How Do You Use Make Sure In A Sentence

As you revise your draft, you make more choices. You might ask yourself, "Is this really what I mean? " Finding words that capture your meaning and convey that meaning to your readers is challenging. When your instructors write things like "awkward," "vague," or "wordy" on your draft, they are letting you know that they want you to work on word choice.

This handout will explain some common issues related to word choice and give you strategies for choosing the best words as you revise your drafts. I see these mistakes all the time and so many more. I'm amazed how often bloggers talk about these types of mistakes and yet, in mainstream media – newspapers,magazines, newsletters from big companies – a lot worse mistakes are made. These writers have degrees and are hired to write properly, to know their trade well.

Most bloggers online are not of that caliber and, for me, it's about how well they communicate and the quality of the information. These two attributes are more important that a typo or a grammatical error. On the other hand, I see people who write without errors but the writing is content poor. However, I do appreciate being reminded to be on the lookout for these common errors.

Some writers think that academic audiences expect them to "sound smart" by using big or technical words. But the most important goal of academic writing is not to sound smart—it is to communicate an argument or information clearly and convincingly. It is true that academic writing has a certain style of its own and that you, as a student, are beginning to learn to read and write in that style.

You may find yourself using words and grammatical constructions that you didn't use in your high school writing. The danger is that if you consciously set out to "sound smart" and use words or structures that are very unfamiliar to you, you may produce sentences that your readers can't understand. So I want to learn how to write with the correct grammar, spelling, and proper sentence constructions etc. On a sheet of paper, write a paragraph on a topic of your choice. Be sure to include a topic sentence, supporting sentences, and a concluding sentence and to use transitional words and phrases to link your ideas together.

Pick up any newspaper or magazine and read the first sentence of an article. Are you fairly confident that you know what the rest of the article is about? If so, you have likely read the topic sentence. An effective topic sentence combines a main idea with the writer's personal attitude or opinion. It serves to orient the reader and provides an indication of what will follow in the rest of the paragraph. One answer to this important question may be "long enough"—long enough for you to address your points and explain your main idea.

To grab attention or to present succinct supporting ideas, a paragraph can be fairly short and consist of two to three sentences. A paragraph in a complex essay about some abstract point in philosophy or archaeology can be two-thirds of a page or more in length. As long as the writer maintains close focus on the topic and does not ramble, a long paragraph is acceptable.

In general, try to keep the paragraphs longer than one sentence but shorter than two-thirds of a page of double spaced text, or roughly 75 to 200 words in length. Material from a source, restate the information from an entire sentence or passage in your own words, using your own original sentence structure. A paraphrased source differs from a summarized source in that you focus on restating the ideas, not condensing them. Again, it is important to check your paraphrase against the source material to make sure it is both accurate and original. Inexperienced writers sometimes use the thesaurus method of paraphrasing; that is, they simply rewrite the source material, replacing most of the words with synonyms. A true paraphrase restates ideas using the writer's own language and style.

In more advanced or creative forms of academic writing, you can play with the placement of topic sentences to build suspense and give your arguments more force. But if in doubt, to keep your paper clear and focused, the easiest method is to place the topic sentence at the start of the paragraph. Although no single sentence in this paragraph states the main idea, the entire paragraph focuses on one concept—that Luella is extremely old. The topic sentence is thus implied rather than stated. This technique is often used in descriptive or narrative writing. Implied topic sentences work well if the writer has a firm idea of what he or she intends to say in the paragraph and sticks to it.

However, a paragraph loses its effectiveness if an implied topic sentence is too subtle or the writer loses focus. For both students and professionals, clear communication is important. Whether you are typing an email or writing a report or essay, it is your responsibility as the writer to present your thoughts and ideas clearly and precisely.

Writing in complete sentences is one way to ensure that you communicate well. This section covers how to recognize and write basic sentence structures and how to avoid some common writing errors. Generally speaking, sentences in written English are not particularly long. This is good news for English learners because it means you don't need to worry about writing long, complex sentences. A sentence usually has two, or possibly three, clauses (subject + verb + object), linked by a conjunction . Make sure you understand their meaning before using them.

These two phenomena are not necessarily the same. Sometimes we have to use our key terms several times within a paper, especially in topic sentences. Sometimes there is simply no substitute for the key terms, and selecting a weaker term as a synonym can do more harm than good. Repeating key terms emphasizes important points and signals to the reader that the argument is still being supported. This kind of repetition can give your paper cohesion and is done by conscious choice.

Learning how to develop a good topic sentence is the first step toward writing a solid paragraph. Once you have composed your topic sentence, you have a guideline for the rest of the paragraph. To complete the paragraph, a writer must support the topic sentence with additional information and summarize the main point with a concluding sentence. Although the main idea—marijuana—is the same in all three topic sentences, the controlling idea differs depending on the writer's viewpoint. In his draft, Jorge frequently paraphrased details from sources.

At times, he needed to rewrite a sentence more than once to ensure he was paraphrasing ideas correctly. Below is a passage with examples of how he paraphrased and adapted the information to create his own paragraph. Then read Jorge's initial attempt at paraphrasing it, followed by the final version of his paraphrase. Like prepositional phrases, these clauses can be fragments if they are not connected to an independent clause containing a subject and a verb.

To fix the problem, you can add such a fragment to the beginning or end of a sentence. If the fragment is added at the beginning of a sentence, add a comma after it before the independent clause. Now that you know what makes a complete sentence—a subject and a verb—you can use other parts of speech to build on this basic structure. Good writers use a variety of sentence structures to make their work more interesting.

