A colon is a punctuation mark that has two vertical dots (:). The colon has a variety of different uses. These include:
• Connecting two related sentences: I had a great idea: I would become a professional wrestler!
• Introducing additional information that is not a complete sentence: You only need two things to succeed: time and money.
• Ratios: The odds of winning are 3:1.
• Time: The movie starts at 7:45 pm.
• Biblical passages: The preacher quoted John 3:16.
A semicolon is a punctuation mark that has a dot over a comma (;). The semicolon has two major uses, one of which is much more common than the other. These are:
• Connecting two related sentences: Sunny loves eating vanilla ice cream; it was her favorite flavor when she was a kid.
• Separating items in a list that have commas: The train travels to Miami, Florida; Atlanta, Georgia; and Birmingham, Alabama.
