A handout describing the proper use of quotation marks.
Grades:
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
  1. Double quotation marks enclose direct quotations:
    • "What was Paris like in the Twenties?" our daughter asked.
    • "Ladies and Gentlemen," the Chief Usher said, "the President of the United States."
    • Robert Louis Stevenson said that "it is better to be a fool than to be dead."
    • When advised not to become a lawyer because the profession was already overcrowded, Daniel Webster replied,"There is always room at the top."

  2. Double quotation marks enclose words or phrases to clarify their meaning or use or to indicate that they are being used in a special way:
    • This was the border of what we often call "the West" or "the Free World."
    • "The Windy City" is a name for Chicago.

  3. Double quotation marks set off the translation of a foreign word or phrase:
    • die Grenze, "the border."

  4. Double quotation marks set off the titles of series of books, of articles or chapters in publications, of essays, of short stories and poems, of individual radio and television programs, and of songs and short musical pieces:
    • a series of books: "The Horizon Concise History"
    • an article: "On Reflexive Verbs in English"
    • a chapter in a book: Chapter Nine, "The Prince and the Peasant"
    • a short story: Pushkin's "The Queen of Spades"
    • a poem: Tennyson's "Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington"
    • a television show: "The Bob Hope Special"
    • a short musical piece: Schubert's "Death and the Maiden."

  5. Single quotation marks enclose quotations within quotations:
    • The blurb for the piece proclaimed, "Two years ago at Geneva, South Vietnam was virtually sold down the river to the Communists. Today the spunky little . . . country is backon its own feet, thanks to 'a mandarin in a sharkskin suit who's upsetting the Red timetable.'"--Frances FitzGerald

  6. Put commas and periods inside quotation marks; put semicolons and colons outside. Other punctuation,such as exclamation points and question marks, should be put inside the closing quotation marks only if part of the matter quoted.

Featured High School Resources

Romeo and Juliet Teaching Unit Kit

LESSON PLANS

Romeo and Juliet Teaching Unit Kit

A complete teaching kit for a full or partial unit on Romeo and Juliet Take your students on a thought-provoking, insig...

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER
lesson plans for animal farm - kit for a complete unit on the novel

LESSON PLANS

Animal Farm Teaching Unit Kit

Everything you need to teach a full or partial unit on Animal Farm Help your students dive into the modern relevance, m...

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER
Poetry Packet for High School

ACTIVITIES

National Poetry Month Themed Packet for High School

To celebrate Poetry Month, this resource shares 3 activities that will help high school students to engage with poetry i...

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

Related Resources

TEACHING RESOURCE

Taking Notes

Taking NotesHearing something once is not enough to really learn it, and that is why note taking is so important.

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

TEACHING RESOURCE

Research Paper: Take Notes

Research Paper: Take Notes After you've gathered your sources, begin reading and taking notes.

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

REFERENCE

Capitals

From Webster's II New Riverside University Dictionary. © 1984 by Houghton Mifflin Company.

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

REFERENCE

Commas

Separates the clauses of a compound sentence connected by a coordinating conjunction: A difference exists between the mu...

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

REFERENCE

Semicolon

Separates the clauses of a compound sentence having no coordinating conjunction: Do not let us speak of darker days; let...

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER

REFERENCE

Italics

From Webster's II New Riverside University Dictionary. © 1984 by Houghton Mifflin Company.

Add to Folder
creative writing
children's book
activities
classroom tools
language arts and writing
vocabulary
Create new folderCREATE NEW FOLDER
loading gif