When I was taking a course in driver education during high school, I was so terrified of making a fatal mistake that I crept along at ten miles per hour. I was also so intent on obeying each and every traffic law that when I saw a sign that told me to “Reduce Speed Ahead,” I did exactly what I was told to do — I reduced my speed to five miles per hour!
It might not surprise you to learn that I think grammar and punctuation rules are almost as important as traffic laws. Not everyone agrees with me, of course. Some people ignore the guidelines for punctuation as boldly as they ignore the posted speed limit.
I know that I’m not apt to cause a fiery collision — or even get a ticket – if I misplace a comma, but I do believe that punctuation serves an important role in … well, just about everything. It helps written communication flow smoothly, prevents misunderstandings, and can even add pizzazz to what would otherwise be dull reading material.
A court case decided by an appeals court in 2017 is a good example of how important punctuation can be.
Drivers for a dairy company in Maine filed suit against their employer, stating that they had not been paid for overtime they had earned. The law that governed overtime pay stated that the following activities did not merit overtime pay:
The canning, processing, preserving, freezing, drying, marketing, storing, packing for shipment or distribution of: (1) Agricultural produce; (2) Meat and fish products; and (3) Perishable foods.
The drivers claimed that they distribute perishable food but don’t pack it for shipment. The court ruled in their favor, stating that if there had been a comma between the word “shipment” and the word “or,” then they would not be eligible for overtime pay because packing and shipment would then have been separate activities, either of which would have been ineligible for overtime pay. Only workers who both packed and distributed were excluded from overtime pay.
The drivers were awarded $5 million in overtime pay because of the absence of a comma.
I don’t think we should frighten little children into obeying the rules of punctuation by telling them scary stories about commas and quotation marks. Punctuation is a wonderful tool, and using it well can be as joyful as using knitting needles or hammers. The picture books below introduce young readers to the fun of punctuation.
Exclamation Mark
By Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld
Exclamation Mark is, as one of my nephews would say, one of “the most funnest” books about punctuation available. It’s the story of an exclamation mark who always stands out, and he thinks that’s a bad thing. No matter what he does, he can’t make himself fit into a line of periods.
Fortunately, one day a question mark arrives. The question mark unleashes a barrage of questions, not letting the exclamation mark get a word in edgewise, until finally he shouts, “Stop!” And it feels great!
He tries it again, pushing himself a little bit more each time, until “it was like he broke free from a life sentence.” He discovers all the wonderful exclamations that need him to give them power. “Cool!” “Happy Birthday!” “Look out!” He rushes off to show the periods what he can do, and they are properly impressed. Then he sets off to … make his mark!
The idea for the book itself is clever. The illustrations turbocharge the cleverness. Each page looks like it was printed on the lined notepad used by first-graders. The text looks as if it was neatly hand-lettered, and each letter is very precisely placed on the lines of the page the way we’re taught to do as first-graders. The exclamation mark and other punctuation marks, which serve as characters in the story, are boldly lettered with black marker. Each punctuation mark has eyes and a mouth that change to show different emotions and personalities. (Yes, punctuation marks do have personalities!)
You can learn more about Amy Krouse Rosenthal here. Most information about Tom Lichtenheld is available here.
Greedy Apostrophe: A Cautionary Tale
By Jan Carr
Illustrated by Ethan Long
Greedy Apostrophe shows us what can happen when punctuation run amok. All the punctuation marks gather in the Hiring Hall one morning, eager to find out what assignments they’ll get for the day. The one latecomer is known by all as Greedy Apostrophe. He shows up looking grouchy, and he even refuses to join in the Punctuation Oath.
The other apostrophes are happy to be given jobs as contractions, but they’re alarmed when the only job left for Greedy Apostrophe is as a possessive. They know that he always gets into trouble with possession.
Sure enough, Greedy Apostrophe creates chaos on the job at a store called Timothy’s Toys. He turns the sign for Puppets into Puppet’s and the one for Marbles into Marble’s. He turns Wands into Wand’s and Capes into Cape’s. The customers become more and more confused.
