Writing Complete Sentences (Cont.)

A comma splice and a run-on both occur from incorrectly joining two sentences into a compound. To join two sentence, the student must use both a comma and a coordinating conjunction (and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet).

• Leaving out the coordinating conjunction creates a comma splice.
• Leaving out both the comma and coordinating conjunction creates a run-on.
• Leaving out the comma creates a sentence error.

Students can fix any of these problems by using both the comma and the coordinating conjunction, using a semicolon, or separating the two sentences with a period.

A rambling sentence occurs when the writer piles idea upon idea, usually with a lot of and's. Rambling sentences should be trimmed down and broken into separate pieces.

Have students review their recent writing for comma splices, run-ons, and rambling sentences. Ask them to fix any examples they find.

Writing Clear Sentences (Cont.)

Use this page to help students root out incomplete comparisons, ambiguous wording, and indefinite references. Each of these problems arises from failing to complete the main idea. Correcting these problems makes that main idea come through clearly the first time the reader reads.

Have students search their recent writing for these issues and fix any problems they find.

Writing Natural Sentences (Cont.)

The writing instructor Peter Elbow once compared writing to weeding a garden: you're always a little behind.

The five sentence issues on this page are the weeds of writing: trite phrases, cliches, jargon, euphemisms, and redundancies. They proliferate in spoken language and plant their seeds in writing, as well.

Use this page to help students recognize each issue. Also, discuss with your class why each is a problem. For example, trite phrases convince the reader you lack original ideas and haven't carefully considered the subject. Each of these issues disrupts communication from writer to reader.

Once students understand these issues, send them back to "weed" their own recent writing.

Writing Acceptable Sentences (Cont.)

Double negatives have been with English since its inception, and usually readers can understand what the writer means. However, because they can impede communication, they do not belong in formal assignments. Students who often use double negatives in speech may have trouble understanding why they are nonstandard. Have them define the following terms:

• Kind (e.g., considerate, helpful, thoughtful)
• Unkind (e.g., inconsiderate, unhelpful, thoughtless)
• Not unkind (e.g., not inconsiderate [or simply considerate], not unhelpful [or simply helpful], not thoughtless [or simply thoughtful])

Unnecessary shifts in construction and nonparallel construction are sentence errors that create confusion. Work through the explanations and examples of each, and discuss with students why the corrected version communicates more clearly.

Have students correct these own issues in their own writing.

Modeling Sentences

Sentence modeling helps students explore the patterns and constructions used by their favorite writers. Use this page to lead students through the steps of sentence modeling. You can also use the minilesson to provide students practice with modeling.