FoundationsLesson 22 of 30 · Shift and punctuation
Question mark, colon and semicolon
Three marks on keys you already own. The question mark and the colon are shifted; the semicolon finally does its real job.
- New keys
- No new keys
- To pass
- Done when the check reaches 92% accuracy and 17 words a minute.
Lesson 22 is locked
It opens when you pass the check in lesson 21 (Apostrophe and quotation marks). Lessons open one at a time, in order.
There are no new keys in this lesson. The question mark is Shift plus the slash, the colon is Shift plus the semicolon, and the semicolon itself has been under your right little finger since the first unit. What is new is using them as punctuation, with the spacing rules that go with each. All three follow the same rule as the comma and the full stop: nothing before them, one space after.
The question mark is the shifted slash, so it is a left Shift held with the left little finger while the right little finger curls down to the slash. Two little fingers working at once is the most awkward combination on the keyboard, which is why it gets its own drill. The colon is easier: left Shift, and the right little finger simply presses the key it is resting on.
A colon introduces something: a list, an explanation, a quotation. A semicolon joins two sentences that belong together; it is stronger than a comma and softer than a full stop. You do not need to be a grammarian to type them, but knowing what they do makes the drills easier to read ahead, and reading ahead is what keeps the rhythm steady through punctuation.
How are you? Note: keep going. It rained; we stayed in.