Core Punctuation: Full Stops, Commas & Capitals (Years 6–9) — English

Use capital letters, full stops and commas correctly to separate sentences and organise ideas within them.

The most basic punctuation marks – capital letters, full stops and commas – do the heavy lifting in clear writing. They tell the reader where sentences begin, end and pause.

Why this matters Missing full stops and comma splices are the errors that most often pull writing down into the lowest accuracy bands at IGCSE. Master these first, and the rest of your punctuation becomes far easier.

A comma cannot join two complete statements on its own — that is a comma splice.

Capital letters

Use a capital letter for:

the first word of a sentence: The lesson began.
the pronoun I: Aisha and I studied.
proper nouns – names of people, places, days, months: Yusuf, London, Ramadan, Monday.

Full stops

A full stop ends a complete statement. Every sentence should end with one (or a question mark or exclamation mark). Two statements cannot be joined with a comma alone – that mistake is called a comma splice.

Wrong: It was hot, we opened the window.
Right: It was hot. We opened the window.

Commas

Commas separate items and mark pauses. Use them to:

separate items in a list: We bought dates, milk, bread and honey.
separate a starter phrase from the main clause: After lunch, we prayed.
mark off extra information: Omar, my cousin, is visiting.

Be careful not to sprinkle commas wherever you take a breath. A comma should do a real job, such as separating list items or clauses. Too many commas can chop a sentence up and confuse the reader, while too few can run ideas together. When you join two complete statements, a coordinating conjunction like and, but or so should sit after the comma, otherwise you create a comma splice.

Putting the marks together

Most sentences you write will use all three of these marks at once: a capital to open, commas to organise the middle and a full stop to close. Reading your work aloud, slowly, is the simplest way to hear where each mark belongs before you check it on the page.

Read your sentence aloud. A natural pause often marks a comma; a full stop marks the point where one complete idea ends and another begins.

Common exam mistake: The comma splice — joining two complete statements with a comma alone, as in "It was hot, we opened the window." This is one of the errors that most often pulls writing into the lowest accuracy bands. Use a full stop, a semicolon, or a comma plus a conjunction instead.

Exam technique: Read your sentence aloud slowly. A natural, short pause usually marks where a comma belongs; a point where one complete idea genuinely ends and another begins marks where a full stop belongs. Your ear catches punctuation your eye can miss.