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ACT English: Punctuation Drill 2, Problem 3. Where does the semicolon fit best?
ACT English: Punctuation Drill 3, Problem 4. Which choice best formats this list of items?
ACT English: Punctuation Drill 2, Problem 5. Which choice indicates the best place for a semi-colon in the sentence?
ACT English 4.5 Grammar and Usage 413 Views
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ACT English: Grammar and Usage Drill 4, Problem 5. Which pronoun fits best in this sentence?
Transcript
- 00:03
Here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by "who" and "whom." Think of them as brothers
- 00:08
who look alike, but get really annoyed when people confuse them.
- 00:11
How would you correct the following sentence, if it needs correcting at all?
- 00:14
The students, who had been studying aeronautics, were thrilled to watch the space shuttle take off.
- 00:25
Let's dive right into the elimination process here.
Full Transcript
- 00:28
Choice (C) is so glaringly wrong, we can't stand it being in our lives for a second longer.
- 00:32
The underlined clause requires a relative pronoun to introduce it.
- 00:36
All choice (C) has to offer is a pitiful "they," which doesn't work at all, so it has to go.
- 00:40
(D) is all kinds of wrong too. "Which" is usually used to refer to non-human things, like objects.
- 00:45
So, unless these students were tables or doormats, (D) is definitely incorrect.
- 00:49
Now we're left with choices (A) and (B), and it comes down to deciding whether "who" or
- 00:53
"whom" is correct in the sentence.
- 00:56
The rule of thumb here is that "who" is the subject pronoun, while "whom" is the object.
- 01:01
The pronoun we need has to be in the subjective case because the students it stands in for
- 01:07
are the ones who've been studying aeronautics.
- 01:09
This means that "who" is correct, making (A) the right answer.
- 01:13
Wow, how come no teacher ever took us to watch a space shuttle launch?
- 01:16
Hm. Young kids plus large explosive machinery. Guess we can see their reasoning.
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ACT English: Punctuation Drill 3, Problem 4. Which choice best formats this list of items?
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