an independent clause that begins with a capital letter, contains at least a verb (such as in a command), and ends with a punctuation mark (period, question mark, or exclamation point)

Students are expected to use complete simple and compound sentences in their writing. A simple sentence consists of one independent clause (e.g., El león rugió en la llanura). A compound sentence is composed of at least two independent clauses linked with a subordinating conjunction and comma (e.g., Alejandro terminó la carrera, pero Braulio no pudo llegar a la meta).

During the editing stage of the writing process, students further improve their drafts and often prepare for publishing by correcting conventions errors. Ensuring that the standard rules of the Spanish language have been applied correctly helps the audience to more easily comprehend the information because they do not have to interrupt their thinking to determine what the writer intended to say.

an incorrect sentence structure that occurs when a sentence is incomplete, sometimes because it is missing a subject or predicate (e.g., Observando el movimiento de las olas)

a grammatically incorrect sentence structure that occurs when two or more independent clauses are joined without an appropriate conjunction or punctuation (e.g., Hoy me levanté temprano llegué tarde a la escuela)

a grammatically incorrect sentence structure that occurs when a comma alone without a conjunction is used to join two independent clauses (e.g., Las orugas se alimentan de hojas, los árboles están cubiertos de ellas) These are commonly referred to as comma splices and are a subset of run-on sentences

standard rules of the Spanish language, including written mechanics such as punctuation, capitalization, spelling, paragraphing, etc. and written/oral grammar such as parts of speech, word order, subject-verb agreement, and sentence structure

the grammatical state of a sentence when the subject and verb match in number (singular or plural) and/or nouns and pronouns match in number and person (first person, second person, third person)