Improving Sentence Writing Ability Through Sentence-Combining ...
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TEACHING Exceptional Children, Vol. 39, No. 3, pp. 6-11. Copyright 2007 CEC.<br />
<strong>Improving</strong> <strong>Sentence</strong><br />
<strong>Writing</strong> <strong>Ability</strong> <strong>Through</strong><br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong> Practice<br />
Young writers usually begin to write by<br />
creating sentences. They learn to create<br />
sentences by expressing what their<br />
teachers term complete thoughts. After<br />
mastering this feat, they move on to creating<br />
sentences that declare, question,<br />
or exclaim. Finally, they string together<br />
enough sentences to qualify as a paragraph<br />
and then a short story. But this<br />
process can be derailed when young<br />
writers encounter the challenges of<br />
writing sentences.<br />
Creating well constructed sentences<br />
is challenging for most writers. For less<br />
skilled writers, including writers with<br />
learning disabilities (LD), it can be even<br />
more difficult. These writers generally<br />
produce less syntactically complex sentences<br />
that contain more grammatical<br />
errors (Myklebust, 1973). They may<br />
also produce sentences that are shorter;<br />
have higher percentages of capitalization,<br />
punctuation, and spelling errors;<br />
and are lower in overall quality than<br />
6 ■ COUNCIL FOR EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN<br />
Bruce Saddler • Jennifer Preschern<br />
those of their average-achieving<br />
peers<br />
(Graham & Harris,<br />
1989; Myklebust).<br />
Anderson (1982)<br />
suggests that less<br />
skilled writers have<br />
more missing subjects<br />
and verbs in<br />
their writing than<br />
regularly achieving<br />
students, and more often overuse the<br />
connector and.<br />
Pete was a third grader, and one of<br />
these less skilled writers. Two years ago,<br />
he was identified as having a learning<br />
disability. His Wechsler (WISC-R;<br />
Wechsler, 1974) performance standard<br />
score was 84 and he had a second-grade<br />
reading level, according to the Wide<br />
Range Achievement Test (WRAT-3;<br />
Wilkinson, 1993). His individualized<br />
education program (IEP) included a<br />
written expression goal, and his teacher<br />
reported that his stories were very short,<br />
lacked interest, and often contained<br />
simple, repetitive sentences. Pete did<br />
not like writing very much and often<br />
could not think of what to say when<br />
asked to write.<br />
Pete’s teacher, Ms. Asaro, used a<br />
writing workshop approach in her<br />
classroom. Ms. Asaro enjoyed teaching<br />
writing and gave her students time<br />
every day to write. In addition, she met<br />
Effective Instructional Strategies<br />
with each of her students regularly and<br />
provided minilessons to sharpen skills<br />
that needed additional support. She<br />
would often model writing tasks, and<br />
also allowed her students choice in<br />
writing topics. Early in the year, Pete<br />
wrote a story for Ms. Asaro<br />
I saw a girl named cat at the<br />
snow arena. She was zooming up<br />
the hill on her jet pack. It was<br />
amazing. I wish I had one. She<br />
showed me where to get one. I get<br />
one and I was happy. The End.<br />
Ms. Asaro decided that the short,<br />
choppy sentences Pete used to compose<br />
his stories were actually making his<br />
writing less enjoyable to read. She<br />
decided to include a writing technique<br />
that she had read about in her instruction<br />
for Pete: sentence combining. She<br />
believed that this supplemental sentence-level<br />
instruction would help Pete<br />
create better, more varied sentences<br />
that might also make his stories more<br />
interesting.<br />
In this article, we discuss the benefits<br />
of sentence combining and how sentence-combining<br />
practice can help writers<br />
craft more interesting sentences that<br />
convey their ideas in a variety of ways.<br />
In addition, we provide suggestions to<br />
assist teachers in adding sentence-combining<br />
instruction to their current writing<br />
instruction.
