21 Sentence Sense
What Is Sentence Sense?
As a speaker of English, you already possess the most important of all sentence skills. You have sentence sense—an instinctive feel for where a sentence begins, where it ends, and how it can be developed. You learned sentence sense automatically and naturally, as part of learning the English language, and you have practiced it through all the years that you have been speaking English. It is as much a part of you as your ability to speak and understand English is a part of you.
Sentence sense can help you recognize and avoid fragments and run-ons, two of the most common and most serious sentence-skills mistakes in written English. Sentence sense will also help you to place commas, spot awkward and unclear phrasing, and add variety to your sentences.
You may ask, “If I already have this `sentence sense,' why do I still make mistakes in punctuating sentences?” One answer could be that your past school experiences in writing were unrewarding or unpleasant. English courses may have been a series of dry writing topics and heavy doses of “correct” grammar and usage, or they may have given no attention at all to sentence skills. For any of these reasons, or perhaps for other reasons, the instinctive sentence skills you practice while speaking may turn off when you start writing. The very act of picking up a pen may shut down your natural system of language abilities and skills.
Turning On Your Sentence Sense
Chances are that you don't read a paper aloud after you write it, or you don't do the next best thing: read it “aloud” in your head. But reading aloud is essential to turn on the natural language system within you. By reading aloud, you will be able to hear the points where your sentences begin and end. In addition, you will be able to pick up any trouble spots where your thoughts are not communicated clearly and well.
The activities that follow will help you turn on and rediscover the enormous language power within you. You will be able to see how your built-in sentence sense can guide your writing just as it guides your speaking.
Activity
Each item that follows lacks basic punctuation. There is no period to mark the end of one sentence and no capital letter to mark the start of the next. Read each item aloud (or in your head) so that you “hear” where each sentence begins and ends. Your voice will tend to drop and pause at the point of each sentence break. Draw a light slash mark (/) at every point where you hear a break. Then go back and read the item a second time. If you are now sure of each place where a split occurs, insert a period and change the first small letter after it to a capital. Minor pauses are often marked in English by commas; these are already inserted. Part of item 1 is done for you as an example.
1. I take my dog for a walk on Saturdays in the big park by the lake I do this very early in the morning before children come to the park that way I can let my dog run freely he jumps out the minute I open the car door and soon sees the first innocent squirrel then he is off like a shot and doesn't stop running for a least half an hour.
2. Lola hates huge tractor trailers that sometimes tailgate her Honda Civic the enormous smoke-belching machines seem ready to swallow her small car she shakes her fist at the drivers, and she rips out a lot of angry words recently she had a very satisfying dream she broke into an army supply depot and stole a bazooka she then became the first person in history to murder a truck.
3. When I sit down to write, my mind is blank all I can think of is my name, which seems to me the most boring name in the world often I get sleepy and tell myself I should take a short nap other times I start daydreaming about things I want to buy sometimes I decide I should make a telephone call to someone I know the piece of paper in front of me is usually still blank when I leave to watch my favorite television show.
4. One of the biggest regrets of my life is that I never told my father I loved him I resented the fact that he had never been able to say the words “I love you” to his children even during the long period of my father's illness, I remained silent and unforgiving then one morning he was dead, with my words left unspoken a guilt I shall never forget tore a hole in my heart I determined not to hold in my feelings with my daughters they know they are loved, because I both show and tell them this all people, no matter who they are, want to be told that they are loved.
5. Two days ago, Greg killed seven flying ants in his bedroom he also sprayed a column of ants forming a colony along the kitchen baseboard yesterday he picked the evening newspaper off the porch and two black army ants scurried onto his hand this morning, he found an ant crawling on a lollipop he had left in his shirt pocket if any more insects appear, he is going to call Orkin Pest Control he feels like the victim in a Hitchcock movie called The Ants he is half afraid to sleep the darkness may be full of tiny squirming things waiting to crawl all over him.
Summary: Using Sentence Sense
You probably did well in locating the end stops in these selections—proving to yourself that you do have sentence sense. This instinctive sense will help you deal with fragments and run-ons, perhaps the two most common sentence-skills mistakes.
Remember the importance of reading your paper aloud. By reading aloud, you turn on the natural language skills that come from all your experience of speaking English. The same sentence sense that helps you communicate effectively in speaking will help you communicate effectively in writing.