Comma rules

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

I'm trying to teach my dd in y2 the rules of sentences and commas. It hasn't been roughed on and her homework is dull, basically they are to find words for the given phonetic sounds that week and write a scentance. Dd is finding it very dull and boring. They have not yet covered any complex writing so far and dd is very read, was begging to be primed for this stuff at end of y1 but the class teacher in y2 seems to be going over all the learning has already done at end of reception and beginning of y1 and we are both growing a bit despondent and frustrated.

Dds learning is fairly swift, but im failing to get her to grasp scentance s, mainly because I'm not terribly confident my self that what im telling her is correct.

Can anyone recommend any free online resources that we can look at together. Specifically she is struggling with this kind of scentance where you use two commas...ie.

My daughter, who is six, is learning how to write.

So there is additional information, that with out, the first and last part of the scentance would make spence if the additional information was missing. I'm over complicating it for her and she is adding commas all over the place in an an attempt to master it.

I get so frustrated as her learning capacityfar out weighs my knowledge base

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

Touched on not roughed
Beginning to not begged, grrrrrr...Getting the hang of ipad and silly auto correct.

[Wolfiefan]

Try getting her to write a short simple sentence.
The boy kicked the ball.
Now what extra detail do you want to add about the boy?
Put commas like brackets round this extra info.
The boy, who was playing football with aliens, kicked the ball.

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

I have tried writing things my self and getting her to add the commas and she does it wright but when it comes to doing her own she adds them where they are not needed.

That sounds like a better suggestion Wolfe so she is seeing how a scentance can evolve. She also writes a little like she talks and waffles for ever so she gots a little lost in skirting around her point with lots of detail so I think that will help her construct coherently in her own mind.

[ProudNeathGirl]

You're going to have to learn to spell "sentence" if you want to help your daughter with her English grammar.
I would get her to read a lot, and read with her. They absorb good sentence construction by osmosis.

[pinkandsparklytoo]

I always thought that the use of double commas was around a part of the sentence which added extra detail but without which it would be a full sentence. Kind of like brackets. Not sure I have explained myself very well.

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

I don't think my learning to spell is relevant, I have the skills to check and correct and make sure I do at all times, incidentally, at 6, she is already better at spelling than me and often corrects me herself. It has so far not impeded her learning. And I'm sure in time she will master her use of commas far better than me too. That does mean I can't help her

I read to her and she reads also, my question is specifically with regard to her learning, and my teaching her the rules of commas, because admittedly I am not confident myself. My difficulty in learning these myself has not held me back in my academic career also, as I said I have the skills to check and correct. I'm just after some resources to further aid that.

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

Infact proud your post was very rude, judgmental and not very unhelpful. I often post here and not in primary education, as I know my dd is incredibly bright but probably not technically G&T as I find that most people are less judgmental and more accepting that helping a isn't elegant child can be difficult if you don't posses suck skills your self.

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

And autocorrect does not help either. An intelligent child...not...isn't elegant. Must work out how to turn off auto correct. But you get the just.

[ProudNeathGirl]

I was only trying to be helpful! I think spelling is incredibly important - getting it wrong can distract from or change the whole meaning of a sentence. It would be a great opportunity for you and DD to learn together.
I think it's great that your so supportive of her education.

[seeker]

Wondering why this is in G and T.............

[RedHelenB]

Why the worry about commas? They will be taught in school. More to the point, if she's a waffler try to focus on her actually writing the main points & the use of adjectives & adverbs to give more description to her writing. The other things would be connectives other than and, so next, therefore, then, afterwards, because etc.

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

Because they are not being taught in school, they spelling 4 and 5 letter words and writing short simple sentence which my dd is finding very mundane and she has already mastered this in yr R she has displayed an interest in looking at them. She seems to have grasped it far better over the past few days. Of course I'm working that too Helen and that is also what she has struggled with hand and what has hindered her. She seems to be getting better to construct a better style in her mind before trying to put it on paper.

[onesandwichshort]

There's a really good series of books called 'The Puncs' which give the rules for punctuation in quite an entertaining way - there's one book for each mark, I think the comma is called Colin. We managed to order them from the library, but they were also out there on Abebooks.

In the longer run, the best way of getting good punctuation is to teach her to parse sentences - i.e. know what all the different bits are called and what they do. When you know what a clause is, it's much easier to see what bits of the sentence need commas. (I know this sounds reactionary, but I learnt English grammar because i went to a school where most pupils weren't English first language, and honestly it taught me so much about how to write).

[TheEnthusiasticTroll]

Thank you onesandwichshort, that is very helpful, ill have a look for those books, she loves reading books for information so would really benefit from books like that.