Avoiding Sentence Fragments

AvoidingSentenceFragmentsAsentenceisdefinedasagroupofwordscontainingasubject,averb,andacompletethought.Ifanyoftheseelementsismissing,thenthegroupofwordsisn`tasentence.Afragmentisagroupofwordsthatispunctuatedlikeasentenceandthatistryingtofunctionasasentence,butoneofthenecessaryelementsismissing.Thereareseveralwaystofindandcorrectfragments.Anygroupofwordsfunctioningasasentenceshouldbecheckedforthebasics.Doesithaveasubject?Doesithaveaverb?Doesitstartwithasubordinatingconjunctionorarelativepronounthatkeepsthethoughtfrombeingcomplete?Iftheanswertoanyofthequestionsisno,itisafragment.Correctingfragmentsisfairlysimpleandyouhaveseveraloptions.Forafragmentthatismissingasubjectorverb,addthemissingelement.Iftheproblemisasubordinatingconjunction,theconjunctioncanberemovedwhichwouldmakethefragmentacompletesentence.Anotheroptionistojointhefragmenttoanothersentenceeitherbeforeitorafteritintheparagraphcreatingacomplexsentence.Nomatterhowyouchoosetocorrectthefragment,itisimportantforyoutoeliminatethemfromyourwriting.Fragmentsareconsideredtobeamajorgrammaticalerrorinwritingbecausetheyindicatethatthewriterisn`tsurewhatasentenceis.Readerswilloftennotpayattentiontothepointawriterismakingifthereaderthinksthewriterdoesn`tevenunderstandhowtowriteacompletesentence.