Grammar and Punctuation: Paths Toward Clarity (Online)

Writing clearly is essential for workplace or publishing success. Have more confidence in your writing and your ability to communicate. Learn how to edit your own work and the work of others. Take up to a year to complete this online course.

Grammar and Punctuation: Paths Toward Clarity

This online course can be started any time and completed at your own pace.

Does your boss or software flag too many mistakes in your writing? Are you tired of feeling uncertain about where to put apostrophes and commas? If you want to write more vivid and compelling prose, it's time to refresh your writing skills: grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure.

This online course helps you learn or re-learn grammar and punctuation in a step-by-step way. Each step is short, clear, and easy to follow. One step or concept builds upon another.

You can go through the course at your own pace with no deadlines. It’s conducted one-on-one via email and is confidential. Your instructor invites your questions and addresses your specific concerns.

Become more confident in your written voice, and who knows? Maybe your new tools will get you a new job or promotion, or will hone your novel’s language to a new edge. Mastery of language is a powerful tool, one you’ll use in all aspects of your life.

Who should take this course

This course is for anyone who wants better writing skills—for work reports, emails, and creative work (novels, even poetry). It’s for both native English speakers and those who have a good foundation in English as a foreign language.

Course outline

This outline presents the structure of the course. Remember, you move at your own pace and have up to a year to finish it. 

Introduction:

• The whys and hows of learning English grammar
• Levels of formality and Standard Written English (S.W.E.)
• Grammar terminology
• 25 common errors in written English

Part l. Stepping in: Basics

1. Sentences: Subject and predicate
2. Parts of speech
3. Kinds of sentences
4. Phrases, clauses, and fragments
5. Person, number, case
6. Matching nouns and verbs
7. Exercises
8. Quiz: self-test (No grades! Helps you see your own progress.)

Part 2. Pronouns: Small and Potent

1. Eight kinds of pronouns
2. Three kinds of personal pronouns
3. Compound constructions: multiple-personality subjects
4. Antecedents: find and match
5. Gender anxiety
6. That and Which, That and Who, Who and Whom
7. Exercises
8. Quiz: self-test

Part 3. Hooking Parts Together

1. Prepositions: small and legion
2. Conjunctions: hooks and ladders
3. Phrases and clauses
   • Prepositional phrases
   • Verbal phrases
   • Independent clauses and coordination
   • Dependent clauses and subordination
4. Restrictive and non-restrictive clauses
5. Most common errors
6. Quiz: self-test
7. Exercises

Part 4. Describe and Modify

1. Adjectives
2. Adverbs
3. Prepositions in description
4. Ambiguity: Dangling, misplaced, and squinting modifiers
5. Quiz: self-test
6. Exercises

Part 5. The Secret Life of Verbs

1. Tense: Dancing through time
2. Voice: Active and passive
3. Mood: Indicative, imperative, and
4. Subjunctive mood: Nuanced and powerful
5. Quiz: self-test
6. Exercises

Part 6. Punctuation: Easier than you Think

1. Period
2. Comma
3. Semi-colon
4. Colon
5. Apostrophe
6. Question mark
7. Exclamation mark
8. Dash
9. Quotation marks
10. Ellipsis
11. British and American punctuation differences
12. Most common errors
13. Quiz: self-test
14. Exercises

Recommended resources

Your instructor:

Sharon M. Van Sluijs has taught grammar, writing (including fiction and poetry), and literature since 1990. She has worked at UW-Madison, Washburn University, SUNY, and with UW Press. Through her business, Rx: Clarity, LLC, Sharon helps clients in a wide range of disciplines use language more clearly and effectively. Sharon earned her BS in English with a minor in French from UW-Madison, and an MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop at the University of Iowa. She was awarded the national Amy Lowell Poetry Traveling Scholarship (1992) and a Wisconsin Arts Board Grant (1994).

Student comments from Sharon's in-person grammar and punctuation course

“It was fast-paced and comprehensive. She answered every question.” –Jean Anderson, Madison, Wis.
 
“It was very informative. Could easily be a two- or three-day class.” –Joe Brockman, Madison, Wis.
 
 “I love the sentence examples. The course was very helpful, and I appreciate all the resource examples to help me back in the office.”
 
“This course was an excellent refresher! Love the grammar quizzes.”

Computer requirements

Computer requirements to use Learn@UW online courses are as follows:

• An Internet connection
• A Web browser such as Internet Explorer 5.0 higher; Netscape 6 or higher; Mozilla; or Safari. Netscape 7.0 is recommended for Mac users.
• Email account (address). You must have an email address to take the course; please include it with your registration.

More information on current requirements.

General information:

Registration: Registrations are confirmed by e-mail. If you do not receive an e-mail confirmation, please call 608-262-2451.

Fee: Level 1:  $125 includes feedback on eight exercises.

Level 2:  $150 includes feedback on eight exercises, plus a critique of up to 2,000 words of your material.

How to register

Online: Register now online with our secure server.

Mail: Print and mail our registration form.

Telephone: Call 608-262-2451 or toll-free 800-725-9692 to register. Our phone is answered M-F, 7:00 am-4:30 pm Central Time. At other times please leave a message, and we will return your call.