IXL | Which sentence is more formal? | 8th grade language arts

Which sentence is more formal?

Sailors used to get scurvy, a disease caused by Vitamin C deficiency, because they didn't get fruits or vegetables.

During the nineteenth century, sailors often suffered from scurvy, a disease caused by Vitamin C deficiency, because no fruits or vegetables were kept onboard their ships.

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question

Which sentence is more formal?

Oh man, the downpour caused lotsa water to surge through the streets and flooded the town.

The downpour flooded the town and caused a torrent of water to surge through the streets.

key idea

Formal writing is used for essays, business letters, and reports. The following types of informal language should be avoided in formal writing:

Type	Examples
slang	cool, funky, dude
idioms	knock your socks off
conversational language	gonna, kinda, yeah
abbreviated language	ASAP, btw, b/c
overly simple or imprecise language	he got some stuff at the store
contractions	can't, won't

Contractions are not as informal as the other types, but they should be used sparingly in formal writing.

Compare the following sentences. The first is informal. The second is formal.

Informal:

Yeah, ostriches can't fly, but they're awesome runners.

Formal:

Though ostriches are flightless, they are remarkably adept runners.

solution

This sentence is more formal:

The downpour flooded the town and caused a torrent of water to surge through the streets.

This sentence is less formal:

Oh man, the downpour caused lotsa water to surge through the streets and flooded the town.

You can tell because it uses conversational language (oh man, lotsa).

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