Pennington Publishing Blog

Double Negatives

“I’ve never been no snitch!” Wallace said.

“So you’re saying that you have been a snitch. You used a double negative. Didn’t you learn in math that a double negative is a positive?” asked Tess.

“Math don’t teach us nothing about English, Tess.”

“I’d have to agree with you, Wallace.”

Definition and Examples

Non-standard English often differs from Standard English because of regional or cultural dialects. One form of Non-standard English is the double negative. In Non-standard English the double negative is used to emphasize the negative; however, in Standard English the double negatives can cancel each other out and form a positive. Example: I do not have no excuses. Standard English Revision: I do not have any excuses.

Read the rule.

Don’t use double negatives in essays or reports.

Re-write the sentence and [bracket] the double negatives.

1. Don’t tell me nothing about that situation. I don’t want to know anything.
2. Never tell nobody about your plans, so you won’t disappoint anyone.
3. Well, I don’t want not to come visit you.
4. I misplaced my phone. I can’t find it nowhere.
5. She is not unhelpful, but she doesn’t have a choice not to help when asked.

Revise the double negatives.

Never write no double negatives.

Answers

1. [Don’t] tell me [nothing] about that situation. I don’t want to know anything.
2. [Never] tell [nobody] about your plans, so you won’t disappoint anyone.
3. Well, I [don’t] want [not] to come visit you.
4. I misplaced my phone. I [can’t] find it [nowhere].
5. She is [not] [unhelpful], but she [doesn’t] have a choice [not] to help when asked.

*****

For more essay rules and practice, check out the author’s TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE. This curriculum includes 42 essay strategy worksheets corresponding to teach the Common Core State Writing Standards, 8 on-demand writing fluencies, 8 writing process essays (4 argumentative and 4 informative/explanatory), 64  sentence revision and 64 rhetorical stance “openers,” writing posters, and helpful editing resources. Differentiate your essay instruction in this comprehensive writing curriculum with remedial writing worksheets, including sentence structure, grammar, thesis statements, errors in reasoning, and transitions.Plus, get an e-comment bank of 438 prescriptive writing responses with an link to insert into Microsoft Word® for easy e-grading (works great with Google Docs),Download the following 24 FREE Writing Style Posters to help your students learn the essay rules. Each has a funny or ironic statement (akin to “Let’s eat Grandma) to teach the memorable rule.

Get the Writing Style Posters FREE Resource:

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Don’t teach grammar mini-lessons for two reasons: this instructional methodology is implicit and ineffective.

Currently, the top Google search for “new research on teaching grammar” brings up this article from The Atlantic, written by Professor Michelle Navarre Cleary:

The Wrong Way to Teach Grammar?

No more diagramming sentences: Students learn more from simply writing and reading.

A century of research shows that traditional grammar lessons—those hours spent diagramming sentences and memorizing parts of speech—don’t help and may even hinder students’ efforts to become better writers. Yes, they need to learn grammar, but the old-fashioned way does not work.

Case settled? Not exactly. In educational research it is much easier to disprove than to prove. Educational researchers frequently employ the null hypothesis in their experimental design. In a nutshell, a grammar program research study might have the following hypothesis: “There is no statistical significance between the achievement of grade 8 students taught with such and such grammar program and those not taught with said grammar program as measured by such and such assessment over such and such a period of time.”

By design, any findings would have to be extremely limited and the control group, unless unexposed to any literacy activities in hermetically-sealed isolation chambers, would have so many variables that any findings would be questionable. Such has been the case with the century of research on grammar and usage acquisition and its transfer to writing. Two separate issues, by the way.

What the good professor is advocating is learning grammar implicitly from reading and writing, especially the latter. She suggests mini-lessons in the context of writing as a superior method of writing instruction (Notice: not grammar instruction).

We know that grammar instruction that works includes teaching students strategies for revising and editing, providing targeted lessons on problems that students immediately apply to their own writing, and having students play with sentences like Legos, combining basic sentences into more complex ones. Often, surprisingly little formal grammar instruction is needed. Researcher Marcia Hurlow has shown that many errors “disappear” from student writing when students focus on their ideas and stop “trying to ‘sound correct.’”

These grammar mini-lessons are part and parcel of the implicit instructional approach: “If you do something over and over again, you’ll eventually stop making mistakes and get gooder at the task.” It’s akin to playing Monopoly for the first time without reading the rules. No, you don’t eventually learn to play by playing and being interrupted by occasional mini-lessons on what to do when passing “Go.”

