I sentence you to ...

Have you ever used one of those websites that tells you the reading level of a book? For example:

• Green Eggs and Ham is a 1.5 (appropriate for a kid halfway through first grade).
• Henry and Beezus is a 4.6
• Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is a 6.7
• The Great Gatsby is a 7.3
• Moby Dick is a 10.3

One of the components of that is often part of this process is counting how many sentences are in the book. While we aren't ready to read from an entire book yet, we can do this if we have a "small" String to start with. In this activity we will count the number of sentences in a String by counting the number of end-of-sentence punctuation marks in the String ( periods, question marks, and exclamation points).

As you test this you might use the following samples.

• example1 = "This. Is? A. Simple! Test?"

• example2 = "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

• example3 = "'I cannot go to school today,' Said little Peggy Ann McKay. 'I have the measles and the mumps, A gash, a rash and purple bumps. My mouth is wet, my throat is dry, I'm going blind in my right eye. My tonsils are as big as rocks, I've counted sixteen chicken pox And there's one more—that's seventeen, And don't you think my face looks green? My leg is cut—my eyes are blue— It might be instamatic flu. I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke, I'm sure that my left leg is broke— My hip hurts when I move my chin, My belly button's caving in, My back is wrenched, my ankle's sprained, My 'pendix pains each time it rains. My nose is cold, my toes are numb. I have a sliver in my thumb. My neck is stiff, my voice is weak, I hardly whisper when I speak. My tongue is filling up my mouth, I think my hair is falling out. My elbow's bent, my spine ain't straight, My temperature is one-o-eight. My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear, There is a hole inside my ear. I have a hangnail, and my heart is—what? What's that? What's that you say? You say today is. . .Saturday? G'bye, I'm going out to play!"

Or you can download this starter file.

 

• Function name
• countSentences()
• Parameters
• one single string
• Return value
• The number of sentences in the input string based on the number of end of sentence characters . ? and !
• Examples
•