TEAS English grammar rules you need to know

What the English section covers

Sentence boundaries: fragments, run-ons and comma splices

A complete sentence has a subject, a verb, and a complete thought. "Because the clinic opened late." is a fragment: "because" makes it depend on another clause. A run-on jams two complete sentences together with nothing between them; a comma splice joins them with only a comma. Fix either one in three ways:

• a period: The shift ended. Maria stayed to finish charting.
• a comma plus a coordinating conjunction (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so): The shift ended, but Maria stayed.
• a semicolon: The shift ended; Maria stayed.

Sentence types follow from clause counts. Simple: one independent clause. Compound: two independent clauses. Complex: one independent and at least one dependent clause. Compound-complex: two or more independent clauses plus at least one dependent clause.

Commas, semicolons, colons and apostrophes

Two classic traps: its is possessive and it's means "it is"; and a comma never separates a subject from its verb ("The student who studied every day, passed" is wrong). Don't use a colon after a verb or preposition ("The kit includes: gauze" is wrong).

Agreement: subjects, verbs and pronouns

A verb agrees with its subject, not with the nearest noun. Cross out prepositional phrases to find the subject: "The box of gloves is empty." Subjects joined by and are plural; with or or nor, the verb agrees with the closer subject ("Neither the students nor the teacher was late"). Indefinite pronouns such as each, everyone, either and neither are singular.

A pronoun must agree with its antecedent in number and must point clearly to one noun. "When Ana called Jess, she was upset" is ambiguous: who was upset? Use the noun instead. Choose case by role: subject pronouns (I, he, she, we, they) do the action; object pronouns (me, him, her, us, them) receive it. Test a pair by dropping the other person: "The coach gave the forms to Sam and me" (gave to me), and use who for subjects and whom for objects.

Modifiers, parallelism and tense

A modifier belongs next to what it describes. "Walking into the lab, the smell of bleach was strong" says the smell was walking; fix it by naming the walker: "Walking into the lab, I noticed the smell of bleach."

Parallel structure: items in a list or comparison take the same form. "She likes reading, to run and swimming" becomes "reading, running and swimming".

Tense should stay consistent unless the time actually changes. Use the past perfect (had + verb) for the earlier of two past events: "By the time the bus arrived, we had waited an hour."

Register, organization and transitions

Some questions ask which wording fits an audience. Formal writing (an email to an admissions office, a report) avoids slang, contractions and casual openers; informal writing (a text to a friend) can use them. Choose the option that is clear, polite and specific.

For paragraphs, the topic sentence states the main idea and the rest supports it. Pick transitions by the relationship they signal: addition (also, furthermore), contrast (however, although), cause and effect (therefore, as a result), sequence (first, then, finally), example (for instance).

Vocabulary from context and word parts

Use context clues first: a definition nearby, a synonym, an antonym signaled by "unlike" or "but", or an example. Then use word parts, which double as medical vocabulary:

The writing process questions follow the order planning (brainstorming, outlining), drafting, revising (content and organization) and editing (grammar, spelling, punctuation). Practice all of this in the grammar and punctuation set and the vocabulary set.