How to Teach Punctuation and Have Fun Doing It

By Donald C. Faulkner

From the Preface to the Smashwords edition

"In June of 2000, after twenty-three years of teaching English, I retired. My experience was all at the secondary level, much of it with students who had experienced limited success in previous English classes. Over time, my classroom became centered around their greatest weakness: the ability to write effectively. Once in the job market, regardless of the eventual extent of their education, almost all of them would at some point need to answer effectively, in writing the all-important question: “Why should I hire you instead of the other 100 people who’ve applied for this job?”

"For a majority of my students, the biggest stumbling block on the road to effective writing proved to be punctuation. As one student put it when asked what he found to be the most difficult part of writing, “I don’t know where the dots go.” To this student and many others, punctuation seemed either an innate ability that defied explanation or an incomprehensible set of rules force-fed them through rote memorization and repetitive drills. This was not, and is not, an effective blueprint for engaging students.

"During my ninth year in the classroom, an extremely rambunctious, last-period 8th grade class had me at the end of my rope—and it was only October. One evening, as I was at home pulling out my hair, the muse of education smiled upon me, and Uncle Donny’s (my system for teaching punctuation) was born. At its heart, Uncle Donny’s is Socratic learning wrapped in a game show. It is learning through questioning; trial and error; and practice, practice, practice within the context of a student’s own writing. It turned that rambunctious 8th grade class around and became the cornerstone of my teaching for the rest of my career.

"I used Uncle Donny’s with junior and senior high students, both traditional and alternative, but I believe that virtually any element of any curriculum in any subject matter at any level, from elementary through adult education, can be incorporated into the overall umbrella that is Uncle Donny’s."

In my book, I explain in detail the punctuation game that is the heart of Uncle Donny’s: how it works, why it works, and how you can integrate it into your entire curriculum. It’s a fast read (42,000 words), and I’ve written it so that by reading the first 10,000 words (the equivalent of eleven Word for Mac pages), you can digest the basics of the game in an evening and begin playing it the next day. All you need is a chalkboard, your imagination, and a willingness to make the hard work of learning more fun for all involved. Enjoy!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Donald C. Faulkner
• Release date: Apr 25, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370477647

Book preview

How to Teach Punctuation and Have Fun Doing It:

Uncle Donny’s Guide to Punctuation Prowess

By Don Faulkner

Copyright 2017 Don Faulkner

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite e-book retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

* * * * *

Table of Contents

Part 1: Uncle Donny’s Guide to Punctuation Prowess

Dedication

Preface

Introduction

Day one: an introduction

The first Board

Round Two through the end of the first Board

Things to remember while playing the Game

Board Two and beyond

Keeping the Game fresh

The Interclass Mechanics Challenge

The Mechanics Checklist

The Student Mechanics Guide

Appendices

Part 2: Uncle Donny’s Student Mechanics Guide: The Road to Punctuation Prowess

Simple and compound sentences

Commas ( , )

Semicolon ( ; )

Quotation marks ( ) in dialogue

Paragraphs

Parentheses ( )

Dash ( — )

Ellipsis ( . . . )

Colon ( : )

Apostrophe ( ‘ )

Hyphen ( - )

Titles

Capitalization

End Matter

* * * * *

Dedication

To my editor and chief, the lovely and talented, cute-as-a-button Carol Ann Horwitz, Queen of the semicolon.

* * * * *

Preface

In June of 2000, after twenty-three years of teaching English, I retired. My experience was all at the secondary level, much of it with students who had experienced limited success in previous English classes. Over time, my classroom became centered around their greatest weakness: the ability to write effectively. Once in the job market, regardless of the eventual extent of their education, almost all of them would at some point need to answer effectively, in writing the all-important question: Why should I hire you instead of the other 100 people who’ve applied for this job?

For a majority of my students, the biggest stumbling block on the road to effective writing proved to be punctuation. As one student put it when asked what he found to be the most difficult part of writing, I don’t know where the dots go. To this student and many others, punctuation seemed either an innate ability that defied explanation or an incomprehensible set of rules force-fed them through rote memorization and repetitive drills. This was not, and is not, an effective blueprint for engaging students.

During my ninth year in the classroom, an extremely rambunctious, last-period 8th grade class had me at the end of my rope—and it was only October. One evening, as I was at home pulling out my hair, the muse of education smiled upon me, and Uncle Donny’s (my system for teaching punctuation) was born. At its heart, Uncle Donny’s is Socratic learning wrapped in a game show. It is learning through questioning; trial and error; and practice, practice, practice within the context of a student’s own writing. It turned that rambunctious 8th grade class around and became the cornerstone of my teaching for the rest of my career.

I used Uncle Donny’s with junior and senior high students, both traditional and alternative, but I believe that virtually any element of any curriculum in any subject matter at any level, from elementary through adult education, can be incorporated into the overall umbrella that is Uncle Donny’s.

That being said:

1. No system is perfect.

2. I guarantee my system works.

No system is perfect. I want to make this clear right up front. Nothing in education works for everyone. No teacher, no class, no system, no philosophy. Nothing works for every teacher, let alone every student. Peruse the differing style sheets of major professional publications (or for that matter a clothing catalogue) and tell me one style fits all. Not all of my students succeeded, nor will all of yours. Not all students will work hard, or hard enough, or at all. Sometimes you and a student just won’t be a good fit. There is nothing you or any system can do about that.

That being said, I guarantee my system works. I guaranteed all my students that if they did exactly what I said, they would be successful. In sixteen years of using Uncle Donny’s, I was never proven wrong. Never. Not once. This does not mean that sixteen years worth of students all became perfect punctuators or that every student who did exactly what I said progressed to the same degree. Nowhere is it written life, liberty and the ability to acquire punctuation skills. However, every student who did do exactly what I said succeeded at least well enough to pass my class. In the real world, that is the bottom line.

