Proofreading for Type I Errors: Practice 4 Answer Key
Read the following paragraph and determine whether each sentence is correct, is a fragment, has a subject/verb agreement error, includes a comma splice, or is a fused sentence. No sentence includes more than one error.
1. Some people eat the
strangest food items for breakfast. Correct
2. Like roast beef, mashed
potatoes, and candied yams. Fragment
3. My uncle, who has traveled to China,
South America, and Africa, like to eat
elephant ears (the plant!) in a coconut
cream sauce. Subject/verb agreement
(My uncle . . . likes)
4. My brother Bill likes hot fudge sauce on his grits, my
sister likes catsup on her
eggs. Comma splice
5. My father on rare occasions eat
cold pepperoni pizza. Subject/verb
agreement (My father . . . eats)
6. My former neighbors back in Island Grove,
Florida, likes to eat swamp
cabbage and heart of palm. Subject/verb agreement
(Neighbors . . . like)
7. Other people
serve the strangest foods at parties. Correct
8. For instance, chocolate covered
turkey! Fragment
9. At my brother Peter's caroling party, he and his
wife served an odd variety of
finger foods. Correct
10. There was octopus in a lemon
butter sauce, squid in a marinara sauce, and
oysters in an apricot sauce. Subject/verb
agreement (There were)
11. A former boyfriend seasoned pancakes in the oddest ways he liked to
throw
in pinches of cloves, cumin, and nutmeg. Fused
Sentence
12. Thinking he was a
creative genius. Fragment
13. No one ate his pancakes. Correct
14. Not
even his dog. Fragment