A Brief Lesson in Grammar

I know for some people, grammar may not seem important in their day to day lives; however, because I am a future English teacher, and because it just drives me nuts, I have decided to put together a mini-lesson with the basic necessities.

1) noun - person, place, thing, or idea (example: Grandma, Vermont, doll, love)
adjective - descriptive word that modifies a noun (ex: red shoes, tiny hand, crazy lady)
adverb - describes verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs; tells how or where (ex: quickly
ran, clumsily undressed)
conjunction - connects words phrases, and clauses (ex: he and I, neither here nor there,
handsome yet slimy)
pronoun - stands in for a noun (ex: he, she, it, they, me)
verb - shows action (ex: jump, think, love, hop)
interjection - interrupts (ex: hey!, hark!)
preposition - connects nouns by showing some kind of relationship (ex: over the hedge,
up a creek)

(^^LEARN THESE; KNOW THESE!!!^^)

2) No double negatives! Read the following sentence: "I don't have no money!" Does this look correct to you? If not, then bravo. If so, why??? Do you even realize what this sentence actually means? You are really saying, "I don't have a nonexistent amount of money," which is another way to say that you have money, because you are saying that you don't have NO money. Get it?

3) To quote Ross from Friends, "Y-o-u-apostrophe-r-e means 'you are'. Y-o-u-r means 'your'!" These two words are not interchangeable--they mean very different things! An English teacher of mine once told us a little trick: the presence of an apostrophe means that it is replacing something else; therefore, it should be easier to tell that "you're" means "you are" because the apostrophe clues us in that it is replacing the "a" in "you are". This area of grammar also applies to "its/it's," "their/they're/there," etc.

4) "I" is a proper noun. It should be capitalized!

5) She and I went shopping...NOT...she and me went shopping!!! Here's a trick: Take out "she". Would you say, "Me went shopping?" Nope.

6) Subjects and verbs must agree! Read: "A book of matches were found under the corpse." Right? Wrong. There is only one book of matches; therefore, the sentence should read, "A book of matches was found under the corpse."

7) Please use punctuation. Run-ons are no fun and hard to read.

I probably sound quite pompous. I am. haha.......Anyway, just think before you type, and I'll be happy.

- Ms. Cynic


PS: I'm sure I'll make a mistake soon, and people will pounce me me. Can't wait. :D