They is a third-person pronoun, usually referring to a group of something.
It is possible, however, to use they in reference to a single something (the same is true for the possessive, objective, and reflexive forms of they: their, them, and themselves). This is sometimes called the singular they.
Do you consider yourself a hard worker? A team player? A people person? Whatever you do, don’t tell that to the person reading your resume. Why not? Because if they hear about one more of those, they’re going to tear the resume into itty-bitty shreds.
As good as certain terms might seem, they’ve been on a few billion too many resumes to mean anything to potential bosses. When you’re updating your resume, make your accomplishments stand out by using words that are powerful and descriptive rather than stale and clichéd.
An introductory phrase is like a clause, but it doesn’t have its own subject and verb; it relies on the subject and verb in the main clause. It sets the stage for the main part of the sentence. When you use an introductory phrase in your writing, you’re signaling to the reader that the central message of the sentence is yet to come.
Introductory clause: After the meeting was over, the staff was exhausted.
It’s a cross between a ninja throwing star and a spinning top. It’s a useful way to enhance focus, and it’s a huge distraction that has no place in the classroom. What the heck is it about this piece of plastic that’s so darn polarizing?
A fidget spinner has three prongs (usually), is small enough to fit in your palm, and spins around a weighted disc at the center.
Various educators teach rules governing the length of paragraphs. They may say that a paragraph should be 100 to 200 words long, or be no more than five or six sentences. But a good paragraph should not be measured in characters, words, or sentences. The true measure of your paragraphs should be ideas.
Your childhood teacher did not wrong you when he or she taught you that there should be three, or four, or five sentences in a paragraph.
On the ninth day of LitMas . . .
. . . you get nine wonderful novellas!
Novellas tend to fly under the radar. Readers know what to expect from short stories, and they know what they’re getting into with novels, but novellas fall into an ill-defined space somewhere between short story and novel. Some people think of them simply as very short novels—others have more specific criteria.
Every November, wordsmiths around the globe take on the ultimate writing challenge—to crank out a 50,000-word novel in just thirty days. The event is called NaNoWriMo (an acronym for National Novel Writing Month), and last year it drew 431,626 participants. Although the format is meant to encourage quick, seat-of-your-pants writing, the words writers churn out during the annual event aren’t necessarily for naught.
Interrupters are little thoughts in the middle of a thought, added to show emotion, tone or emphasis. When we use an interrupter in the middle of a sentence, it should be emphasized with commas. This is because without the use of commas, the flow of the sentence may be awkward for the reader.
Interrupters are easily identified by saying the sentence out loud; you’ll naturally pause where the commas should be.
By Laura Wallis for The Stir by CafeMom
I come from a long line of English teachers on my mother’s side. I remember being corrected on my grammar pretty much as soon as I could speak—for my grandmother, my full grasp of the distinction between “bring” and “take” was as vital as covering my mouth when I yawned. Speaking and writing correctly was just good manners.
These days, though, the school of thought on correcting kids has relaxed somewhat.
Guest post from Scott Yates
Abbreviations and acronyms have embedded themselves in English as somewhat of an auxiliary language. If you thought Latin was a dead language, it isn’t. It lives somewhat zombie-like in some very common abbreviations like, e.g., i.e., etc.
(Notice how the “etc.” in that last sentence did double-duty there? No extra charge for that. 😉
(Same goes for the double-duty parenthesis at the end of the last parenthetical winky-face.)
