Chapter 14
Punctuation: definitions (W14.2)
Apostrophes of omission
These are sometimes referred to as apostrophes of contraction. The apostrophe indicates where a letter or letters has been omitted so the word has contracted:
She’s in the garden. She is in the garden.
We’re going shopping. We are going shopping.
It’s not fair. It is not fair.
Sometimes, though, an apostrophe of omission indicates that the word has lost quite a few letters:
I can’t say. I cannot say.
I won’t go. I will not go.
One o’clock. One of the clock.
NB When using ‘its’ as a possessive pronoun, there is no apostrophe. This is easily checked by seeing if the sentence would make sense if ‘its’ were changed to ‘it is’:
The dog chased its tail.
Does not make sense as:
The dog chased it is tail.
Apostrophes of possession
This indicates ownership and always goes after the last letter of the word that does the owning:
The cat’s basket. (The basket of the cat.)
The lady’s house. (The house of the lady.)
In the singular form this is quite straightforward.
For plurals, it can be equally straightforward if the plural ends in ‘s’:
The cats’ baskets. (The baskets of the cats.)
The ladies’ houses. (The houses of the ladies.)
But if the plural form does not end in ‘s’ then finding the meaning is essential in order to put the apostrophe in the right place.
With the plurals ‘men’, ‘children’ and ‘sheep’ the apostrophe goes after the last letter of the word that does the owning:
The men’s books. (The books of the men.)
The children’s clothes. (The clothes of the children.)
The sheep’s tails. (The tails of the sheep.)
To check out where the apostrophe should go, just turn the phrase round:
the womens meeting – the meeting of the women.
The apostrophe goes after the last letter of the owning word, women. So it becomes the women’s meeting.
Bullet points
A bullet pointed list is introduced by a sentence stem that then leads to the items in the list. If the list is made up of full sentences, then these are punctuated as sentences at the end of each bullet. If the list is of single words or phrases there is no punctuation at the end of each item until the last one. For example:
For homework you can choose to:
- Read the next chapter of your current book.
- Complete the story that you started today in class.
- Ask someone at home to tell you about a time when they did something naughty and were told off.
Or:
You will need to use:
- plain paper
- coloured felt tips
- scissors
- glue.
Colon
A colon introduces a quotation, an explanation, an example or a series.
Quotation |
Noyes creates atmosphere with: ‘the wind was a torrent of darkness’. |
Explanation |
You have two choices: go back or go forward. |
Example |
There are different kinds of bear: the grizzly, the polar bear, the honey bear, to name just three. |
Series |
You will need to do three things: take the number, inform the supervisor and log the details. |
A colon can sometimes introduce a list that is set out as bullet points.
Ellipsis
Ellipsis is a cohesive device. These are the elements that help a sentence and text to hang together. The punctuation mark for ellipsis consists of three dots to indicate that a word or words have been intentionally missed out by the writer, for example:
There are many ways to get to my house. One is…
Parenthesis
Parenthesis is a way of adding more information to a sentence. It can be punctuated in three different ways:
with commas: |
Michael, in a hurry, dropped a plate. |
with brackets: |
Michael (in a hurry) dropped a plate. |
with dashes: |
Michael – in a hurry – dropped a plate. |
There is no hard and fast rule for deciding which of these punctuation devices you use in creating parentheses; it is really about the effect you want. If you want to make the added information run smoothly into the sentence, you might use commas; if you want to suggest that this is additional information that is separated from the main sentence you may want to use brackets, or if you see the additional information as more of an aside, you may want to use dashes.
Semicolon
The semicolon can be seen as the medium length pause in the sequence of comma, semicolon and full stop but it does have two distinct uses:
- To link two sentences for the effect of contrast or closeness in meaning:
He was cold. He was weary
These two short sentences are effective in expressing the starkness of the boy’s condition but if you wanted to show that the two are linked – that is, that he was weary mainly due to being so cold - you may prefer to use a semicolon:
He was cold; he was weary.
If you read the two examples aloud you’ll see that the second has a different rhythm from the first and rather than separating the two ideas, the first idea swings into the second.
- To separate ideas (rather than individual words which are separated by commas) in a list, for example:
Robots can: move their joints automatically; work accurately for hours without error; get into places humans cannot; send back information.
Speech marks
Speech marks are tricky. If a reader reads two books in a row they are likely to have different ways of setting out direct speech. For example, do the books use single or double inverted commas? In many adult novels speech is set out without any punctuation at all. It is easy to see why children would get confused by this variety of approaches to the punctuating of direct speech. Generally, however, the conventions about punctuation at the end of speech and when to start on a new line are standard.
The best way to find out about speech punctuation is to get hold of a novel for children aged 8–10. That should show the current conventions for setting out speech punctuation.
These definitions are taken from Reedy, D. and Bearne. E. (2013) Teaching Grammar Effectively in Primary Schools. Leicester: United Kingdom Literacy Association.