Direct quotations
The punctuation of direct quotations is controversial. Should it be?
“Hello,” he said.
or should the comma follow the second quotation marks as follows:
“Hello”, he said?
You can find more discussion of this controversy on the internet here. The terms "conventional" and "logical" are used for the above two versions respectively. The conventional (the first above, where the comma precedes the speech marks) is said to be the version which is normally found and taught in the USA.
However the reason the logical is better is because punctuation marks have a meaning of their own; for example a comma usually indicates a pause. Therefore putting a comma before the quotation should be used to indicate a pause in the speech. How else could it be indicated otherwise?
Frequently both ESOL and first-language speakers of English make mistakes with contractions, the shortened forms of work combinations like "I'm" for "I am". The following web-site has a 50-item exercise which can give you practice and instant feedback although it doesn't give you the actual answers. Go to Web School. There are several other items at the Web School too. Their home page is here; click on the "Language" option and then "Daily Language".