English Grammar for Impatient Students: A Self-Teaching Guide

Book excerpt: Using proper grammar and punctuation improves the clarity of your writing and increases readers' confidence in your ideas. Appropriate for virtually any age range, this entertaining guide makes learning English grammar and usage simple and fun. You'll find simple explanations, plenty of examples, and helpful exercises. Rather than asking you to memorize scores of grammar rules, writer and editor Chris Kennedy shows you how to apply basic principles to avoid making the most common mistakes. - The parts of speech. - Sentences, clauses, and phrases. - Sentence diagrams. - Periods, commas, semicolons, colons, dashes, and other punctuation. - Possessive case. - Passive and active voice. - Parallelism and verbals. - Figures and written-out numbers. - Troublesome adjectives and adverbs. - Commonly confused words. - Giving the reader a good first impression. - Becoming a confident writer. Contents 1. An Overview of Grammar 2. The Parts of Speech 3. Punctuation 4. Common Problems 5. Exercises & Solutions