A Quiz About Parallel Structure

A Quiz About Parallel Structure A Quiz About Parallel Structure A Quiz About Parallel Structure By Mark Nichol Many writers are thwarted by unsuccessful efforts to express equivalent ideas in phrases that clearly identify the hierarchy and relationships of those ideas. Here are five sentences in which syntactical structure fails to communicate these concepts. Try your hand at resolving the confusion, and then compare your results to my solutions at the bottom of the page: 1. â€Å"Learn to use this art form not only for performance but also to collaborate, exercise, and respect the differences of others.† 2. â€Å"Children enrolled in high-quality preschool programs are more likely to graduate from high school, hold down jobs, and less likely to be on welfare or end up in jail.† 3. â€Å"She will be returned to the same, or a substantially similar, position to the one held prior to the leave of absence, as required by law.† 4. â€Å"They pulled him from his vehicle, beat him, robbed him of his money and equipment.† 5. â€Å"Dedication, hard work, flexibility, a sense of humor, and the interest and ability to learn and improve professionally are some of the positive qualities the company seeks in all employees.† Answers 1. This sentence isn’t strictly incorrect, but it would be clearer if it didn’t lead the reader to infer that the additional benefits of the art form are that participants can collaborate the differences of others, exercise the differences of others, and respect the differences of others. That implication is eliminated if the preposition to is inserted before the second and third items in the list: â€Å"Learn to use this art form not only for performance but also to collaborate, to exercise, and to respect the differences of others.† 2. This sentence has contrasting â€Å"more likely† and â€Å"less likely† phrases, but includes two of one and one of the other, and the second â€Å"more likely phrase† is confusingly cordoned off by commas, leaving it bereft of context. To make the sentence correct, the brace of commas must be omitted and a conjunction added: â€Å"Children enrolled in high-quality preschool programs are more likely to graduate from high school and hold down jobs and are less likely to end up on welfare or in jail.† 3. This type of error is distressingly frequent, considering that it seems obvious that if the parenthetical phrase is removed, the sentence is awkward, therefore the original sentence is awkward. One of several possible fixes is to get the trailing phrase out of the way immediately by moving it to the head of the sentence, then presenting the fully expressed basic statement followed by the alternative: â€Å"As required by law, she will be returned to the same position held prior to the leave of absence, or a substantially similar one.† 4. Here’s another common error the omission of a conjunction before a concluding compound list item. As written, the sentence implies that there were four stages to the crime: 1) They pulled him from his vehicle, 2) they beat him, 3) they robbed him, and 4) equipment. Huh? That’s wrong. Only three things occurred; items 3) and 4) are one step. Because that one step is the final list item, it should be preceded by a conjunction: â€Å"They pulled him from his vehicle, beat him, and robbed him of his money and equipment.† 5. Interest and ability take different prepositions, so they need to be separated into parallel phrases where each word is supported by its own preposition: â€Å"Dedication, hard work, flexibility, a sense of humor, and the interest in learning and improving professionally and the ability to do so are some of the positive qualities the company seeks in all employees.† Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Grammar category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:English Grammar 101: All You Need to KnowCannot or Can Not?The Two Sounds of G

A Blessing in Blood

A Blessing in Blood A Blessing in Blood A Blessing in Blood By Maeve Maddox The English words blessing and blood are closely related. Old English blod came from P.Gmc *blodam, a word that in a still earlier form may have meant to swell, gush, spurt, or that which bursts out. The English word blood has cognates in several other languages: German: Blut Dutch: bloed Swedish: blod Danish: blod Norwegian: blod Yiddish: blut Old English bletsia, bledsian, bloedsian, meant to consecrate, make holy, give thanks. The P.Gmc form of the word was *blothisojan, mark with blood. The word bless is unique to English. Originally used for the act of sprinkling a pagan altar with blood, the word was adopted by Christian translators to render into English Latin benedicere and Greek eulogein which had been used to translate Hebrew brk, to bend (the knee) in the act of worship. Towards the end of the OE period, bledsian took on the meaning make happy because of the words resemblance to OE blià °s, bliss, merriment, happiness, grace, favor. Bliss comes from a P.Gmc. word meaning gentle, kind, as does blithe. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Vocabulary category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Good At, Good In, and Good With50 Idioms About Roads and PathsHow Verbs Become Adjectives

Biography of Archimedes Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Biography of Archimedes - Essay Example Archimedes may be from an ancient civilization but his ideas were far from ancient. In fact, he might be credited as one of the first individuals that were able to think outside the box. Archimedes was born in the third century BC in Syracuse and we know very little about his life. What we do know is that his father’s name was Phidias and he was an astronomer, which might give us some insight into Archimedes’ character. His intelligence was probably sparked at an early age by looking into the heavens and considering all of the possibilities of the universe. What we do not know is if Archimedes ever had a wife or children. He was killed during the Second Punic War but not after, he made countless contributions to the world of mathematics and psychics. In fact, it is safe to assume that without his inventions and discoveries, the world – especially his immediate world – would have looked considerably different. His inventions shaped thought and shaped the war and his influence cannot be overlooked or diminished. Archimedes discovered the value of pi by drawing a large polygon outside a circle and placing smaller polygons inside the circle. As polygons increase, so do the sides of the polygons and as this number of sides increases, the number becomes an accurate estimate of a circle. When the number of sides of the polygons reached 96, Archimedes calculated their lengths and illustrated that the value of pi is approximately 3.1416. Archimedes also demonstrated how the area of circles is equal to pi if it is multiplied by the square of the circle’s radius. Archimedes is significant to not only to the world of mathematics, but also to the world in general as almost everything contains an element of math, whether we realize it or not. Through his thinking and discoveries, Archimedes makes understanding of the physical world and the phenomenon within it easier. One of his most popular inventions is the Archimean Screw,