Six pupils were selected at random from each of grades one through eight in a single school and were asked to write a rough draft of any length on any topic of interest to them. The 48 resulting essays were analyzed for errors in punctuation and sentence structure. Results indicated that elementary school children have difficulty in placing punctuation at the end of a sentence, in treating their ideas separately, and in capitalizing the beginning of a new sentence. Run-on sentences were a problem across the grades. Tables summarize the types of errors made by 50% or more of the students at each grade level and those made by 10% to 50% of all of the students. (AA)