What’s Wrong with the Implicit Approach in Mini-Lessons?

1. It is simply inefficient. Waiting to teach a mini-lesson as students need the grammatical tool always comes with this advice: “When you notice that some of your students are having capitalization issues regarding article titles, pull a group of students needing the instruction and teach the relevant rules.” Of course, other students may need that same instruction, but have not yet evidenced the problems in writer mini-conferences with the teacher. Furthermore, why not teach the capitalization rules for all proper nouns. You know you are going to have to teach another mini-lesson next week on the capitalization of song and poem titles. Lastly, the beauty of the Common Core State Standards is the grade-level expectations and the mastery approach to learning. The CCSS Language Strand has quite explicit grammar, usage, and mechanics grade-level Standards.
2. It is haphazard and disjointed. A traditional grammar approach provides explicit, planned instruction. An isolated mini-lesson on combining sentences by starting with a prepositional phrase will not make sense unless students have a solid foundation of subjects, predicates (a prepositional phrase never includes the subject or predicate), the characteristics of a phrase and a complete sentence, the role of commas with introductory phrases, etc. All other academic disciplines build upon foundations: no math teacher would do a mini-lesson on long division before teaching the multiplication tables.
3. It does not connect to other  language instruction. An isolated mini-lesson on semi-colons does not connect to related lessons on comma-conjunction rules, independent and dependent clauses, the use of phrases in lists, etc. The amount of scaffolding required to teach a mini-lesson on mis-use of the semi-colon is significant. Interestingly, the most popular approach to grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction, Daily Oral Language, is at the forefront of criticism by those favoring the mini-lesson approach for not connecting to other language instruction. See my article “Why Daily Oral Language (D.O.L.) Doesn’t Work” for more.
4. It falsely teaches students that grammar is an editing skill alone. Aside from the sentence combining practice, advocates of the mini-lesson approach teaches students that grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction is all about mistakes, rather than about tools to enrich speaking and writing.

Why Are Grammar Mini-Lessons So Ineffective?

1. There is no corroborating research. Those advocating the relegation of grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction to mini-lessons have zero research studies to confirm a positive correlation with this approach on either grammar or writing assessments. It’s easy to throw stones at traditional grammar approaches, but it does not follow that mini-lessons are the best and only alternatives. The professor in The Atlantic article only cites anecdotal evidence that learning grammar from writing does, indeed, work.
2. We’ve been there and done that. Decades of ignoring explicit grammar instruction have not seen increased reading or writing ability in our students. The Common Core authors in Appendix A crush the notion that implicit instructional approaches produce better results than explicit ones. Hence, the unpopular (among grammar mini-lesson fans) inclusion of a separate Language Strand. Even the most recent National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) position statement in the NCTE Guideline now stresses the importance of direct instruction in these areas (even including parts of speech and sentence diagramming) with the caveat that instruction must be connected to reading, writing, and speaking. Regarding instructional approaches, the NCTE position might surprise some die-hard anti-grammar fanatics.
3. There is less grammar teaching in mini-center classrooms. It’s just true. Those who use mini-lessons devalue the important contributions that grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction bring to developing readers and writers. Or, as is often the case, teachers did not learn grammar as students and did not learn how to teach grammar, usage, and mechanics in teacher preparation classes. Grammar can be scary and teachers seek their own instructional comfort levels.
4. This instructional philosophy trickles into other language instruction. The implicit instruction of grammar mini-lessons bleeds into other areas of language instruction. Typically, those who teach grammar mini-lessons follow suit in vocabulary instruction. Again, the days of teaching only vocabulary in context and assorted mini-lessons on context clues has not done the job. The Common Core State Standards require a variety of direct vocabulary instruction at each grade level to improve the academic language of our students. See an example of the Vocabulary Acquisition and Use Standards, again found in the Language Strand to see if these Standards are conducive to a mini-lesson approach (They are not). In reading instruction we abandoned the “whole to part” strategy years ago following the 1985 National Reading Panel Report with its reading research consistently supporting the explicit, systematic approach to reading development. Interestingly, many teachers who now teach direct vocabulary and reading instruction have hung on to the implicit approach to grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction.
5. Not enough practice. William Van Cleave argued that mini-lessons rarely produced the amount of connected practice to master syntactic skills.

