English Writing Lessons - How To Use Commas - English Writing Lesson

Learn how to use commas correctly in this English lesson. Get feedback from a certified English teacher in an online less. Learn how: http://bit.ly/ooe-teachers. You can see the full lesson (which includes the text and a quiz) here: https://www.oxfordonlineenglish.com/video-lesson-how-to-use-commas Commas are difficult to use correctly in English - why is this? It's because commas do different jobs in the sentence. These different types of comma follow different rules. So, to use commas correctly in English, you need to understand the different types of comma and what they do. Contents: 1. The Listing Comma 0:33 2. The Joining Comma 3:05 3. The Bracketing Comma 5:56 4. Common Mistakes 9:30 1. The listing comma The listing comma is used to separate items on a list. For example: - "We need two cucumbers, four tomatoes, some onions and a lettuce." - "We spent our time relaxing on the beach, swimming in the sea and drinking coffee in the seaside cafés." You can see that we use a comma between every item on the list, except for the last two; there isn't a comma before 'and'. In American English, there could also be a comma before 'and'. 2. The joining comma The joining comma is used to link two complete sentences, together with a linking word. For example: - "We were tired, and we really didn't feel like going anywhere." - "He seemed nice, but he just wasn't my type." We often use the joining comma with linking words such as 'but', 'and', 'or', 'although' and others. You can't use a joining comma with all linking words. For example, 'however' cannot be used with a comma. 3. The bracketing comma The bracketing comma is used to add extra information to a sentence. For example: - "This book, first published in 1956, is still useful for students today." — We add the extra phrase 'first published in 1956' between a pair of commas. - "One of my colleagues, who used to be a semi-professional footballer, invited me to play in their 5-a-side team this weekend." — We add the extra information 'who used to be a semi-professional footballer' in between a pair of commas. You'll learn more about how to use these different types of comma in the video lesson. You can also learn about common mistakes which English learners make with commas, so that you can avoid them. SUBSCRIBE to continue improving your English! https://goo.gl/UUQW8j Become an OOE member to see our newest lessons before they're available to the public, and more! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNbeSPp8RYKmHUliYBUDizg/join A big thank you to the Alphabet translation team from Syria for the Arabic captions!