Just as any competent artisan knows the tools of his or her trade, the professional writer should know the basics of the English language. That includes knowing the terms of grammar (verbal, antecedent, etc.) as well as the rules. How is the writer to avoid a run-on sentence if he or she doesn’t know what it is? To learn these things, students must do the ditch digging of the intellectual process: repeated study and memorization. This page contains a thorough (but not overly long) list of terms and rules for using the language that the professional writer should know.