AP style/grammar workshop

Jennifer Cox

objectives

• Refresher on grammar

• Learn to use the AP Stylebook

• Two worksheets to complete after viewing the lecture1. Grammar

2. AP style

Common grammar obstacles

• Capitalization

• Subject/verb agreement

• Subject/pronoun agreement

• Possessives & contractions

• Passive voice

• Quotes issues

• Commas (handout)

capitalization

• Proper nouns:• Noun – people, places & things• Proper noun – specific people, places, & things

http://www.chompchomp.com/terms/propernoun.htm

capitalization

• Titles & sentence ordering:• Only capitalize the title if it comes before a name

WRONG: This class is great, said Jennifer Cox, a Professor.

RIGHT: This class is great, said Jennifer Cox, a professor.

EVEN BETTER: This class is great, Professor Cox said.

Subject/verb agreement

• A verb must agree with the intended number of its subject

WRONG: This class [singular subject] are [plural verb] great. RIGHT: This class [singular subject] is [singular verb] great.RIGHT: These classes [plural subject] are [plural verb] great.

Subject/verb agreement

The data is collected

The data are collected

Subject/verb agreement

The media is great.

The media are great.

Subject/pronoun agreement

The team must win their game.

The team must win its game.

Possessives/contractions

• You’re & Your

• It’s & Its

• They’re & Their

• Who’s & Whose

• The governor’s bill & The governors’ bill

• James’s shirt & James’ bike

Passive voice

• Turning the object of a sentence into the subject of a sentence

• Weakens the impact of your writing

• Makes the reader work harder than he or she should

Why was the road crossed by the chicken?

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Passive voice

The books were juggled by the accounting firm.

The accounting firm juggled the books.

Quotes issues

• Punctuation ALWAYS goes inside the quotation marks!

• “said” comes after the name…

• unless there is attributing information attached to it

“This class is great,” said Jennifer Cox, a professor at Salisbury University.

“This class is great,” Professor Cox said.

“This class is great,” said Professor Cox.

Commas - handout

• Commas in a series

• Independent clauses

• Introductory clauses

• Nonessential clauses

• Commas within quotes or paraphrases

What is ap style?

• Used by newspaper journalists in the United States as a grammatical guide

• Makes words and items generalizable in all locations

• Used by journalists in all types of writing (print and online)

• Used by PR practitioners to communicate with the press• Press releases• Emails• Media kits

Ap style – look up

• Proper nouns• Organizations (NASA, CIA, the Y/YMCA)• Peoples’ titles (president, military titles, academic

titles)• Places (states, cities without states [datelines])• Company names

Ap style

Dimensions• Always use numerals

• He is 6 feet tall.

• He is a 6-foot-tall baseball player.

Ages

• She is 16 years old.

• She is a 16-year-old hockey player.

Ap style

• Technology words:• website• Internet• email• the Web & Web page• URL• Smartphone

Ap style - Memorize

• Numbers zero through nine- written out; 10 and up – numerical

• Weird ones:• Dumpster & Realtor

• Toward versus towards

• More than versus over

• Fewer versus less than (individual versus bulk items)

• Under way

announcements

• Reading for tomorrow: Chapter 1 – Changing News Concepts

• Two worksheets due by 5 p.m. tomorrow

• I will post the answers online after that so you can check your work

• Please tune in for tomorrow’s lecture about hard news writing

• First AP style quiz tomorrow in MyClasses – you must take it by 9 p.m.