<strong>Sentence</strong> <strong>Combining</strong><br />
<strong>Sentence</strong> combining was originally<br />
developed in the 1970s to provide systematic<br />
instruction in sentence construction<br />
skills. Despite evidence that<br />
sentence combining can be used to<br />
improve students’ sentence construction<br />
skills (Hillocks, 1986; O’Hare,<br />
1973), such instruction is not a frequently<br />
included component in popular<br />
whole-language approaches to writing<br />
instruction, such as Writers’ Workshop<br />
(Pritchard, 1987). However, many students<br />
with writing disabilities may<br />
require more explicit and focused<br />
instruction (Harris & Graham, 1996).<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong> combining can provide systematic<br />
instruction in sentence construction<br />
skills within an overall framework<br />
of the writing workshop. In fact,<br />
researchers have found that sentencecombining<br />
practice can help young writers<br />
create qualitatively better stories and<br />
increase the amount and quality of revisions<br />
(Saddler & Graham, 2005).<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-combining<br />
practice can help writers<br />
craft more interesting<br />
sentences that convey their<br />
ideas in a variety of ways.<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong> combining provides direct,<br />
mindful practice in manipulating and<br />
rewriting basic or kernel sentences into<br />
more syntactically mature or varied<br />
forms (Strong, 1976). <strong>Through</strong> the<br />
process of constructing and changing<br />
sentences, students learn to untangle,<br />
tighten, and rewrite sentences that may<br />
be too complex for a reader to easily<br />
understand. Conversely, students who<br />
may write short, choppy sentences can<br />
learn to change these sentences into<br />
more varied and syntactically complex<br />
sentences that better reflect what they<br />
want to say.<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-combining practice may<br />
improve writing in four ways.<br />
✍ Students start considering the reader’s<br />
perspective during the process of<br />
What Does the Literature Say About <strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong> Practice?<br />
Researchers have documented the positive effects of sentence-combining practice<br />
with writers from elementary age (Gale, 1968) through college (Smith & Combs,<br />
1980). Researched areas include (a) the efficacy of oral training (Ney, 1966); (b)<br />
the impact on reading rate and comprehension, (Wilkinson & Patty, 1993); (c) the<br />
less skilled writer (Saddler & Graham, 2005); and (d) the durability of gains<br />
(Combs, 1975). However, despite generally strong evidence of its effectiveness<br />
from many research efforts in the 1970s and 1980s, sentence combining is not well<br />
known or used in classrooms today.<br />
In a recent study by Saddler and Graham (2005), the researchers assessed the<br />
effects of a sentence-combining procedure involving peer-assisted practice with<br />
more and less skilled young writers. Forty-two students in the fourth grade<br />
received either sentence-combining instruction or grammar instruction. Students<br />
were paired for instruction and received thirty 25-minute lessons, three times a<br />
week for 10 weeks outside their regular classrooms. The results indicated that in<br />
comparison to peers receiving grammar instruction, students in the experimental<br />
treatment condition became more adept at combining simpler sentences together<br />
to create more complex sentences. In addition, the experimental students' sentence-combining<br />
skills transferred to a story-writing task, which resulted in<br />
improvements in both writing quality and revising ability.<br />
learning and manipulating syntactic<br />
options in their own writings.<br />
✍ Students may reduce the choppy or<br />
run-on sentence style. Specific pattern<br />
drill and mindful syntactic<br />
manipulation allow the writers to<br />
become aware of syntactic alternatives.<br />
This awareness may boost students’<br />
confidence in their ability to<br />
manipulate sentence syntax, and<br />
make them more willing to vary,<br />
experiment, and innovate in their<br />
writing.<br />
✍ <strong>Sentence</strong>-combining exercises can<br />
illustrate how punctuation organizes<br />
sentence elements and may help students<br />
become confident about punctuation<br />
(Lindemann, 1995).<br />
✍ <strong>Sentence</strong>-combining practice may<br />
foster revision skills by providing an<br />
organized knowledge of syntactic<br />
