The Basics and Introduction

Editing Marks, Terminology, and the Basics

While there are many different editing marks teachers may use, the following are the most common. Most likely, your teacher will explain her or his marks to you, and if you have any questions, you should always ask. Asking shows that you are interested in improving your writing and that you respect the time and effort your teacher put into grading.

Abbreviations:

Awk	Awkward
CS	Comma Splice
CC	Coordinating Conjunction
DC	Dependent Clause
Frag	Fragment
Fus	Fusion
RO	Run-on
SP	Spelling
WC	Word Choice

The Basics (just the facts)

Independent Clauses (IC)
For your run-of-the-mill IC, you only need two things: a subject and what's called a predicate which means a tensed verb plus anything after it. That's it! You can, of course have more.

NOTE: By a tensed verb, we mean that it must function as a verb, not as something else. For example, the word run or running can be a verb, but in the phrase "running shoes," the word running is not a tensed verb. It doesn't actually state what the subject of the sentence is doing. Nor is run a tensed verb in the sentence "I like to run."

Examples of independent clauses: (subjects in red, verbs in blue and the entire predicate is underlined)

Sophia cried all night long.

The newly planted oak tree grew.

Amon has been waiting.

The Power Puff Girls is one of my favorite shows.

IC are your basic, simple sentence. They can stand by themselves. If I came up to you and said any of the above, you might wonder why I was compelled to start a conversation that way, but you'd recognized what I just said as being a complete thought.

Dependent Clauses (DC)
A DC cannot stand by itself. It is like an IC, in that it, too, has a subject and verb, but there is a word proceeding it that makes the entire word cluster dependent. By dependent, I mean that it must "lean" against an IC. It needs something to complete it.

Examples of dependent clauses (subjects in red, verbs in blue, subordinators bolded):

because I won a billion dollars

when Seth pukes

as I recall

If I were to come up to you in the hall and say one of the above, you'd probably wait for me to finish my thought, thinking to yourself, "And . . . " or "What . . ." That's why we say these clauses are dependent.

Some words that begin dependent clauses are the following:

After	Although	As (as if)	Before
If	Since	That	Than
Though	Unless	Until	When(ever)
Whereas	Which	While	Who(m)

Phrases
Phrases, lovely phrases, are a groups of words that lack either a subject or a verb. There are many types, including prepositional, verbal, adjectival, adverbial, and so many more, but you don't have to know about them, though I really think it's a good thing for everyone to know.

Here are a few examples:

inside her twisted mind

having already been to Mars

to use tomorrow

If I came up to you in the hall and said one of the above, you'd probably wait for me to finish my sentence. These, like DC's, are not enough to stand by themselves. They need something to connect to. They need an IC.

Coordinating Conjunctions (CC)
CC's are words that put equal elements together, and thankfully, there are only 7 of them: And, But, For, Nor, Or, So, and Yet. You can learn to memorize them by thinking of the word FANBOYS (For And Nor But Or Yet So) or by making up a chant like "and, or, for, nor, so, but, yet." It kind of rhymes.

odd yet interesting (joining 2 adjectives)

kiwis and mangos (joining 2 nouns)

write or die (joining two verbs)

I like cats, but they can be annoying. (joining 2 clauses)

Usage Notes:
If you're making a list of things and you have more than 2 elements, use commas to separate each item. If you are putting together 2 IC's, you'll also need a comma.

Back

fine print