Exercise 1

Toni's Grammar Challenge

Pick out the Grammar Gremlins that pop up in some of the following sentences—and correct
them. Good luck!

1. The man who is coming to dinner will be an hour late. - Who’s

2. If the parties for you and i , then you and I should arrive together. - I
3. The best way to loose weight is to eat less, exercise more, and try a little liposuction. -
lose
4. "Even the sight of caterpillars made me sick," said Alice. - makes
5. A preposition is a word or group of words used before a noun.
6. And you can start a sentence with a capital letter, but not too often.
7. The violence in the drama negatively effected many in the audience.
8. "whom shall I say is calling?" asked the butler, with a disdainful sniff.
9. None of the dog’s in the park was on a leash.
10. Edna, the eldest daughter, was born ten minutes before her brother, Eldon.
11. It’s hard to know when it’s time to fold your hand and cut your losses.
12. The pirate, to possibly neutralize his crew's mutinous mumbling, “ordered an extra
pint of beer for each man.”
13. The Billionaire boasted to the crowd, "I myself am a self-made man."
14. "I before e except after c" is an ancient rhyme society has accepted even, though there
are several exceptions to the rule.
15. After putting on her Nightgown, Sleeping Beauty would lay down to await the prince.
16. With whom should I go home — the prince I just met or the frog who brought me?
dash

Once you have finished the exercise above, scroll to the next page to see the answers.

Only do this once you have completed the exercise. 😊

Scroll down for the answers.

Answers to Toni's Grammar Challenge

So how did you do? Did you find all the mischievous errors—and the right way to correct
them? And did you realize that some of the sentences were correct just as they are?

Here are the answers—what should have been used in the sentences above. Remember to
keep your guard up against those pesky ‘Grammar Gremlins’.

1. who's instead of whose (whose is possessive, who's is a contraction of "who is")

2. party's instead of parties (possessive, not plural)
3. lose instead of loose (loose means to set free)
4. makes instead of make (verb should agree with singular subject "sight")
5. Correct
6. Correct
7. affected instead of effected (effect is the noun, affect is the verb)
8. who instead of whom (subject of the verb; whom is used as object and after
prepositions)
9. was instead of were (none is a contraction of "no one" and takes a singular verb)
10. elder instead of eldest (comparison of two—eldest implies more than two)
11. It's instead of Its (contraction of "it is")
12. neutralize should be neutralise (British spelling)
13. delete myself (myself is unnecessary, redundant, and, by the way, pretentious)
14. Correct
15. lie instead of lay (lay is a transitive verb that requires a direct object; hint: most often
you lay an object down, but a person lies down)
16. Correct

Exercise 2

See if you can identify and correct the errors in the following. We will go through
the answers together in class.

In each case try to identify the error/s in each sentence and then correct it/them. You
do not need to rewrite the whole sentence. Simply 1) identify the error/s, then 2) write
down the error/s and 3) next to it write down the correction/s.

1. If you have any questions, please call Jim Shorts or myself.

2. Posted on the bulletin board, Phyllis read the new job openings.
3. We will succeed irregardless(regardless) of past failures.
4. Fred feels badly(bad) about his poor performance.
5. The new series of management classes looklooks interesting.
6. Sometimes a person gives up on an exercise goal because their isn’t is no
time for it.
7. The new incentive program is havinghas a positive effect on our work group.
8. We need to practice our readingsreading for tomorrows assembly.