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See how much you know about grammar by taking the 10 Question Grammar Quiz for Teachers. Don’t worry; I’ll dispense with the usual “If you score 9 or 10 out of 10, you are…” Let’s keep things fun! Take out a pen and some scratch paper. Number from 1‒10.

First, let’s get the obvious out of the way. I wrote this quiz to sell my grammar books to teachers. I selected quiz items from the grades 4‒8 Common Core Anchor Standards for Language. Helpful links follow each question if you want to learn explore the grammatical topics.

The answers to the multiple-choice questions follow my promotional materials to ensure that you glance at my books. I would be happy to explain any of the distractors. Comments are welcomed (not welcome).

Grammar Quiz for Teachers

1. When multiple adjectives are used within a sentence, the adjectival types should follow this order:

A. Which one? How many? What kind? B. What kind? Which one? How many?

C. What kind? How many? Which one? D. How many? Which one? What kind?

2. When multiple adverbs are used within a sentence, the adverbial types should follow this order:

A. Where? What degree? How? When? B. How? When? What degree? Where?

C. When? How? Where? What Degree? D. What degree? How? Where? When?

I know you’re craving examples at this point, but we need to teach the rules, so that students will be able to apply them and not solely depend upon oral language proficiency.

3. A past participle is best described by what part of speech?

A. Adverb B. Adjective

C. Verb D. Conjunction

http://www.grammar-monster.com/glossary/past_participles.htm

4. Examples of correlative conjunctions include the following:

A. unless, despite B. for, nor

C. either, or D. however, then

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

5. Examples of coordinate adjectives include the following:

A. dark green moss B. homemade apple pie

C. heavy, bulky sweater D. delicious, low-fat, dessert

https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/commas-with-adjectives

6. Which of the following does not describe a function of the present perfect verb tense (or form, if you prefer)?

A. A physical or mental action or a state of being happening or existing before the present

B. An ongoing action happening or existing now

C. An action that took place at some unidentified time in the past that relates to the present

D. An action that began in the past but continues to the present

https://blog.penningtonpublishing.com/tag/perfect-verbs/

Okay, so you’re probably not going to get all of these answers correct. I’m sure it’s just the way I’ve phrased the questions and/or answers.

7. Identify which answer provides James as the subject of this sentence:

A. Running helped James lower his body fat.

B. Why is James asking if Sheena wants dessert?

C. The teacher of the year is James.

D. The birthday party for James was orchestrated by his closest friends.

https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/grammar/syntax-sentences-and-clauses/subjects-and-predicates/v/subjects-and-predicates-syntax-khan-academy

8. The grammatical problem in this sentence is a dangling modifier:

A. Re-reading the question clearly improves the accuracy of your answers.

B. I dusted always on Tuesdays.

C. He acted more conspicuously than I.

D. Fired from her job, her car became her home.

https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/597/1/

9. The grammatical problem in this sentence is the use of an indefinite pronoun reference:

A. He did have pens, but we didn’t need any right now.

B. I called Jesse’s work, but he never answered.

C. None were happier than he.

D. Peter was a brilliant chemist and teacher. That is why his students loved his class.

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/pronouns/

10. Which one of the following sentences includes a direct object?

A. To him I gave my favorite ring.

B. “Is this Marsha?” “It is I.”

C. The popcorn seems too salty for most people.

D. Ismelda acts nicely when no one is looking.

http://www.write.com/writing-guides/general-writing/grammar/direct-and-indirect-objects/

Want to take the Mechanics Quiz for Teachers? Check it out after you correct your grammar quiz.

Quiz Answers

1. A      2. D      3. B      4. C     5. C     6. B     7. B     8. D     9. C     10. A

*****

Teaching Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics (Grades 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and High School) are full-year, traditional, grade-level grammar, usage, and mechanics programs with plenty of remedial practice to help students catch up while they keep up with grade-level standards. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep lessons in print or interactive Google slides with a fun secret agent theme. Simple sentence diagrams, mentor texts, video lessons, sentence dictations. Plenty of practice in the writing context. Includes biweekly tests and a final exam.

Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Interactive Notebook (Grades 4‒8) is a full-year, no prep interactive notebook without all the mess. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep grammar, usage, and mechanics lessons, formatted in Cornell Notes with cartoon response, writing application, 3D graphic organizers (easy cut and paste foldables), and great resource links. No need to create a teacher INB for student make-up work—it’s done for you! Plus, get remedial worksheets, biweekly tests, and a final exam.

