Laura asks:
I'm having difficulty with parallel structure. Could you please help me with the following sentences.
"Parallel structure," or parallelism, means using the same parts of speech in words, phrases and clauses that form a kind of list. Let's take your first sentence:
The food at the party should be a lot, something everyone can eat, nicely decorated, and opening the appetite.
Each phrase should follow grammatically from "should be," so the last phrase is a problem: You can't can't say "should be opening the appetite."
The list also includes a noun ("lot"), a clause ("something everyone can eat"), an adjective ("decorated"), and a plain-wrong expression ("opening the appetite").
We could correct this in various ways; here's one:
The food at the party should be plentiful, acceptable to everyone, nicely decorated, and appetizing.
We've now got a string of adjectives, all describing the food.
Now let's just correct the next four sentences Laura sent. You'll see that I've revised a few other problems as well as faulty parallelism. If you have questions about the corrections, please post a comment and I'll try to explain.
The five steps are the following: (1)starting the problem, (2)observation that includes all points of view, (3)induction, (4)hypothesis, and (5)concluding your ideas.
The five steps are the following: (1) stating the problem, (2) including all points of view, (3) reasoning by induction, (4) framing a hypothesis, and (5) concluding your argument.
If I were to classify the material read, it would fall into 2 types, academic and pleasure.
If I were to classify the material read, it would fall into two types: academic and pleasure.
The article was divided into 2 sections for 2 reasons. First to give the reader some facts and figures on aviation; and second the last section of the article was written for the purpose of informing the reader when and where the first aircraft was invented.
The article was divided into two sections for two reasons: first, to give the reader some facts and figures on aviation; second, to inform the reader when and where the first aircraft was invented.
The rooms will be much larger, the decorations more elaborate, there will be a modern tile bath, and plenty of closets.
The rooms will be much larger, and the decorations more elaborate; there will be a modern tile bath and plenty of closets.
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