A punctuation question with a list tests how you connect the items to the sentence around them. First, find the job of the blank: does it introduce the list or separate its items? Then test whether the words before and after it stand alone. A colon introduces a list after a full sentence; a period ends a sentence, and a semicolon outside a list joins two full sentences. Use no mark when the sentence needs the list to be complete.
Hints
- Hint 1
Find where the manager starts giving the reasons. Does the blank introduce them or sit between two of them?
- Hint 2
Read all three reasons and test whether they can stand alone as a sentence. Do they say what someone does, or do they name the reasons for repeating an order?
Step-by-step
Find how the list attaches
Step 1Test the words before the list
Add the shared words as follows to The manager notes that the reasons are, then cover what comes next. Can those words stand alone as a sentence? Yes: the manager tells us that the reasons will come next, and the sentence has everything it needs. Because we're choosing the mark that brings in those reasons, the blank comes before the list, not between its items.
- Step 2
Check whether the reasons stand alone
Read the reasons: confirm the order, to give the cashier time to enter it, and to prompt nearby staff to start preparing the drink. Can these form a full sentence of their own? A full sentence needs a subject, the person or thing it's about, and a main verb that says what that subject does or is. Here, each reason begins with to plus a verb, so it names a goal rather than giving a main verb. These words form a list, not a second full sentence.
- Step 3
Choose the mark that introduces the list
The version with a period leaves the list beginning with confirm the order as an incomplete sentence, and the version with a semicolon would need a full sentence after it. The version as follows to runs the list into a complete sentence without punctuation. A colon introduces a list after a full sentence, so as follows: to attaches the reasons to the manager's sentence. Choice B.