Greedy Apostrophe is on a spree, and he runs to a school, where he attacks the labels over the supplies. He turns Rulers into Ruler’s, Erasers into Eraser’s, and Pencils into Pencil’s. An alert student who knows where apostrophes belong spots his work. She and the other students chase him, but he gets away.
This cautionary tale tells us that Greedy Apostrophe is still at large in the world, adding possession to words that should be plurals. Young readers are encouraged to find Greedy Apostrophe and put him the Punctuation Pen.
The illustrations in Greedy Apostrophe are hilarious. The titular apostrophe truly does look greedy and even a bit fiendish as he breaks the rules of punctuation with abandon. He’s even seen peeking out from under a sewer cover and gloating about what he’s done.
The back matter provides a concise explanation of how to use apostrophes correctly, including now to handle the perennial problem of “it’s” versus “its.”
You can learn more about Jan Carr here. More information about Ethan Long is available here.
Eats, Shoots & Leaves: Why, Commas Really Do Make a Difference
By Lynne Truss
Illustrated by Bonnie Timmons
This book for young readers is a slimmed-down version of Lynn Truss’s book by the same name for adult readers. I like this one even better than the one for adults because it has lots of hilarious illustrations. It focuses exclusively on the comma, which Truss calls “the little dot with a tail.”
The book begins with an explanation for the title: A panda walks into a library, eats a sandwich, and shoots two arrows with a bow. When a librarian asks him why he did that, he points to a badly punctuated page in a book that reads, “PANDA. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”
Each two-page spread shows two ways of punctuating the same sentence with commas. For example: “I’ve finally decided to cheer up, everybody” versus “I’ve finally decide to cheer up everybody.” One illustration shows a girl who transitions from looking depressed under a rain cloud to looking cheerful under a rainbow. The next illustration shows a clown with balloons entertaining a crowd.
The back matter includes thumbnails of the illustrations with an explanation of how the placement of commas made a difference in the meaning of the sentences used as examples.
Anyone who doesn’t giggle while reading this book is missing a funny bone. It’s sure to be a hit with readers of all ages.
You can learn more about Lynne Truss here. More information about Bonnie Timmons is available here.
Punctuation Celebration
By Elsa Knight Bruno
Illustrated by Jenny Whitehead
Instead of focusing on only one punctuation mark, Elsa Knight Bruno’s book celebrates punctuation as a whole, and she does it with rhyming poetry, which is quite an accomplishment. She includes poems about the more common punctuation marks, but she also features the punctuation marks that usually get less attention: parentheses, ellipses, dashes, hyphens, and the semi-colon.
The premise behind Punctuation Celebration is that a Punctuation Field Day is in progress. Punctuation marks are among the players, and each is introduced in a poem. The field day concludes with a match between words and punctuation. It ends in a tie because “Mixing words and punctuation — it’s a winning combination!”
Here’s just one example of the clever poems included:
The colon is quite stubborn.
And always will insist
It be the one and only one
To introduce a list.
Another use, when telling time,
No matter how you spin it,
At 6:30 it separates
The hours from the minutes.
In addition to the main poems about the punctuation marks, each punctuation mark is also celebrated in a secondary poem that includes that particular mark. The main poems and the secondary poems show the featured punctuation mark highlighted in red to help young reads see how it functions in writing.
The illustrations focus on what is described in the secondary poems, which include a bake shop, a carousel, a birthday party, and an art class, and they’re almost bursting with color. For example, the page about hyphens shows a pillow fight in progress with colorful hyphens tracing the trajectory of the pillows being thrown.
Punctuation Celebration gets bonus points for celebrating not just the joy of punctuation but the joy of rhyming poetry as well.
You can learn more about Elsa Knight Bruno here. More information about Jenny Whitehead is available here.
I know that many people think punctuation marks exist solely to make their lives miserable. They’ve had unhappy experiences in English classes and think that getting punctuation right is a mystery they’ll never understand. It doesn’t have to be that way. I hope that the books described above will help children understand that punctuation not only makes life run more smooth — it can actually be fun!