When checking for the subject of a sentence you can do one of two things. The book states to cross out the prepositional phrase, so everything that comes right after the preposition will be deleted. The book gives this example:
“The rules about the dress code are very specific.”
The other option would be to make sure the conjugated verb agrees with the subject.
“The rules…are very specific.” Correct 😀
“…the dress code are very specific.” Incorrect 🙁
The dress code is would be the correct conjugation and not the dress code are. Since the verb does not agree with the subject, which in this case is conjugated in the third person plural, the rules are the subject and not the dress code. I find this method a bit helpful when I revise my papers. It is even easier to spot an error when editing my papers in French and German because these languages have more subject-verb conjugations than English. Unfortunately this method fails when you have a sentence in which the conjugated verb is the same for “one” and “the students”.
“One of the students won the science prize.”
I like how the writer of this book recommends asking question when dealing with fragments. Asking a question will quickly answer what is missing in the sentence. After realizing what is missing you’ll be able to complete the sentence.
The big red balloon popped. Scared the baby.
In this example you can see that second part is the fragment since it is missing a subject. So then you simply ask, “what scared the baby?’ The answer is the balloon.
The big red balloon popped and scared the baby.
These few pages were useful and gave me clear examples of what to do and what to avoid doing.