At heart, I’m an actor and a game-show host, so for me, Uncle Donny’s was a perfect venue through which to inform and entertain. But if my style doesn’t work for you, experiment. Alter Uncle Donny’s, adapt it. Keep what works and throw the rest away. Take it in directions that I never did. It took me a year to get it right, and I continued to tinker with it until I retired. Through it all, regardless of how much tweaking I’d done or how much I had left to do, Uncle Donny’s worked better for me than anything else I ever tried, and it’s worked for other teachers, veterans and rookies alike. If you use the basics of the system exactly as I tell you to, it’ll work for you.

* * * * *

Introduction

Ownership

For many school writing assignments, students are told what to write, when to write it, how long the piece should be, and how much time they have to write it. Once the writing is done, they are told what they did wrong and how to correct it. Once the corrections have been attempted, they are told whether or not those corrections are correct. At no time is control of the writing process or its evaluation given to the writer. While feedback from a teacher-as-practiced-reader is invaluable, so is a writer’s self-critique. How else will student writers learn to set their own criteria, then examine and evaluate their drafts and finished pieces?

Punctuation is only a part of writing. However, to many students it is writing. Teachers who help their students over the punctuation hurdle earn their trust for the more important job of helping them take back ownership of their writing while discovering how useful effective writing skills can be in their lives.

Uncle Donny’s evolved as part of my effort to reach reluctant student writers. However, I soon discovered that it was just as effective in turning competent writers into confident writers and good writers into excellent ones. It can be of great value to any student of any ability level at any age as long as they do exactly what you say.

A final word before we begin

There are a lot of ideas, techniques and suggestions in this book. I have used them all but not all within the same school year. Please do not feel that you have to do everything! or that you have to do it all today! Start small, and only use what fits your needs in any given situation. That’s what I did.

* * * * *

Day One: an introduction

The bet

The Board

A brief history of punctuation

The Game

Points

Oral Readings

The bet

As students enter your classroom, they see the following text written on the board at the front of the room (hereafter known as the marker board): w r i t i n g w o u l d b e a l o t c l e a r e r i f w o r d s w e r e s e p a r a t e d b y d o t s

1 bernard could tell that this was not going to be his day

2 whenever a look from his huge brown soulful eyes didnt

3 work he knew he was in trouble rhonda honey let me

4 explain i did it for you sweet lips rhonda cut him off shouting

5 bernard i can overlook the loud hawaiian shirt and the

6 barrette adds a certain sparkle but a nose ring im sorry

7 bernard but a nose ring looks just plain stupid on a bassett

8 hound rhonda is not as liberal as she would have you believe

When writing the top line, make sure that you leave plenty of space between the letters so that dots can be inserted between them to create words: w r i t i n g • w o u l d • b e • a • l o t • c l e a r e r • i f • w o r d s • w e r e • s e p a r a t e d • b y • d o t s.

The bell rings, and while you are attending to beginning-of-class procedural matters, most students are reading the marker board. By the time you begin speaking, for the most part their curiosity is peaked, and they are ready to listen.

You (Y hereafter): There is not a reason in the world why you should believe that I know what I’m talking about or that, if I do, I can teach any of it to you. For all you know, I’m a terrible teacher. Why should you believe anything that I say unless I can prove to you that I know what I’m talking about? With this in mind, I’ve got a deal for you.

Here you turn to the marker board where you’ve written Bernard’s tale of woe or some other brief paragraph without punctuation or capitalization. Keep the first few Boards brief. A good deal of class time will be used up just learning how to play the Game. (The Game: the game show that is the core of Uncle Donny’s; Boards: what you write on the marker board to be used in the Game.)

Y: "If you do exactly what I tell you—exactly—I guarantee that when we are done working on Bernard’s tale of woe, you as a class will have punctuated and capitalized it with at least 70%, probably 80%, and possibly 90% accuracy."

(back to Day One: An Introduction)

The Board

Don’t make the first Board terribly difficult, but don’t make it so easy that the challenge loses credibility. The original Board shouldn’t contain anything obscure, such as punctuating quotes within quotes. It should contain constructions your students should have covered in previous years. Not every student will know everything, but enough students will know enough for the class to reach 70% accuracy. Let’s assume your first Board covers simple and compound sentences, appropriate end marks, commas separating items in a series, and the basics of quotation marks.

1 bernard could tell that this was not going to be his day

2 whenever a look from his huge brown soulful eyes didnt

3 work he knew he was in trouble rhonda honey let me

4 explain i did it for you sweet lips rhonda cut him off shouting

5 bernard i can overlook the loud hawaiian shirt and the

6 barrette adds a certain sparkle but a nose ring im sorry

7 bernard but a nose ring looks just plain stupid on a bassett

8 hound rhonda is not as liberal as she would have you believe

Here’s how I would want this Board to be punctuated and capitalized:

1 ¶ Bernard could tell that this was not going to be his day.

2 Whenever a look from his huge, brown, soulful eyes didn’t

3 work, he knew he was in trouble. "Rhonda, honey, let me

4 explain. I did it for you, sweet lips." ¶ Rhonda cut him off, shouting,

5 "Bernard, I can overlook the loud Hawaiian shirt, and the

6 barrette adds a certain sparkle, but a nose ring?! I’m sorry,

7 Bernard, but a nose ring looks just plain stupid on a Bassett

8 Hound!" ¶ Rhonda is not as liberal as she would have you believe.

Let’s break it down so it is easier to follow:

Bernard could tell that this was not going to be his day. Whenever a look from his huge, brown, soulful eyes didn’t work, he knew he was in trouble. "Rhonda, honey, let me explain. I