FTCE › Standard Punctuation and Capitalization
Capital letters should be used _______________.
for proper nouns and to begin sentences
only for proper nouns
only to begin sentences
in a non-standard spelling; all capitalization rules are idiomatic
This is a very basic question interrogating the test-taker's knowledge of the rules of capitalization. While the rules of capitalization (not to mention spelling and punctuation) remained unstandardized for the vast majority of the history of the English language, at this point the rules are mostly set. Proper nouns (names, whether of people or things) always require capitalization, as do the words beginning any sentence.