Dialogue Completion | English Grammar for Class 6 PDF Download

What is Dialogue Completion

Example:
Jacob – __________
Ashley- Are you kidding? It’s only June now.
Jacob – What do you mean? What’s wrong with June?
Ashley – Don’t you know that you should trim your roses only in the beginning of winter when it’s not the flowering season.

(a) Can you help me trim the roses in the garden next week?
(b) Do you know what’s the right time to trim rose plants?
(c) You know so much about gardening
(d) Should I do anything special to keep the roses fresh during summer months?

Ans : (a) Can you help me trim the roses in the garden next week?

Tips for Solving Questions
There are no rules for dialogue completion but that doesn’t mean questions on dialogue completion are easy. To help you out, here are a few tips which might help you out:

1. Start with reading the entire dialogue carefully and try to capture the essence of it, like what that conversation is about. Then go through all the given options (if there are) and then try to find out which one fits the best.
2. While solving a question on dialogue completion, considering three things can help you a lot. First, the relationship between the speakers of the dialogue. Second, the topic on which the conversation is based. Third, the situation in which the speakers are. If you figure these things out, you will be able to find the answer easily.
3. Keep practising. The more you solve these questions. The easier they will become for you.
4. As I have already said there are no specific rules for it but you need to have a hold over basic grammar to solve them. Some topics which could help you are the following.
   • Direct/indirect speech
   • Subject-verb agreement
   • Tenses
   • Use of prepositions and conjunctions
   • Article and pronoun rules.

Format of Dialogue Writing

• New Paragraph for Every Speaker
  Every speaker gets a new paragraph. Each time a speaker says something, you have to put in a fresh paragraph, even if it is just one word. 
• Punctuations Come under Quotation Marks
  All the punctuations used with dialogue must be put under the quotes. 
• Remove End Quote if the Paragraph is Long
  If the paragraph of dialogue is too long and you need to change the paragraph, then there is no need to put end quotes. 
• Dialogue Tags
  Dialogue tags i.e. He says/she says are always written outside the dialogue and is separated by a comma. When dialogue ends in a question or exclamation mark, tags that follow start in lower case.
  For eg- He says, “We should start our own business.” 
• Use Single Quotation Mark to Quote Something with a Dialogue
  If you have to quote something within a dialogue we should put single quotes as double quotes are already enclosing the main dialogue.
  For eg- Bill shouted, “ ‘boo!’ you lost the game.
• The Dialogue Ends with an Ellipsis
  If the Dialogue ends with an ellipsis, we should not add a comma or any other punctuation. For eg- She stared at the sunset. “I guess you’ll go back to doing what you do and I will…” her voice drifted off.