structures that enable writers to consider<br />
alternatives in sentence structures<br />
(Hillocks, 1986; see box, “What<br />
Does the Literature Say About<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong> Practice?”).<br />
Instructional Recommendations<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong> combining can be easily<br />
taught and practiced alongside the writing<br />
process approach whether in an<br />
inclusive classroom, a resource room, or<br />
a self-contained setting. The exercises<br />
can be introduced and practiced at any<br />
time, although writers may most effectively<br />
apply it during the revising stages<br />
(as students review their writing to<br />
determine if sentence-level changes can<br />
be made).<br />
In the following sections we describe<br />
how to introduce sentence combining,<br />
provide examples of using such exercises<br />
to improve sentence variety and correct<br />
fragments and run-on sentences,<br />
and offer suggestions on evaluating student<br />
responses.<br />
Creating Exercises<br />
The first step in creating sentence-combining<br />
exercises is to analyze a sample<br />
of your student’s writing to determine<br />
what skills need to be acquired (see<br />
Table 1). For example, Ms. Asaro<br />
noticed after reading Pete’s writing sample<br />
that many of his sentences followed<br />
a very similar simple pattern that made<br />
his stories hard to read and not very<br />
enjoyable. Pete was the only writer in<br />
her class that she believed needed direct<br />
sentence-level instruction; however, if<br />
several students or the whole class<br />
lacked the same skill, she could teach<br />
these activities to the entire group (see<br />
Table 1).<br />
Even if the student’s writing does not<br />
have many short, choppy sentences, as<br />
Pete’s had, it is usually best to start with<br />
TEACHING EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN ■ JAN/FEB 2007 ■ 7
Table 1. Creating <strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong> Exercises<br />
Instructional Approach Original <strong>Sentence</strong>s Combined <strong>Sentence</strong><br />
Cued exercises<br />
provide the student with a “clue<br />
word” to prompt a certain sentence<br />
combination.<br />
OR<br />
provide the student with a<br />
parenthetical word at the end of<br />
the sentence to be combined.<br />
Once students are comfortable with combining sentences using clues or parenthetical words, the teacher can move to open<br />
instruction.<br />
Open exercises require the student to<br />
decide what important material in<br />
the second sentence to include in a<br />
combined sentence. Many sentence<br />
combinations are possible.<br />
Once students are comfortable with combining two or three kernel sentences, the intellectual stakes can be raised.<br />
Open, naturalistic exercises elicit<br />
many interesting combinations<br />
and would provide a meaningful<br />
conversation regarding which<br />
version sounds best.<br />
exercises that combine two simple<br />
sentences to make one sentence with<br />
compound parts or one compound sentence.<br />
Keep the two sentences in the<br />
exercise as similar as possible, except<br />
for the words to be combined. For<br />
example, choose sentences such as The<br />
dog is big. The dog ran fast.<br />
Initially, exercises can be created<br />
from a literature series or other classroom<br />
books by simply reducing a passage<br />
into kernel sentences. Well-known<br />
stories can be reduced to kernels and<br />
then rewritten by student pairs. The<br />
new versions could then be read and<br />
discussed for rhetorical effect. Classroom<br />
activities or school events could<br />
also be sources of inspiration, along<br />
with the lives and interests of the stu-<br />
8 ■ COUNCIL FOR EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN<br />
The cake was delicious.<br />
The cake was chocolate.<br />
The boy fell over the chair. He lost<br />
his balance. (because)<br />
The boy fell over the chair. The chair<br />
was broken.<br />
The apple fell. The apple was green.<br />
It fell from the branch. It didn't hit<br />
anyone.<br />
dents themselves. Textbooks, newspapers,<br />
and magazines also provide suitable<br />
content for sentence-combining<br />
exercises. These sources provide a<br />
bonus for students by providing information<br />
on a new concept or reinforcing<br />
a lesson while practicing writing.<br />
These contrived exercises can be<br />
expanded so students can work and<br />
rework their own prose, thereby practicing<br />
controlling and manipulating the<br />
syntactic options available to them<br />
