A sentence is a group of words that makes complete sense on its own. It tells us who is doing something, and what they are doing.
Why this matters: Clear sentences with capital letters and full stops make your writing easy to read. They help others understand exactly what you mean.
What is a sentence?
A sentence must make full sense. "The dog barked." is a sentence. "The big brown" is not, because it does not tell us what happened.
Capital letters
We use a capital letter in two main places:
| Rule | Example |
|---|---|
| At the start of a sentence | We went to the park. |
| For names of people and places | My friend Ali lives in Leeds. |
Full stops
A full stop is the small dot that shows a sentence has ended. Every telling sentence needs one.
The sun set behind the hills.
Putting words in order
Sometimes words get jumbled. Read them, find the naming word and the doing word, then put them in an order that makes sense.
Jumbled: cake / baked / Mum. In order: Mum baked cake. (You could add "a": Mum baked a cake.)