01 Tense & Sequence
Stay consistent unless time changes
Keep the same tense across a passage unless the meaning genuinely shifts in time. Use the
past perfect (
had + verb) for the earlier of two past events:
By the time the rescuers arrived, the climbers had already descended.02 Dangling & Misplaced Modifiers
The noun after the comma must be the one doing the action
× Walking to school, the rain soaked us. — the rain wasn’t walking. Fix by putting the right subject right after the modifier:
Walking to school, we got soaked.03 Parallelism
Items in a list share a form
Verbs, phrases, or structures joined in a series must match:
She likes hiking, swimming, and cycling (not “to cycle”).
Ready to practice?
14 questions for this session — 4 guided (label the structure first), 6 on the clock, and 4 in home practice. Every timed score feeds your sub-skill Error Log.
Open Session 09 Exercises →