Syntax in Reading and Writing is a function-based, sentence level syntax program, designed to build reading comprehension and increase writing sophistication. The 18 parts of speech, phrases, and clauses lessons are each leveled from basic (elementary) to advanced (middle and high school) and feature 5 lesson components (10–15 minutes each): 1. Learn It!  2. Identify It!  3. Explain It! (analysis of challenging sentences) 4. Revise It! (kernel sentences, sentence expansion, syntactic manipulation) 5. Create It! (Short writing application with the syntactic focus in different genre).

Get the Diagnostic Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Assessments, Matrix, and Final Exam FREE Resource:

Get the Grammar and Mechanics Grades 4-8 Instructional Scope and Sequence FREE Resource:

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If we consider the traditional four communicative contexts of English-language arts (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) and add on a fifth, the visual context, thanks to the interesting research of Kress and van Leeuwen, we find that language never takes place in isolation. Even when my wife talks to herself, she does have an audience (and I’m rarely included).

A few examples (with good instructional links and the related Common Core Standards) will remind us of how we teach the language interactively:

We teach students to actively listen to a speaker by asking relevant questions.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.6.1.C
“Pose and respond to specific questions with elaboration and detail by making comments that contribute to the topic, text, or issue under discussion.”

We teach students to speak to their audience, using specific techniques to interest our listeners.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.4.4
“Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience in an organized manner, using appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak clearly at an understandable pace.”

We teach students to engage their audience in writing assignments.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.3.A
Engage and orient the reader by establishing a context and point of view and introducing a narrator and/or characters; organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically.

We teach students to maintain a dialog with the author when reading.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RF.5.4.A
Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding.

We teach students to analyze media and consider the choices in terms of content, editing, and production made by, say, a filmmaker, videographer, or graphic artist.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.7.7
Compare and contrast a text to an audio, video, or multimedia version of the text, analyzing each medium’s portrayal of the subject (e.g., how the delivery of a speech affects the impact of the words).

So, why are teachers so reticent to abandon teaching grammar in isolation?

Now, most of you are thinking that I’m referring to teaching grammar in isolation via drill and kill worksheets, divorced from listening, speaking, writing, and reading. I’m not. As an aside, while I certainly try to apply my grammar, usage, and mechanics instruction to the instructional subject, I (like all teachers I work with at my school) find that some grammatical instruction is most efficiently accomplished in isolation. For example, when I teach sentence variety through modeled grammatical sentence openers in the context of revising process paper drafts, I always find that some re-teaching is necessary for some students. If half of my students still don’t know the definition of an adverb, its function, proper adverbial order, and some examples, they won’t be able to use a few of my grammatical sentence openers revisions to improve their process papers.  I see no reason not to bust out a down and dirty adverbs worksheet for those seventh grade students who need it.

What I mean by teaching grammar in isolation is didactic direct instruction (teacher talks to the class) or individual students complete a grammar worksheet and turn it in to the teacher to grade instruction.

Instead of those types of isolated learning experiences, I contend that grammar is best learned by function and, interactively, in a social context. My new Syntax in Reading and Writing program features collaborative learning in an “I do it,” “We do it,” “You do it” gradual release model.

Not to get to hung up on definitions, but let’s cite one:

“A grammar is the rules and constraints on what can be represented. A grammar is a social resource of a particular group” (Kress and van Leeuwen).

If grammar provides the tools (“the rules and constraints”) for communication, it makes sense that these tools would best be defined, identified, practiced, and applied in the context of collaborative communication (the “social resource of a particular group”). The classroom teacher certainly provides one important source of communication, but students themselves are often an untapped source of learning. Students can learn grammar from each other.

*****

Teaching Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics (Grades 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and High School) are full-year, traditional, grade-level grammar, usage, and mechanics programs with plenty of remedial practice to help students catch up while they keep up with grade-level standards. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep lessons in print or interactive Google slides with a fun secret agent theme. Simple sentence diagrams, mentor texts, video lessons, sentence dictations. Plenty of practice in the writing context. Includes biweekly tests and a final exam.

Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Interactive Notebook (Grades 4‒8) is a full-year, no prep interactive notebook without all the mess. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep grammar, usage, and mechanics lessons, formatted in Cornell Notes with cartoon response, writing application, 3D graphic organizers (easy cut and paste foldables), and great resource links. No need to create a teacher INB for student make-up work—it’s done for you! Plus, get remedial worksheets, biweekly tests, and a final exam.

