Punctuation

Mississippi

Suggest improvements for the highlighted problem areas: In the debate about the source of the Mississippi, we heard three student's opinions: Nathan: It isnt any mystery that the source of the Mississippi is the northeast corner of Minnesota. In 1832, Henry Schoolcraft proved that the river began with springs under Lake Itasca. Hillary: Nathan, your wrong. Actually, the Missouri River is longer than the upper Mississippi and has a larger area from which it collects water. Therefore, the true source of the Mississippi is the Rocky Mountain region of western Montana. Cecil: Hillary and Nathan's ideas fail to recognize the big picture. The waters of the Mississippi come from rain clouds that float over 22 states and 2 provinces in North America. Answer: - Apostrophe for Contraction - Three contractions are particularly troublesome for many people: who's, they're, and you're. For example, consider the mistake in our opening paragraph: Nathan, your wrong. The problem is that the contraction you're sounds just like another word, your. These are homonyms -- words that sound alike but have different meanings and different spellings. Because they sound alike, they are easily confounded: Contraction <Homonym> Possessive who is = who's <sounds like> whose they are = they're <sounds like> their you are = you're <sounds like> your Because Hillary meant to say, "Nathan, you are wrong," we need to use the contraction: Nathan, you're wrong.

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