1. Misplacing apostrophes when referring to decades (1970’s).
2. Placing hyphens between words that shouldn’t be hyphenated. When in doubt, check your dictionary; generally, you hyphenate words to avoid confusion in understanding the meaning of a sentence.
3. Using semicolons for items in a series. Semicolons and commas provide appropriate pauses between words and sentences, but they’re used differently. Commas separate independent clauses and items in a series, etc.; semicolons create a pause between sentences in place of a period.
4. Putting only one apostrophe (or none) in place of “and” between two nouns in informal writing (e.g., rock n roll).
5. Using dashes to introduce items in a series.
The Classy Writing Blog
How to Fix More Common Punctuation Errors
“Don’t follow the blunderers — be a leader and punctuate properly….” Read more.
Quotes
Em dash or en dash.
On typewriters it’s easy,
On keyboards, less so. ~ Craig Harrison
For some odd reason, I’ve always been interested in punctuation. It’s just always been that one subset of literacy that has really intrigued me. I still sit around and read the paper, and sometimes I have a red Sharpie in my hand. I play a little game: How many errors can I find today? ~ Jeff Rubin, “father” of National Punctuation Day®, Not to Put Too Fine a Point on It, This Guy Cares About Writing’s Jots and Tittles
Comments? Suggestions? Need help? Feel free to contact me.
Michelle Troutman
classywriting.com
