Tricky Punctuation in Cartoons. Lidia Stanton

you need to know how to start one, too.

      The FIRST WORD OF A SENTENCE starts with a capital letter.

      A customer returned to the optician’s with a pair of glasses he had bought the previous day. He complained that the glasses were useless. The optician took the man outside and asked him to look up at the sky. Surprised, the customer looked into the sky. Hurriedly, the optician asked the customer what he could see. The man said, ‘I can see the sun,’ to which the optician replied as loudly as she could, ‘Ninety-three million miles and you’re complaining!’

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      That was an easy read, wasn’t it? I could almost hear your well-paced reading voice. Every full stop and capital letter served as navigation points to help you breathe normally and decide how to best use your voice.

      A PROPER NAME starts with a capital letter.

      ‘Proper’ means correct. It also means unique, one that everyone recognises.

      You certainly do, Zed. A proper name is one that refers to a particular person (or robot), place, event or institution. Zed, Emma Brown, Mr Spencer, Portugal, Manchester United and Easter are all proper names.

      Sometimes I wake up grumpy. Other times I let her sleep.

      STOP AND THINK

      What’s my pet’s name?

      I promise there is a hamster in the sentence above. Have you noticed anything unusual about the word ‘grumpy’? We usually associate it with feeling grumpy. Here, it’s a proper name and needs a capital letter.

      I HAVE A PROPER NAME

      C

      Sometimes I wake up Grumpy. Other times I let her sleep.

      OVER TO YOU

      How many missing capital letters can you find in the passage below? Use the box below to re-write it.

      Two mysterious people live in my house: somebody and nobody. Somebody did it and nobody knows who.

      I SAY BE SOMEBODY NOBODY THOUGHT YOU COULD BE

      STOP AND THINK

      Why do we sometimes start words like ‘Mum’, ‘Dad’, ‘Nan’, ‘Granny’ and ‘Grandad’ with a capital letter, but not always?

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      When we capitalise these words, we refer to a specific person or persons that we are, or someone is, related to. They then become proper names, or proper nouns. When we write ‘dad’ or ‘mums’, we are using common nouns. A dad is someone who is a father and mums are a group of mothers in general.

      LEMON SQUEEZY

      These sentences don’t look right. Can you re-write them so that all proper names start with capital letters?

      dad didn’t want every tom, dick and harry using our front garden bench.

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      rob slater is training for the winter olympics.

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      the queen will deliver a speech at the house of lords.

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      when in rome, do as the romans do.

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      an englishman’s home is his castle.

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      year 6 mums and dads waited outside the national gallery in london.

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      would you rather have a house in the big apple or silicon valley?

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      if the mountain will not come to mahomet, mahomet must go to the mountain.

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      liz chang, a panorama journalist, reported live from westminster.

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      please, two more minutes, dad. i’m not ready yet.

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      if cinderella’s shoe fit perfectly, then why did it fall off?

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      STOP AND CHECK

      Did you start all your sentences with a capital letter?

      STEP