelling, consult your dictionary.

• Perhaps the most famous rule is ‘put i before e, except after c’ The exceptions to this rule include words such as forfeit, weird, neighbour and either.
• For many short words you double the last letter when you add an ending to them, e.g. omitted, fatter, biggest, dropping. Exceptions to this rule include buses, gases and entering.
• If a word ends with a silent ‘e’, when you are adding anything to the word you drop the ‘e’, e.g. caring, shining, conceivable. However, you keep the ‘e’ when there is a soft-sounding ‘ce’ or ‘ge’ ending, e.g. changeable, noticeable.
• Short words that end in ‘11’ only have one ‘I’ when you add to the word, e.g. handful, welcome, until. Exceptions to this rule include farewell, illness and tallness.
• Adjectives with one ‘1’ usually take a double ‘11’ when they become adverbs, e.g. real/really, careful/carefully.
• Verbs ending in ‘ie’ drop the ‘e’ when adding ‘ing’ or ‘ed’, e.g. lie/lying/lied. Notice also that the ‘i’ changes to a ‘y’ because you can’t have a double ‘ii’.
• If a word ends in a double consonant and you add an ending, it is usual to retain both consonants, e.g. assess/ assessment.
• When you add ‘ness’ to a word that ends in ‘n’ it is usual to keep a double ‘nn’ e.g. keen/keenness.
• When a word ends in ‘oe’ you keep the letter ‘e’ when adding to the word, e.g. hoe/hoeing. However, if your addition begins with ‘e’ you will drop the ‘e’, e.g. hoe/ hoed.
• When adding an extra part to a word, both consonants are retained so you have a double consonant within the words, e.g. unnecessary (un + necessary), withhold (with + hold).

IMPROVING VOCABULARY

As your course progresses, you will find that your vocabulary will increase as you read, write and use your dictionary. However, you can help to increase your vocabulary further by considering the following points:

• When you encounter a new word in your lectures or seminars, write it down and look it up after your lecture has finished. You might find it useful to keep a separate notebook that contains definitions of new words.
• Don’t skip over or ignore words that you don’t understand.
• If you encounter new words during your reading, make a note of the word and use your dictionary or the ‘glossary of terms’ to find its meaning. If the word is crucial to understand the meaning of what you are reading, you will need to do this immediately. However, it is usually better not to disrupt your reading, but to look up all the words that you don’t understand when you have finished.
• Don’t be afraid to ask tutors what something means - other students probably don’t know what it means but don’t want to ask – they will be pleased that you have had the courage to do so.
• Read as much as you can.
• Try to use any new words that you have learned in your speech or writing to reinforce their meaning.

WRITING AT THE CORRECT LEVEL AND PITCH

Many adult learners who are new to writing assignments worry that they are not pitching their work at the correct level. Obviously, this will depend upon your course – someone studying for a degree will have to pitch their assignment at a more complex level than someone studying for a GCSE, for example.

The best way to overcome this problem is to ask your tutor to provide examples of successful assignments completed by previous students on the course. Read through the assignments and ask yourself the following questions:

• 1)How has the assignment been written?
• 2)What information has been included?
• 3)How has the author structured their argument?
• 4)What technical jargon has been used?
• 5)How much knowledge of the subject does the reader require to be able to understand the writing?
• 6)Do you understand what has been written?

If you are still finding it difficult to understand what is required, speak to your tutor. Ask them to work through the above questions on a couple of assignments. They might be able to provide you with an example of an essay that has not been pitched at the correct level – by reading through this essay you will be able to avoid mistakes in your own assignments.

Some tutors may prefer not to provide examples of other work because they believe that this may stifle your creativeness. If this is the case, write a draft assignment and discuss it thoroughly with your tutor, who will be able to give you positive and constructive feedback for your final version. Take note of all feedback provided by your tutors. Learn from your mistakes and produce a better assignment next time. If you don’t understand the feedback, or where you have gone wrong, ask your tutor for clarification.