How To Use Make Sure In A Sentence This section covers different sentence structures that you can use to make longer, more complex sentences. All complete sentences have at least one independent clause. You can identify an independent clause by reading it on its own and looking for the subject and the verb. A comma marks a slight break between different parts of a sentence. Used properly, commas make the meaning of sentences clear by grouping and separating words, phrases, and clauses. Many people are uncertain about the use of commas, though, and often sprinkle them throughout their writing without knowing the basic rules.

In reponse to someone who mentioned the sad underuse of the semicolon, I would like to add the sad misuse of the semicolon. I've noticed that lots of people use this helpful punctuation mark, but very few use it correctly. Its proper use is pretty straightforward, and it's almost always taught in school; I don't know why it doesn't sink in. Maybe it's because you need to be able to recognize an independent clause in order to know when to use it the right way. When I was an English teacher, I caught a few students for plagiarism because their essays actually used semicolons correctly, and I knew that the students themselves didn't know how to do that. The last sentence of this paragraph is the topic sentence.

It draws on specific examples and then makes a general statement that draws a conclusion from these examples (animals' senses are better than humans'). In this case, the supporting sentences are placed before the topic sentence and the concluding sentence is the same as the topic sentence. Using the tips on developing effective topic sentences in this section, create a topic sentence on each of the following subjects. Remember to include a controlling idea as well as a main idea.

The foundation of a good paragraph is the topic sentence, which expresses the main idea of the paragraph. The topic sentence relates to the thesis, or main point, of the essay and guides the reader by signposting what the paragraph is about. All the sentences in the rest of the paragraph should relate to the topic sentence. Is a group of words that may stand alone as a complete, grammatically correct thought.

The following sentences show independent clauses. Not using any punctuation or connecting words between independent clauses is also grammatically incorrect, and is called a run-on sentence. Joining two independent clauses together with ONLY a comma is grammatically incorrect, and is called a comma splice. You can fix run-ons like this by splitting them up into complete sentences, just like we did with the other run-ons in this lesson. You can also take out details that don't help people understand the writer's main point.

In our example, information about the other cashier singing is important. Without these details, we won't understand why the writer is grouchy. But we don't really need to know about the characters in the cartoon. Algorithms, such as the Gunning Fog Index, Flesch Reading Ease Index, and Flesch-Kincaid Index attempt to evaluate readability or grade level of text. Such algorithms are appealing because they are based on mathematical formulas and measures.

Unfortunately, the emphasis of these tests on quantitative accuracy can mislead writers into thinking that clear and simple writing is a formulaic process. Have someone not familiar with the issue read the paper and point out words or sentences he/she finds confusing. Do not brush off this reader's confusion by assuming he or she simply doesn't know enough about the topic. Instead, rewrite the sentences so that your "outsider" reader can follow along at all times.

In an essay or paper, each paragraph should focus on a single idea. By stating the main idea in the topic sentence, you clarify what the paragraph is about for both yourself and your reader. It's unfortunate that people these days have actually started believing "do/write what sounds correct". If we do so, then there are people who interpret languages on there own. People need to understand the importance of using correct English grammar while framing sentences.

You know, I find it interesting that people who make these mistakes are Americans as in people who lived and studied there. Many of us who were taught English outside USA tend to have aced the grammar tests better. The people sometimes is that people tend to use phonetical type of spelling and that boggles me.

I also was nerdy enough to be in spelling quiz bees 😉 But then again, it depends on the education system. I have much more to learn…we all do, mine happens to be trying to work on run on sentences ;). My pet peeve is when people cannot spell correctly especially if it is supposed to be their mother tongue. As a group, identify the weakest areas of the paragraph and rewrite them.

Focus on the relationship between the topic sentence, supporting sentences, and concluding sentence. Use transitions to illustrate the connection between each sentence in the paragraph. Transitional words and phrases are useful tools to incorporate into workplace documents. They guide the reader through the document, clarifying relationships between sentences and paragraphs so that the reader understands why they have been written in that particular order.

You should avoid introducing any new ideas into your concluding sentence. A conclusion is intended to provide the reader with a sense of completion. Introducing a subject that is not covered in the paragraph will confuse the reader and weaken your writing. Avoid using implied topic sentences in an informational document. Readers often lose patience if they are unable to quickly grasp what the writer is trying to say.

The clearest and most efficient way to communicate in an informational document is to position the topic sentence at the beginning of the paragraph. When creating a workplace document, use the "top down" approach—keep the topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph so that readers immediately understand the gist of the message. This method saves busy colleagues precious time and effort trying to figure out the main points and relevant details. Circle the main idea and underline the controlling idea in each of the following topic sentences. This topic sentence declares a favourable position for standardizing math and English education. If the purpose of the essay is actually to evaluate education in only one particular province or to discuss math or English education specifically, then the topic sentence is misleading.

You may find that a particular paragraph you write may be longer than one that will hold your audience's interest. In such cases, you should divide the paragraph into two or more shorter paragraphs, adding a topic statement or some kind of transitional word or phrase at the start of the new paragraph. Transition words or phrases show the connection between the two ideas. Paragraphs separate ideas into logical, manageable chunks. One paragraph focuses on only one main idea and presents coherent sentences to support that one point. Because all the sentences in one paragraph support the same point, a paragraph may stand on its own.

To create longer assignments and to discuss more than one point, writers group together paragraphs. Similarly, a summary paragraph condenses a long piece of writing into a smaller paragraph by extracting only the vital information. A summary uses only the writer's own words.