within their actual writing (Strong,<br />
1986). The most naturalistic way to<br />
engage students at their level of understanding<br />
and to also provide direct resolution<br />
of problems associated with a<br />
current piece of writing is to use students’<br />
work.<br />
The chocolate cake was delicious.<br />
The redundant information in the<br />
second sentence has been eliminated,<br />
and only the underlined clue word<br />
included in the new combination.<br />
The boy lost his balance because he<br />
fell over the chair.<br />
The boy fell over the broken chair.<br />
With practice, the student understands<br />
that the word “broken” in the second<br />
sentence offers new information and<br />
should be included in the new<br />
combination.<br />
The green apple fell from the branch,<br />
hitting no one.<br />
OR<br />
Falling from the branch, the green<br />
apple did not hit anyone.<br />
OR<br />
The green apple did not hit anyone<br />
when it fell from the branch.<br />
Introducing <strong>Sentence</strong> <strong>Combining</strong><br />
Introduce sentence-combining exercises<br />
to the class by explaining that this activity<br />
will help the students write more<br />
interesting sentences that will also<br />
sound better to readers. Add that good<br />
writers often work with their sentences<br />
to make them sound better. Make it<br />
clear that there will usually be more<br />
than one answer for many of the problems<br />
and that mistakes are opportunities<br />
for learning. Explain that mistakes<br />
are expected, as many of the students<br />
may be experiencing certain sentence<br />
combinations for the first time.<br />
Begin with whole-class discussion by<br />
showing students a simple pair of kernels<br />
and modeling how to combine<br />
them. Then share what your thinking
was in performing the combination and<br />
why the new combination sounds better.<br />
Suggest that when combining sentences,<br />
they may move words or parts<br />
around, delete or change words or<br />
parts, or add words or parts to the sentences<br />
to make them sound better—just<br />
as skilled writers do. If necessary, circle<br />
the words that are the same in both sentences,<br />
and show how redundant information<br />
can be eliminated. Write all the<br />
different possibilities on the board, and<br />
explain why some options are better<br />
than others.<br />
After modeling several sentences, the<br />
students should practice either independently<br />
or with a peer, with teacher<br />
support as needed. After allowing the<br />
students some time to work on practice<br />
sentence combinations, have them share<br />
all the different possible solutions, either<br />
orally or by writing responses on an<br />
overhead or board. Point out the best<br />
options, and discuss why they are better.<br />
During these discussions, researchers<br />
suggest including oral practice along<br />
with written (Frank, 1993; Strong,<br />
1986). Oral practice can be included<br />
simply and effectively by presenting kernel<br />
sentence clusters on an overhead<br />
and then asking student pairs to discuss<br />
the kernels and provide examples of<br />
combinations. The teachers can write<br />
down, read aloud, and then discuss suggestions<br />
provided by several student<br />
pairs to identify which “sound” the best.<br />
Using <strong>Sentence</strong> <strong>Combining</strong><br />
to Teach <strong>Sentence</strong> Variety<br />
Once students understand the concept of<br />
combining sentences, sentences can be<br />
varied and specific skills can be targeted.<br />
For example, to teach more sophisticated<br />
time transitions, choose two sentences<br />
such as The woman opened her front<br />
door. Then, the telephone rang. Ask the<br />
students how they could combine these<br />
sentences and eliminate redundant<br />
information. If the students cannot<br />
brainstorm complex sentences such as<br />
Before the telephone rang, the woman<br />
opened the front door or Just as the<br />
woman opened the front door, the telephone<br />
rang, a list can be provided with<br />
different possible time transition words<br />
such as before, after, when, while, by the<br />
time, until, whenever, as, and as soon as.<br />
Encourage students to try combining the<br />
sentences using all the different types of<br />
transitions that express time, and discuss<br />
how the different transitions affect<br />
the meaning of the sentence.<br />
Once students understand<br />
the concept of combining<br />
sentences, sentences<br />
can be varied and<br />
specific skills targeted.<br />
After the students have practiced<br />
