Simple English Grammar & Usage

we offer this app to help people improve their ability to follow the rules, conventions, and preferences associated with formal English. This app is intended for various readers and needs. You might feel your skills in these areas need drastic improvement, or you might just need to brush up on a few matters.

• Separating grammar and usage: Part I focuses on the grammatical terminology used to describe language. Part II goes a step further by covering the rules and conventions—the “prescriptions” for proper language, or what you should and should not do in formal communication. Rather than conflate these two issues (description versus prescription), this app separates them so readers can pay attention to the parts that matter most to them.

• A nontechnical approach: You do not have to be a grammarian or linguist to use this app. Part I covers the technical aspects of grammar, but we assume our readers do not necessarily have a background in this area. More importantly, Part II does not rely on Part I or on previous knowledge of formal grammar.

• Accessible, bottom-line information: Part II in particular offers bottom-line definitions, hints, and rules that summarize the least you need to know about grammar and usage.

• More than just the bottom line: Most reference apps on grammar stop with the bottom-line rules and with maybe an example or two. The problem is that almost every grammar rule is not self-explanatory. If it were, you would not need an app on grammar at this point in your life. Unlike most reference apps on grammar, ours gives a thorough explanation so that you can better understand the rules, exceptions, and methods for correcting an error. Our goal is for you to know how to avoid problems so you will not need this or any other grammar app later. Thus, we provide enough information so you can truly understand and learn.

• A focus on the most important aspects of grammar and usage: To avoid overwhelming our readers, this app focuses on what matters the most. Neither Part I nor Part II covers every aspect of formal English. Instead, Part I deals with the grammatical terminology and information that are most useful and common. Part II deals with the most serious or most frequent errors in formal English.

• Clearly marked examples of correct and incorrect sentences: People learn from examples, so we include plenty. But research indicates that many people who are given incorrect examples only remember how to create these errors. Often readers do not know that the examples are actually incorrect, or they only remember seeing mistakes, meaning all they learn is how to commit an error. In this app we clearly mark errors (with an X); other examples are correct. We attempt to include at least as many correct examples as errors.


Contents

Introduction

PART I Grammar 101
1 Parts of Speech
2 Basic Phrases
3 Sentences and Clauses
4 Verb Forms
5 Verbals

PART II How to Find and Correct Mistakes
6 Writing Complete Sentences
7 Subject-Verb Agreement
8 Pronoun Problems
9 Verb Problems
10 Modification
11 Commas
12 Apostrophes
13 Semicolons and Colons
14 Quotation Marks
15 Capitalization
16 Parallelism
17 Grammar Etiquette for Digital Communication