CONTRACTIONS: OMG!
The Evil Testing Serpent will—and we mean will—test you on the two difficult
contractions.
Its vs. It’s
Remember: It’s is a contraction of it is. The possessive Its has no
apostrophe.*
Incorrect: Its no sin to eat another person’s bread, right?
Correct: It’s no sin to eat another person’s bread, right?
Their vs. They’re
They’re is a contraction of they are. Their is possessive.Incorrect: If people take each other’s bread, their going straight to hell.
Correct: If people take each other’s bread, they’re going straight to hell.
COMMAS: DEAR LORD, NO, RUN FOR THE HILLS!
Commas are a pain in the neck. You know this, we know this, and most
importantly, the Serpent knows this. We’ve already seen commas crop up in our
examples. They are by far the most commonly tested punctuation mark.
Commas do a lot of things. They separate asides, they separate elements in a
list, they link independent clauses with conjunctions such as and, but, so, and
they link independent and dependent clauses.