Pam,
That's terrific. How about making it a Teaching Tip for ateg.org? (You
could call it, ", and: The Pencil Test.")
Brock
-----Original Message-----
From: Pam Dykstra [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2000 9:59 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: What do I do on Monday?
Hi Gretchen Lee,
Here is how I teach the comma with the coordinating conjunction "and," the
conjunction that causes the most problems for my students. Although this is
an
oversimplification, it makes sense to my students who no longer use a comma
whenever they use the word "and." But before explaining this, some
background. I
teach the sentence by saying that a sentence has two parts: a subject and a
predicate. The subject answers the question "Who or what?" The predicate
answers
the question "What about it?"
If the words "and, but, for, or, so," or "nor" connect two sentences, use a
comma. If "and, but, for, or, so," or "nor" connect two words or groups of
words,
do not use a comma. To check for sentences, use the pencil test. Place
your
pencil on the conjunction. Read the words to the left and ask yourself who
or
what? and what about it? If you have both a who or what (subject) and a
what
about it (predicate), you have a sentence. Then read the words to the
right,
asking again who or what? and what about it? If there is a subject and
predicate
on both sides, use a comma. If there is not a subject and predicate on both
sides, do not use a comma.
Hope this helps. Pam
Pam Dykstra
South Suburban College
South Holland, IL
Gretchen Lee wrote:
> In a message dated 12/9/2000 3:49:17 PM Pacific Standard Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> << It would also be useful to include specific examples where there are
none
> -- in spare time, of course.:)
>
> judy
>
> [The ideal would be to build up enough concrete instances for teachers
to
> 'get' the principle at work and so be able to design examples of their
> own...=-- an online grammar course? >>
>
> Judy,
>
> Several teachers who lurk on this list and I have been talking about
starting
> a list specifically for sharing concrete teaching ideas about grammar for
> middle school and lower. NCTE has agreed to host it, but maybe we don't
need
> it. I can throw together a web page to store ideas if people want to
> contribute through ATEG. (Or maybe I'm asking the wrong question. Is
there
> an ATEG list for elementary and middle school teachers?)
>
> For example, my focus this month in writing workshop has been commas. I
keep
> finding, however, that my sixth graders can't recognize some of the
> structures that require commas in their own writing. The difference
between
> two independent clauses (however you define them!) joined by a conjunction
> and a sentence with a compound verb seems to be as big a mystery as it was
> before we started. And before anyone asks, no - I didn't use worksheets
> (well, okay. I did make up an overhead with sentences from their
writing!).
>
> We've "done" chunking, and sentence imitating, and sentence rearranging
> (mostly with sentences from their novels - the current one is _Beowulf_),
and
> I'm about to go to sentence combining to see if that helps. But they
don't
> SEE the different sentence structures.
>
> Should I be "doing" sentence patterns? How does one do that within the
> context of their writing?
>
> Any concrete tips for me?
>
> Gretchen in San Jose
> [log in to unmask]
>
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