Grammar post

When to use semicolons or colons

I chose to do this for a blog because I need to work on these.

Semi colons should be used in sentence that are combined by compound sentences or use a lot of commas in the sentence so that a reader won't get confused. An example is:

I have recommended this student because she communicates well with other students, faculty, and staff; completes her assignments ably and on time; and demonstrates an ability to organize people, materials, and time.

Also a semi colon could be used to put to sentences together that do not already have a coordinating conjunction, here is another example:

Comparisons are often used to emphasize a basic idea; however, they are more often used to explain something complex or unfamiliar by showing how something we don't understand relates to something we do.

Colons act in almost the same manner as the semi colon the only difference is that it does not combine to sentences, it could emphasis or combine a sentence with a reaction, phrase, or a list of procedures, an example is:

The use of these punctuation marks often confuses students: comma, semicolon, colon, hyphen, and dash.

This was really helpful to me. I went to this sight to find this information: http://leo.stcloudstate.edu/punct/col-semi.html