What’s the big deal about Sentence Improvement (SI)??
Remember – Error ID’s focused on small sections of sentences
SI’s focus on a whole chunk of the sentence, or half of the sentence
All ERROR ID strategies still apply!!
SI Q’s are largest part of the writing section on the SAT

SI Q’s appear 2x:
o 11 SI Q’s in the first 25-minute section
o 14 SI Q’s by themselves in a 10-minute section
What are SI Questions?



You’ll see a sentence with a large part of it underlined
Choice A is always “fine as is”, so don’t bother reading it
Choices B, C, D, and E: You need to choose the CLEAREST answer
2 Important SI Strategies to Know and Love
1. Anticipate and Eliminate
a. You don’t need to read all the answers completely! Your goal is to keep it
moving!
b. You decide which rule is violated with the underlined part of the sentence,
and your eye looks at the answers for the correct way to fix the sentence
c. USE POE – process of ELIMINATION
d. Often, the answer choices will have the same error repeated, so don’t waste
time reading those answer choices if you know they are wrong!
e. Think: “Which one doesn’t belong with the others?” – That’s often your
answer.
2. Look at VERB underlined first – and decide if it’s SVA, PA, PC, Parallelism from
Error IDs
SI Q’s deal with 3 main errors:
Sentence Fragments, Run-on Sentences, Dangling Modifiers…
Know the lingo:
(IC) = Stand-alone sentence = S+V
(the –ing verb cannot stand alone!)
(DC) = Fragment/cannot stand alone = S or V (or –ing verb)
(M) = a phrase that gives more info to a thing in a sentence
SI Strategy: Fixing Fragments (Dependent Clauses)
EX 1: Kendrick Lamar, who is a hip-hop artist trying to rap about race relations.



A –ing verb doesn’t make a complete sentence!
WHO, WHICH, THAT, ALTHOUGH = words that are so powerful, they can make a an
independent clause (sentence) into a dependent clause (fragment).
This is a fragment, or dependent clause. It cannot stand alone.
EX 2: Kendrick Lamar, a hip-hop artist, is trying to rap about race relations.
EX 3: Kendrick Lamar, who is a hip-hop artist, is trying to rap about race relations.
EX 4: Kendrick Lamar is a hip-hop artist trying to rap about race relations.
EX 5: Trying to rap about race relations, Kendrick Lamar is a hip-hop artist.

Verbs ending in –ing or –ed at the beginning of sentences = modifier.
EX 6: Trying to rap about race relations.

Is this a complete sentence? Who’s trying to rap about race relations? Uh….
SI Strategy: Get Rid of Run-On’s
Here’s all the INDEPENDNET CLAUSES (complete sentences) that exist in the world:
S+V/./S+V
S + V / , conjunction / S + V
, and
, but
, for
, or
, nor
, yet
, so
S+V/;/S+V
S + V / ; however, / S + V
; therefore,
;consequently,
; moreover,
S + V / because / S + V
although
while
S + V / , / S + V = A comma is not strong enough to go between 2
independent clauses. Ever.
There are 3 ways to fix the above error:
1. Get rid of comma and add semi-colon (most frequent fix on SAT)
2. Get rid of comma and add comma (,) + conjunction.
3. Get rid of comma and add a period.
There are 3 ways to fix a Run-On Sentence:
1. Add a , conjunction
2. Use a semi-colon
3. Get rid of one IC (independent clause/stand-alone sentence) and make it a DC
(dependent clause/fragment)
HOW? Begin with a modifier word (below) to give more info and describe
something in sentence.
, who……., which……, that….
EX: Kiet plays in a band, it sounds awesome.
EX: Kiet plays in a band, which sounds awesome.
EX: Kiet plays in a band, and it sounds awesome.
EX: Kiet plays in a band; it sounds awesome.
ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT
SI Strategy: Don’t let those Modifiers Dangle!
Modifiers:
 Often start a sentence as a –ing / -ed verb
EX 1: Sitting close to the field, a foul ball hit Cynthia.


Who is sitting?
The person/thing that the modifier describes MUST come right after the comma….
MODIFER PHRASE + COMMA + PERSON/THING DESCRIBED BY MODIFIER PHRASE
EX 2: Sitting close to the field, Cyntnia was hit by a foul ball.
Power of comma’s on the SAT…
If you see a comma in or near the underlined part of the sentence, there’s a 50/50 chance
you have a FRAGMENT, RUN-ON, or DANGLING MODIFIER error.
SUMMARY OF STRATEGIES:
So…
1. ID the error
2. Make the correction in your head
3. Find the correction in the options below (don’t bother reading “wrong”
answer choices!)

Check for fragments (must have S+V or independent clause – IC)

If a sentence has 2 IC’s (independent clauses/stand-alone sentences)
connected with just a comma – need to replace comma with ; or ,
conjunction.

If a sentence starts with a modifier (-ed/-ing verbs) – that modifier must
describe the thing/person immediately after the comma