Syntax in Reading and Writing is a function-based, sentence level syntax program, designed to build reading comprehension and increase writing sophistication. The 18 parts of speech, phrases, and clauses lessons are each leveled from basic (elementary) to advanced (middle and high school) and feature 5 lesson components (10–15 minutes each): 1. Learn It!  2. Identify It!  3. Explain It! (analysis of challenging sentences) 4. Revise It! (kernel sentences, sentence expansion, syntactic manipulation) 5. Create It! (Short writing application with the syntactic focus in different genre).

Get the Diagnostic Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Assessments, Matrix, and Final Exam FREE Resource:

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Non-standard English Commonly Misused Words       

Play the quick video lesson HERE and click the upper left back arrow to return to this lesson.            

Common Core Language Standard 1

We speak differently in different social situations. Hopefully, you talk to your mom and teacher differently than the way you talk to your friends. Most of us text differently than the way we write an essay. After all, beginning an essay with “BTW some so reb ldrs thot they really would win the civil war LOL” will probably not impress your history teacher. Students definitely need to learn the fine art of “code switching.” To code switch means to consider your audience and adjust what you say or write and how you do so. Using non-standard English in the wrong setting, such as in the classroom, is important to recognize and avoid.

Today’s grammar and usage lesson is on Non-standard English Commonly Misused Words. Remember that Non-standard English often differs from Standard English because of regional or cultural dialects. Often we are used to hearing and saying words or expressions that are not Standard English. Now let’s read the mechanics lesson and study the examples. 

Following are commonly misused words:

• Additions: We should say anyway, not anyways. We should say toward, not towards.
• Deletions: We should say used to, not use to. We should say nothing, not nothin’. something, not somethin’, and anything, not anythin’. Example: I used to play guitar.
• Misused Phrases: We should say I couldn’t care less, not I could care less. We should say once in a while, not once and a while. We should say any more, not no more. We should say could have, not could of. And no would of, should of, might of.

Now circle or highlight what is right and revise what is wrong according to grammar and usage lesson.

Practice:  I could care less if you put somethin’ towards the balance of the loan. That amount doesn’t matter much anyways.

Let’s check the Practice Answers.

Grammar and Usage Practice Answers:  I couldn’t care less if you put something toward the balance of the loan. That amount doesn’t matter much anyway.

Now let’s apply what we have learned. 

Writing Application: Write your own sentence using a commonly misused phrase.

*****

Teaching Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics (Grades 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and High School) are full-year, traditional, grade-level grammar, usage, and mechanics programs with plenty of remedial practice to help students catch up while they keep up with grade-level standards. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep lessons in print or interactive Google slides with a fun secret agent theme. Simple sentence diagrams, mentor texts, video lessons, sentence dictations. Plenty of practice in the writing context. Includes biweekly tests and a final exam.

Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Interactive Notebook (Grades 4‒8) is a full-year, no prep interactive notebook without all the mess. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep grammar, usage, and mechanics lessons, formatted in Cornell Notes with cartoon response, writing application, 3D graphic organizers (easy cut and paste foldables), and great resource links. No need to create a teacher INB for student make-up work—it’s done for you! Plus, get remedial worksheets, biweekly tests, and a final exam.

Syntax in Reading and Writing is a function-based, sentence level syntax program, designed to build reading comprehension and increase writing sophistication. The 18 parts of speech, phrases, and clauses lessons are each leveled from basic (elementary) to advanced (middle and high school) and feature 5 lesson components (10–15 minutes each): 1. Learn It!  2. Identify It!  3. Explain It! (analysis of challenging sentences) 4. Revise It! (kernel sentences, sentence expansion, syntactic manipulation) 5. Create It! (Short writing application with the syntactic focus in different genre).

Get the Diagnostic Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Assessments, Matrix, and Final Exam FREE Resource:

Grammar/Mechanics, Spelling/Vocabulary, Writing grammar books, Grammar Lessons, grammar programs, grammar teaching resources, Language Conventions Lessons, non-standard English, pennington publishing, teaching resources, Teaching the Language Strand, writing openers

Non-standard English  Misused Words      

Play the quick video lesson HERE and click the upper left back arrow to return to this lesson.            

Common Core Language Standard 1

Sometimes we hear an incorrect word or phrase so often that it sounds correct. Learning to pay attention to those commonly misused words and phrases will help you use them correctly in your speaking and writing.

