Written Portion:

There are many rules regarding phrases, sentences and sentence fragments. This is especially because these are three similar yet different topics. In terms of sentences, it is obviously important to use proper punctuation. You must capitalize the letters at the beginning of sentences as well as Proper Nouns. For example, “you Are BUgging me and kyle.” is not a proper sentence, though, “You are bugging me and Kyle.” is a proper sentence. It is also crucial to know what Proper Nouns, nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and the rest are. It is equally important to know punctuation such as periods, commas, apostrophes, question marks and exclamation points. It would not make sense to say, “What are you doing.” or “I am going to the store at 11?”. All these things are significant if you are wanting to form a sentence. A sentence needs a subject, verb or object. For example, “I walked around the mall earlier.” is a proper sentence where “Around the mall earlier.” is not a sentence. It is missing a subject. Sentences that miss a subject, verb or object are called sentence fragments. Sentence fragments are not a complete idea and doesn’t contain a main clause. Another example of this would be “Shows a decrease in lifespan.” There is not a subject. What is having a decrease in lifespan? People? Cats? It must be more specific. If it is not specific, it will only be a sentence fragment, or a part of a sentence. Though, there are some sentence fragments which make great clauses. These are called introductory phrases, and these are extremely similar to sentence fragments. The difference is that phrases have a different set of rules. Phrases do not have a subject or verb. They are also unable to be stand-alone sentences. In the sentence “In order to stay successful, one must study.” the phrase is “In order to stay successful”. That is because there is no verb or subject. An incorrect introductory phrase would be in the sentence “Athletes must exercise every day, in order to stay healthy.” having the clause be “Athletes must exercise every day,”. This is not an introductory phrase because it could be its own sentence. Those are all the rules for phrases, sentences and sentence fragments. 

 

Test Questions: 

1. TRUE OR FALSE: In an introductory phrase, there must be at least be a subject and a verb. 

1. TRUE OF FALSE: In a sentence, the subject and verb must agree in number. 

1. Which is a complete thought?  

1. Phrases 

1. Sentences 

1. Sentence Fragments 

1. Which is an introductory phrase? 

1. An athlete must exercise, in order to win. 

1. In order to win, an athlete must exercise 

1. A sentence must have what? 

1. Subject 

1. Verb 

1. Object 

1. All of the above 

Key: 

1. False 

1. True 

1. B) 

1. B) 

1. D)