This week for one of the online colleges that I teach for I am facilitating a student workshop on grammar and thought that I would write a blog post on this topic by stating the Top 5 grammar mistakes I see online colleges often making.

1. A lot!- Always remember that words like “a lot” are two words. You would be surprised how many times I find my students writing “alot.” MS Word should catch common errors like this for you when writing research papers, but I mostly see this in the class discussions. I highly recommend that you first type all discussion questions in MS Word first and then copy and paste them into your online class discussion boards. Many students tend to only write what they are saying out loud and fail to take the time to actually double check their spelling and grammar. However, I have been noticing more and more students using programs like Dragon and other speech recognition software that does the typing for you. This is a very good tool and a great convenience, but one still must double check the spelling and grammar. I actually use this in some of my online classes as well which saves me so much time and is easier on my hands and fingers.

2. Run-on Sentences- This is a common mistake I often see many online college students make. They fail to use commas and semi-colons and should really break up these long run-on sentences into smaller sentences.

3. Abuse of Commas- This is very similar to run-on sentences as some students will use more than two commas in the same sentence which seems to be very long winded and often lose the reader.

4. Quotes- Many students often do not directly quote information from the exact source which can lead to plagiarism issues. Using quotes correctly is one way to prevent plagiarism as outlined in my previous blog post on “How to Avoid Plagiarism.” Also, a common grammar mistake I find online students making with quotes is not putting all punctuation inside the quotes.

5. Common Usage- Here are the most typical common usage grammar mistakes I find in my online courses that students really need to make sure they don’t make:

  • There vs. Their vs. They’re
  • Loose vs. Lose
  • Its vs. Its
  • i.e. vs. e.g.
  • Effect vs. Affect
  • You’re vs. Your vs. You Are
  • Then vs. Than
  • Whose vs. Who’s

And finally, here are some great websites and resources that may help you learn more about how not to make any of these basic grammar mistakes as well as help you get better grades in your online classes:

Grammar Errors: http://www.grammarerrors.com/

Purdue University Online Writing Lab: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/

Common Errors in English Usage: http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html

Guide to Grammar and Style (Rutgers): http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/

Notes on Writing (UCONN): http://web.uconn.edu/langlois/writing/usage.html

A Brief Writing Guide (Central Michigan University): http://www.chsbs.cmich.edu/robert_noggle/General%20student%20Info/writing-guide.html

 

Has this blog post on grammar been helpful? Hopefully, by reading this blog post you will improve your overall grammar in your online courses. Next week I will be teaching a workshop on critical thinking and will be writing a blog post on that. “See you” next week!