A.  When he was ten years old, he had decided he wanted to be a doctor.

19.  Misplaced or dangling modifier

B.  The United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan in 1945.

6.  Wrong or missing verb ending

C.  Marie Antoinette spent huge sums of money on herself and her favorites.  Her extravagance helped bring on the French Revolution.

12.  Sentence fragment

D.  Paradise Lost contains many allusions to classical mythology.

4.  Wrong word

E.  When you first see a painting by Georgia O'Keeffe, you are impressed by a sense of power and stillness.

11.  Unnecessary shift in pronoun

F.  President Richard Nixon compared the United States to a "pitiful, helpless giant."

7.  Wrong or missing preposition

G.  Though I gave advice for revising, his draft only became worse.

1.  Missing comma after an introductory element

H.  The car is lying on its side in the ditch.  It's a white 2004 Surbaru.

20.  Its/It's confusion

I.  I was strongly attracted to her, for she had special qualities.

8.  Comma splice

J.  People who wanted to preserve wilderness areas opposed the plan to privatize national parks.

17.  Unnecessary comma(s) with a restrictive element

K.  Joy laughs until she cries during The Simpsons.

10.  Unnecessary shift in tense

L.  A central part of my life goals has been to go to law school.

14.  Lack of subject-verb agreement

M.  Every student must provide a uniform.

16.  Lack of agreement between pronoun and antecedent

N.  By the time Ian arrived, Jill had died.

13.  Wrong tense or verb form

O.  The words "I do" may sound simple, but they mean a life commitment.

3.  Missing comma in a compound sentence

P.  Sharks eat mostly squid, shrimp, crabs, and other fish.

15.  Missing comma in a series

Q.  Marina, who was the president of the club, was first to speak.

5.  Missing comma(s) with a nonrestrictive element

R.  Company policy prohibited the smoking that many employees resented. [or]  Many employees resented the company policy that prohibited smoking.

2.  Vague pronoun reference

S.  She doubted the value of meditation; nevertheless, she decided to try it once.

18.  Fused sentence

T.  Overambitious parents can be very harmful to a child's well-being.

9.  Missing or misplaced possessive apostrophe

 

Here are the twenty most common errors by name.  AFTER YOU HAVE COMPLETED THE CORRECTIONS ABOVE, match each example above with the kind of error in the following list -- by typing the letter of the example after each name in the list below.

1. Missing comma after an introductory element  G
2. Vague pronoun reference  R
3. Missing comma in a compound sentence  O
4. Wrong word  D
5. Missing comma(s) with a nonrestrictive element  Q
6. Wrong or missing verb ending  B
7. Wrong or missing preposition  F
8. Comma splice  I
9. Missing or misplaced possessive apostrophe  T
10. Unnecessary shift in tense  K
11. Unnecessary shift in pronoun  E
12. Sentence fragment  C
13. Wrong tense or verb form  N
14. Lack of subject-verb agreement  L
15. Missing comma in a series  P
16. Lack of agreement between pronoun and antecedent  M
17. Unnecessary comma(s) with a restrictive element  J
18. Fused sentence  S
19. Misplaced or dangling modifier  A
20. Its/It's confusion  H

[you can click here for additional, complete explanations from the Lunsford text]