sentence combining as an isolated skill,<br />
choose a paragraph that lacks the target<br />
skill area. For example, narrative paragraphs<br />
with short, choppy sentences are<br />
ideal for modeling compound sentences.<br />
Descriptive paragraphs (with<br />
many sentences beginning with then)<br />
are a good model for subordinate clauses<br />
for time relationships.<br />
Improve descriptive paragraphs by<br />
adding adjective clauses or appositives,<br />
which result in more sophisticated sentences.<br />
Choose a writing sample and<br />
work with the students to edit and combine<br />
the sentences for better grammatical<br />
flow.<br />
Practice further by combining underdeveloped<br />
or choppy sentences. During<br />
this process, it is important to focus on<br />
creating better, more meaningful sentences,<br />
not on editing the work for<br />
spelling mistakes or other technical<br />
writing problems.<br />
Using <strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong><br />
Activities to Correct Run-ons<br />
and Fragments<br />
Run-ons and fragments often stem from<br />
difficulty understanding punctuation<br />
marks and sentence boundaries. Students<br />
frequently use and, but, and or to<br />
create incredibly long sentences, or fail<br />
to include punctuation where necessary.<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-combining activities can help<br />
students understand how sentences<br />
function.<br />
The first step is to analyze a student’s<br />
writing to determine what kind of<br />
errors they are making. Run-on sentence<br />
mistakes typically fall into one of<br />
two categories: failing to use periods to<br />
separate thoughts, or using too many<br />
conjunctions such as and, but, and so to<br />
connect ideas. Fragments usually result<br />
when students either fail to complete a<br />
thought, or start a thought with a subordinate<br />
conjunction. Even though students<br />
may make more than one type of<br />
mistake, choose just one to target. For<br />
example, choose to work on eliminating<br />
run-ons that overuse conjunctions to<br />
connect ideas.<br />
In order to target run-ons that fail to<br />
use punctuation, compare the sentence<br />
to an island that can stand alone and<br />
then provide the students with two sentences<br />
to combine. Show them how<br />
each independent sentence can stand<br />
alone. Identify the subject, predicate,<br />
and modifiers in each individual sentence.<br />
As a group, work on ways to<br />
combine the sentences. Often, students<br />
fail to add punctuation marks because<br />
they are trying to create sentence variety.<br />
Because they do not understand<br />
how to create grammatical complexity,<br />
they end up with run-ons. Once they<br />
can manipulate sentences, they become<br />
aware of the boundaries among ideas.<br />
Use the same sort of activities to help<br />
eliminate run-ons that use conjunctions<br />
to connect too many ideas. When introducing<br />
the activity, write the overused<br />
conjunction onto a picture of a bridge.<br />
(See sidebar, “How Bridge Conjunctions<br />
Link Ideas.”) Tell students that conjunctions<br />
(specifically and, but, and so)<br />
work as bridges to link ideas. When<br />
there are too many bridges in a sentence,<br />
it becomes difficult to “cross” and<br />
the reader cannot understand the<br />
author’s meaning. Write a run-on sentence<br />
such as, My mom goes to work in<br />
the morning and then she comes home<br />
at night and then she makes dinner and<br />
then she reads me a story on the board.<br />
Replace all the ands with pictures of<br />
bridges to help the students visualize<br />
the problems with the sentence. Once<br />
students see how run-ons can be confusing,<br />
pick sentences that can be combined<br />
using the overused conjunction.<br />
When students understand the purpose<br />
and function of these conjunctions, they<br />
will be less likely to misuse them.<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong>-combining activities are<br />
also effective for eliminating sentence<br />
TEACHING EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN ■ JAN/FEB 2007 ■ 9
How Bridge Conjunctions Link Ideas<br />
My mom goes to work in the morning then she comes home at<br />
night then she makes dinner then she reads me a story<br />
fragments that start with subordinate<br />
conjunctions. Students often write fragments<br />
because they don’t understand<br />
the purpose of the cohesive words. Just<br />
as with the previously discussed<br />
method of teaching students how to<br />
eliminate run-ons, choose two sentences<br />
