Sentence diagramming (also known as Reed-Kellogg diagramming) was a popular classroom grammar technique for nearly a century. It lost favor about thirty years ago, but several Surfnetkids readers recently suggested sentence diagramming as a topic. I hope this means grammar …[Continue]
Grammar Resources
Grammar
My 1979 edition of Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style reigns over my workspace from its place of honor on my bookshelf. It’s a slim volume because, like all good writing, the needless words have been omitted. The original, …[Continue]
Comma Rules
The poor overused comma is a frequently misunderstood punctuation mark. This week’s website picks explain comma usage in as few as five rules, or as many as thirty….[Continue]
Homophones
A homophone is a group of words that sound the same, but are spelled differently and have different meanings, such as “to, too, and two.” Homophones are a special kind of a homonym, which in addition to words that are …[Continue]
Commonly Confused Words
When your sheep’s wool is long and curly, do you sheer it or shear it? When tired, do you lay down or lie down for a nap? Even native English speakers can be confused by homonyms and words that some …[Continue]
Parts of Speech Games
There are nine parts of speech that classify how words are used in particular sentences. They are verbs, nouns, pronouns, articles, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interjections. In English, there are many words that can be more than one part …[Continue]
Diagramming Sentences
Sentence diagramming (also known as Reed-Kellogg diagramming) was a popular classroom grammar technique for nearly a century. It lost favor about thirty years ago, but several Surfnetkids readers recently suggested sentence diagramming as a topic. I hope this means grammar …[Continue]
Adjectives
An adjective is a word or phrase that describes a noun. Adjectives usually answer questions such as: “What kind is it?”, “How many are there?”, or “Which one is it?” Today’s sites explore adjectives with articles, lessons and worksheets for …[Continue]
Active and Passive Voice
The passive voice is frowned upon by many teachers. Or should I say, many teachers frown upon the passive voice? Today’s sites illustrate the differences between active and passive voice, bust some common grammar myths, and will help you write …[Continue]
Homework Help
When you’ve googled till your fingers are numb, and all your searching still hasn’t provided an answer to your homework question, it’s nice to know that there are real people out there who can help. Here’s the scoop on teachers, …[Continue]
