Stop! Grammar time.

 

Merrick, D. (2015). Blake's grammar and punctuation guide. Glebe, NSW: Pascal, [69].

This resource can be found here. 

As the image above shows, commas break up parts of sentences and helps strengthen understanding of the clauses in the sentences. In case you don't know, clauses are the basic make-ups of sentences and we have covered this in previous Grammar Times.

A comma enables a sentence to be longer, breaking up two separate ideas but putting them in the one sentence. These ideas can be in the middle, or at the beginning, of a sentence:

The hiker, who had been lost for many days, was found hidden in a cave.

Afterwards, we had lunch on the beach.

lightning flashed and, within a few minutes, the storm struck.

By day, he is Bruce Wayne. By night, he is Batman. 

However; commas can do so much more than make our sentences longer! 

Commas also help list items:

I like strawberries, bananas and mangoes. Roy doesn't. Roy likes apples, pears, figs and durian.

As a note, you do not need one before the "and" in your lists. It will flow on without adding the extra comma.

But be aware of placing too many commas in your sentences. It will confuse readers and not make much sense grammatically. Just look at the next example:

Hey, come, back, here Ken. You, have, forgotten to, take this, with, you.

See how the sentence does not flow very well? Now, there are other punctuation marks like semi-colons and colons that help with pauses and lists; but we will look at those another time. 

But be wise with commas. They comma at you anytime you read or write!