Lesson – 5
Punctuation
Read the lines given below.
one day two merchants named ram and shyam came to the magnificent
court of akbar ram said your majesty this is my friend shyam i had given him
my treasure before going on some work in a new town after returning from
there when i asked him to return that treasure he is denying everything
It is difficult to understand these lines as we have not put the punctuation
marks wherever necessary.
Now, read the same lines again.
One day two merchants named Ram and Shyam came to the magnificent
court of Akbar. Ram said, “Your majesty! This is my friend Shyam. I had
given him my treasure before going on some work in a new town. After
returning from there when I asked him to return that treasure, he is denying
everything.”
It is easier to understand these lines now because we have put the
punctuations marks wherever necessary.
Remember
Punctuation means putting pauses at the right places in sentences
to express the meaning clearly and to make it easier to understand.
There are several punctuation marks. Some of them are discussed below:
1. Capital Letter
We all know that there are 26 alphabets in English language. These
can be written in two ways:
Capital letters Small letters
A B C D E….. a b c d e…..
We use capital letters for the following:
the first letter of the first word in a sentence
a. Eggs are rich in protein.
b. Rosy is a hard-working girl.
the first letter of all proper nouns
a. My birthday is in December.
b. The play is written by Shakespeare.
the pronoun ‘I’
a. My father and I went to the zoo yesterday.
the important words in the headings of books, movies and stories
a. the Ramayana
b. the Discovery of India
every new line of a poem may usually begin with a capital letter
The sweetest thing that ever grew
Beside a human door!
the first word of a direct quotation
She said, ‘All my demands have been met.’
2. Full Stop (.)
A small dot (.) put in the end of a sentence is called full stop. We use
full stop at the end of assertive sentences.
Examples:
a. Bring a dozen apples from the market.
b. The children are playing in the park.
3. Question Mark (?)
We use question mark at the end of a question.
a. How old is he?
b. Are you sure this news is true?
4. Exclamation Mark (!)
It is used at the end of a sentence where in we express sudden or
strong feelings.
a. What an excellent idea!
b. Alas! His uncle is no more.
5. Apostrophe (‘)
We use apostrophe for the following to show possession or
belongingness.
a. This is Rohan’s bag.
b. My mother purchases vegetables from Kapoor’s family mart.
Remember
We put the ( ’ ) before s in case of singular and plural nouns not ending in
‘s’.
Examples: women’s college, Tanu’s clothes, etc.
We put the ( ’ )after s in case of singular or plural nouns ending in ‘s’.
Examples: ladies’ tailor, boys’ school, etc.
Apostrophe also helps in writing short forms.
Examples:
a. did not – didn’t
He did not attend the function.
He didn’t attend the function.
b. I am – I’m
I am going to the airport.
I’m going to the airport.
6. Comma (.)
Comma has the following uses:
to separate words in a series
a. Bring pens, pencils, erasers and notebooks from the market.
b. Radhika is a sweet, kind and polite girl.
[Remember not to put comma before ‘and’]
to separate the rest of the sentence from the name of the person being
spoken to
a. Where are you going, Geetika?
b. Sunny, please pass me the sugar.
to separate groups of words in a sentence
a. The day after, she visited her grandparents.
b. She is, as far as I know, a very reliable person.
to separate expressions like ‘thank you’, ‘yes’, ‘well’, ‘in fact’,
‘however’
a. Yes, I will participate in the function.
b. The result was, in fact, declared by the teacher.
c. Thank you, mummy.
7. Quotation Mark or Inverted Comma (“ ”)
The quotation marks are used to set off the actual words used by a
speaker.
a. Gopal said, “I want to become a lawyer when I grow up.”
b. The speaker said, “It is our duty to defend our country.”
A.
________________________________________________________________________
B. Punctuate the following sentences.
a. switch off the television arjun
_____________________________________________________________________
b. he said i cant come with you
_____________________________________________________________________
c. how tall you have grown
_____________________________________________________________________
d. we visited Mumbai, Nagpur, patna, agra and delhi
_____________________________________________________________________
e. have you finished your homework
_____________________________________________________________________
f. can you do me a favour she asked
_____________________________________________________________________
g. dont drive so fast
_____________________________________________________________________
h. This is niharikas bag
_____________________________________________________________________
i. The manager said you are late again
_____________________________________________________________________
j. you look very tired sit down and relax
_____________________________________________________________________
C. Danny has forgotten to punctuate this letter. Help him to punctuate
the letter using full stop, comma, exclamation mark or question mark.
H.No.34__ Jai Apartments
Sector – 25___ Rohini
Delhi
25 November 2019
Dear Joe
Hi____ How are you____ I’m having a great time at the camp_____ Every
day I swim_____ play basketball_____ dance and sing songs____ I’ve
made many new friends___
Yours affectionately
Danny
D. Rewrite the following passage after putting the punctuation marks
wherever necessary.
once on a stormy night a traveller named vivek went to a dharamshala
to seek shelter he was highly disappointed to find the door locked
when he knocked at the door the keeper of the dharamshala called out
from within i am sorry i cannot open the door for i have lost the key
however the door can be unlocked with a silver key do you have one
the traveller who was quite intelligent got the hint and pushed a rupee
coin under the door the keeper opened the door and let him in
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
