How the Grinch Stole the Commas! By: Kelly Gentzel

Cindy Lou Who loves her commas and her comma tree. She was very upset when she went downstairs to find the Grinch stealing her commas.

The Grinch loves to steal commas from all the little children The Grinch loves to steal commas from all the little children. We need your help to get all the commas back and put them in the correct place before Christmas Day.

The Grinch pats Cindy Lou on the head and says, “Go back to bed little girl.” Rules for Dialogue: -Commas used to separate dialogue from the rest of the sentence -keep the punctuation inside the quotation marks

The Grinch puts the comma train in his big bag of stolen commas, and leaves Cindy Lou Who’s house and hops on his sleigh with his dog Max. Watch out for comma splices! A comma splice happens when you hook two or more independent clauses (group of words with a subject and verb) together with commas but no coordinating conjunction. Rule for Side-By-Side Sentences: Commas to set off side-by-side sentences when a coordinating conjunction (FANBOYS) is also used (the compound sentence comma)

Cindy Lou Who, climbing up the snowy mountain, gets the commas back so the children can have a wonderful Christmas. Rule for Extra Information: Commas to set off extra information interrupters (the nonrestrictive elements comma pair, the appositive pair, the participle comma pair)

While she is on the mountain, she makes the Grinch realize what he has done and changes his feelings towards commas. Rule for Introductory Elements: Commas to set off introductions (the introductory elements commas go before the subject of the main clause; the direct address)

The Grinch’s heart grows three sizes, so he puts the stolen commas in his bag, tumbles down the mountain, and slides down the chimney to return the commas. Rule for commas in a list: Commas to separate three or more items in a list (the series comma) Remember! Compound verbs and nouns do NOT need commas. Compound verbs and nouns only contain TWO different parts. They only need commas if there are THREE OR MORE different parts.

All is well in Who-Ville once again, as the commas were put back where they belong on the Christmas tree.

Years later, the Grinch continues to reestablish his love for commas; therefore, he attends Christmas dinner with Cindy Lou Who and Max every Christmas Eve.

Works Cited Page Ideas for storyline were taken from How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss -Rules for commas cited by Dr. Smith -Images from Google Images http://magazine.uc.edu/content/dam/magazine/images/famous/how-the-grinch-stole-christmas-movie-poster-1966-1020427389.jpg http://www.christmas-clipart.com/free_christmas_clip_art_images/christmas_tree_coloring_page_0515-1011-1821-0735_SMU.jpg http://www.kknutson.com/christmas-tree-coloring-pages-online/ https://www.google.com/search?q=grinch&biw=1188&bih=533&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi0l9H8ssjJAhUFbT4KHR3JDXsQ_AUIBigB#tbm=isch&q=grinch+cindy+lou+cartoon&imgrc=O8mnxCBZbQLQVM%3A https://www.google.com/search?q=sad+face&biw=1188&bih=533&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjIpOqa9cjJAhXKHT4KHbVMBBgQ_AUIBigB#imgrc=CLSGzszGexg4pM%3A https://www.google.com/search?q=grinch&biw=1188&bih=533&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi0l9H8ssjJAhUFbT4KHR3JDXsQ_AUIBigB#tbm=isch&q=grinch+heart+gif&imgrc=r5uDYdG5yJQ01M%3A http://www.novel-writing-help.com/punctuating-dialogue.html

The End!