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About Writing: A Guide: Is Your Sentence a Fragment?

About Writing: A Guide
Is Your Sentence a Fragment?

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Notes

table of contents
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Table Of Contents
  5. Composing
    1. Types of Writing Styles
    2. Understanding the Assignment
    3. Assessing the Writing Situation
    4. Test Your Thesis
    5. Constructing an Outline
    6. Checklist: Planning a Document
    7. Transitions
    8. Visuals Help You Communicate
  6. Academic writing
    1. Active Reading
    2. Analyzing a Text
    3. Rhetorical Concepts
    4. Academic Writing: Point of View
    5. Academic Writing: Verb Tense
    6. How to: Write a Summary
    7. Countering Opposing Arguments
    8. Putting Inductive Reasoning to the Test
    9. Most Common Evidence Used by Authors
  7. Researching
    1. Keyword Searching: Do it Better!
    2. Is this source scholarly?
    3. Evaluating Sources
    4. Evaluating Web Sources
    5. What Do You Need for a Citation?
    6. Avoiding Plagiarism
  8. MLA/APA/CMS
    1. What is MLA, APA, and CMS?
    2. MLA Signal Phrases
    3. MLA Citation Examples
    4. APA Signal Phrases
    5. APA Citation Examples
    6. CMS Signal Phrases
  9. Basic Grammar
    1. Introducing... Subordinate Clauses!
  10. Grammatical Sentences
    1. Subject-Verb Agreement
    2. Should You Use –s (or –es) for a Present-Tense Verb?
    3. Is Your Sentence a Fragment?
    4. Is Your Sentence a Run-On?
    5. Does Your Sentence Have a Dangling Modifier?
  11. Multilingual Writers and ESL Challenges
    1. Verb Forms: The Basics
    2. Verb Tenses: Active Voice
    3. Verb Tenses: Passive Voice
    4. The Meaning of Modals
    5. Nouns
    6. Articles for Common Nouns
    7. Non-count Nouns
    8. Geography and ‘The’
    9. How to Order Cumulative Adjectives
    10. Three Magic Words: At, On, and In
    11. Combo Time! – Adjectives & Prepositions
    12. Combo Time! – Verbs & Prepositions
  12. Revising
    1. A strategy for analyzing and revising a first draft
    2. Checklist: Revision
    3. How to: Be a Constructive Peer Reviewer

Is Your Sentence a Fragment?

Is there a verb? If no, fragment alert! If yes, Is there a subject? If no, fragment alert! If yes, Does your word group begin with because or when (a subordinate clause)? If yes, fragment alert! If no, Congratulations! Your sentence is not a fragment.

Examples

No Verb: A movie with pointless twists. VS. The movie has pointless twists.

No subject: For not doing her own homework, Missy was expelled. VS.Missy was expelled for not doing her own homework.

Beginning with Subordinate Clause: Because the band didn’t know the street address, the party was impossible to find. VS. The band couldn’t find the party because no one knew the address.

Annotate

Next chapter
Is Your Sentence a Run-On?
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College Writing: Guides, Handbooks, and Advice
Copyright © 2015 by Robin Jeffrey. About Writing: A Guide by Robin Jeffrey is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.
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