Today’s grammar and usage lesson is on Non-standard English Commonly Misused Words. Remember that Non-standard English often differs from Standard English because of regional or cultural dialects. Often we are used to hearing and saying words that are not Standard English. 

Now let’s read the grammar and usage lesson and study the examples.

Following are commonly misused words:

• Farther refers to a physical distance. Example: How much farther is the next restaurant? Further refers to a degree or more time. Example: Further your knowledge by reading.
• Beside means “next to.” Examples: She sits beside me. Besides means “except” or “furthermore.” Example: No one is having fun besides him. I am tired, besides I am sick.
• Less deals with an amount, but can’t be counted. Example: I want less food. Fewer deals with an amount you can count. Example: I want fewer apples, not more.
• Disinterested describes a person who is neutral, fair, and impartial. Example: The disinterested referee made the call. Uninterested describes a person who is not interested. Example: The uninterested girl paid no attention to the flirtatious boy.
• Allowed means permitted. Example: Parking is allowed on this street. Aloud means heard by others. Example: He spoke aloud to the class.

Now circle or highlight what is right and revise what is wrong according to grammar and usage lesson.

Practice: I’m really disinterested about the season. I am watching less games than ever. Plus, the stadium is further than I want to go and tailgating isn’t aloud. And I have to sit beside a stranger.

Let’s check the Practice Answers.

Mechanics Practice Answers: I’m really disinterested about the season. I am watching fewer games than ever. Plus, the stadium is farther than I want to go and tailgating isn’t allowed. And I have to sit beside a stranger.

Now let’s apply what we have learned.

Writing Application:  Write your own sentence using a non-standard English Commonly Misused Words. Then write a second sentence correcting that non-standard English.

*****

Teaching Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics (Grades 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and High School) are full-year, traditional, grade-level grammar, usage, and mechanics programs with plenty of remedial practice to help students catch up while they keep up with grade-level standards. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep lessons in print or interactive Google slides with a fun secret agent theme. Simple sentence diagrams, mentor texts, video lessons, sentence dictations. Plenty of practice in the writing context. Includes biweekly tests and a final exam.

Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Interactive Notebook (Grades 4‒8) is a full-year, no prep interactive notebook without all the mess. Twice-per-week, 30-minute, no prep grammar, usage, and mechanics lessons, formatted in Cornell Notes with cartoon response, writing application, 3D graphic organizers (easy cut and paste foldables), and great resource links. No need to create a teacher INB for student make-up work—it’s done for you! Plus, get remedial worksheets, biweekly tests, and a final exam.

Syntax in Reading and Writing is a function-based, sentence level syntax program, designed to build reading comprehension and increase writing sophistication. The 18 parts of speech, phrases, and clauses lessons are each leveled from basic (elementary) to advanced (middle and high school) and feature 5 lesson components (10–15 minutes each): 1. Learn It!  2. Identify It!  3. Explain It! (analysis of challenging sentences) 4. Revise It! (kernel sentences, sentence expansion, syntactic manipulation) 5. Create It! (Short writing application with the syntactic focus in different genre).

Get the Diagnostic Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics Assessments, Matrix, and Final Exam FREE Resource:

Grammar/Mechanics, Writing grammar books, Grammar Lessons, grammar programs, grammar teaching resources, Language Conventions Lessons, non-standard English, pennington publishing, teaching resources, Teaching the Language Strand, writing openers

Non-standard English Additions   

Play the quick video lesson HERE and click the upper left back arrow to return to this lesson.            

Common Core Language Standard 1

Some people can’t leave “well enough alone.” In other words, they have to add on more than what is needed. People do this in their speaking and writing as well.

Today’s grammar and usage lesson is on Non-standard English Additions. Non-standard English often differs from Standard English because of regional or cultural dialects. 

Now let’s read the grammar and usage lesson and study the examples.

Avoid using non-standard use additions. Don’t add the of or on prepositions when unnecessary. Examples: Get off of my couch. Don’t blame on me for that.

When writing in Standard English, do not use double negatives. Example: Don’t use no notes on the test.

Now circle or highlight what is right and revise what is wrong according to grammar and usage lesson.

Practice: All of a sudden, she changed her mind. She said she did it on accident. She never did nothing like that before now.

Let’s check the Practice Answers.

Grammar and Usage Practice Answers: Suddenly, she changed her mind. She said she did it accidentally. She never did anything like that before now.

Now let’s apply what we have learned.

Writing Application: Write your own sentence using a non-standard English addition. Then write a second sentence correcting that non-standard English.

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