Date it Right: 6 Rules You Need to Follow

Your PTE review package won’t typically focus on writing years and may cause you to disregard this all together. However, that is a BIG MISTAKE! Properly writing years, months, and days of the week may seem trivial, but small details like these can cause serious problems when provided with errors.

If you are working in the healthcare industry, dates are especially important. It could spell the difference between a missed doctor’s appointment or medicine taken pass its expiration date. Avoid these errors by learning these tips and rules.  

Writing Years

Most style guides agree that when beginning your sentences with a year, it should be written in words. Starting sentences with numerals is a poor style of writing.

Incorrect: 2020 is a great year to pursue your dreams.

Correct: Two thousand twenty is a great year to pursue your dreams.

Writing Months and Days

When writing in a month-day date format, use cardinal numbers (one, two, and three). If you want to use ordinal numbers (first, second, and third) pair it with the word “of.” 

Correct: Judith was born on the 10th of May.

Correct: Judith was born on May 10.

However, many people are still confused when writing dates with commas. If you are using a Month-Day-Year format, put commas after the day and year. If you are using a Day-Month-Year format, do not use commas.

Month-Day-Year: On May 10, 2015, Judith was born.

Day-Month-Year: On 10 May 2017 Judith was born.

Writing Days of the Week

When writing days, it must always come with a comma after the days of the week to make it more readable.

Monday, May 10, is Judith’s first birthday.

Writing Centuries

When writing about centuries, do not add apostrophe and s. Centuries are plurals and not possessive words. 

Incorrect: Men often wore skirts in the 1600’s.

Correct: Men often wore skirts in the 1600s.

Writing decades

If you are writing decades, make sure to use an apostrophe before the number and add an s after it. You can also write it like centuries or write out the words. 

Correct: In the ‘60s, Jim grew his beard for about one foot long.

Correct: In the 1960s, Jim grew his beard for about one foot long.

Correct: In the sixties, Jim grew his beard for about one foot long.  

Writing dates in numbers

Many formats are used when writing dates as numerals. However, all numeral formats should not be used in formal writing because there are only a few instances when it is appropriate. In America, they use the month/day/year format. In the UK and parts of Europe, they make use of the day/month/year format. As for most Asian countries, they use the year/month/day format. 

Take to heart these rules when writing dates. However, be cautious of your style and your tone when writing.

For more grammar tips, language hacks, and others, check out our blog! You can also visit us at our PTE Review Center in Quezon City for your personal questions and inquiries.

REFERENCES:                    

“All You Need to Know About Writing Dates and Times.” Online Spellcheck Blog. Accessed on October 18, 2019. Accessed from https://blog.online-spellcheck.com/spellcheck-help/need-know-writing-dates-times/

“How to Write Dates Correctly in English.” Grammarly. Accessed on October 18, 2019. Accessed from https://www.grammarly.com/blog/how-to-write-dates/

“Writing Dates and Times.” Grammar Book. Accessed on October 18, 2019. Accessed from https://data.grammarbook.com/blog/numbers/writing-dates-and-times/