that can be combined using the<br />
conjunction that is often misused in the<br />
writing. Figure 1 illustrates which sentence-combining<br />
skills respond to specific<br />
writing needs.<br />
<strong>Sentence</strong> <strong>Combining</strong> During<br />
Revising<br />
Once the revision process has been<br />
modeled, have the students edit one of<br />
their own pieces of writing. The goal is<br />
for them to find two or three places to<br />
add sentence variety, ideally using the<br />
skill that has been taught. For example,<br />
if you have been working on writing<br />
more sophisticated paragraphs by using<br />
participle phrases, have the students<br />
either choose a sentence that can be<br />
embellished using a participle phrase, or<br />
identify two sentences that can be combined<br />
to create one sentence with a participle<br />
phrase. If necessary, help them<br />
find places to make changes. Again, the<br />
focus is on improving meaning, not on<br />
writing mechanics such as spelling or<br />
punctuation.<br />
After the students have proofread a<br />
previous piece, assign a new writing<br />
topic; in this piece, the students should<br />
include at least two sentences that target<br />
the writing goal. For example, if<br />
working on cause/effect subordinate<br />
clauses, there should be two sentences<br />
that correctly use because, since, so, or<br />
even though. Because the overall goal of<br />
writing is meaning, not just grammar,<br />
also allow the students to add these<br />
10 ■ COUNCIL FOR EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN<br />
grammatically complex sentences during<br />
the revision process.<br />
Another great way to increase students’<br />
metacognitive awareness of the<br />
skill is to have them proofread each others’<br />
work. Have the students look for<br />
one sentence that they think is written<br />
well in a partner’s work, and one place<br />
where there could be a revision. Allow<br />
the students about 10 to 15 minutes to<br />
work while providing assistance to<br />
those who need it. Then, ask students<br />
to provide one positive comment and<br />
one corrective comment on their partners’<br />
work. Students really enjoy being<br />
sentence detectives. In addition, it helps<br />
them see that the revising process is not<br />
just about fixing spelling and making<br />
capital letters!<br />
Evaluating Responses<br />
While rating responses, students may<br />
want to establish criteria to help them<br />
test the overall “correctness” of a combined<br />
sentence. Although our language<br />
does have rules governing syntax, don’t<br />
launch into a detailed discussion about<br />
the grammatical issues in play. Effectiveness<br />
is a much better indicator of<br />
merit. Gauging effectiveness encourages<br />
risk taking as it welcomes “mistakes” as<br />
opportunities for problem solving.<br />
Within this context, “mistakes” become<br />
sentences that can be formed in better<br />
ways than the writer originally tried.<br />
Nemans (1995) recommends three<br />
standards to aid students in gauging the<br />
effectiveness of responses: (a) clarity<br />
and directness of meaning, (b) rhythmic<br />
appeal, and (c) intended audience.<br />
Think of the reasons you like to read<br />
your favorite author. Why does their<br />
writing appeal to you? Initially, these<br />
three standards could be applied to sentence<br />
combinations through teacher<br />
modeling and discussion. Students<br />
could then use the standards to rate<br />
each other’s responses. These questions<br />
can also serve as whole-class discussion<br />
starters about sentence combining.<br />
Final Thoughts<br />
Although sentence-combining exercises<br />
have proven effective in increasing the<br />
syntactical fluency of writers (Saddler &<br />
Graham, 2005), they only represent one<br />
component within a writing program.<br />
Ms. Asaro supplemented her writing<br />
instruction with sentence-combining<br />
practice for Pete; she did not replace any<br />
of her other instruction. As Ms. Asaro<br />
discovered, these exercises were not a<br />
“quick-fix.” Pete needed 2 months of<br />
practice via short, frequent minilessons<br />
before Ms. Asaro noticed his writing<br />
consistently improving. Ms. Asaro collected<br />
this writing sample from Pete following<br />
their practice:<br />
There was an alien who crashed<br />
on the earth. His name was Joe.<br />
He went to the phone and called<br />
the police. The police didn’t hear<br />
him, so he hung up. Then last<br />
night he went over to his space<br />
ship and boom! a lot of smoke<br />
came out. He couldn’t believe it,<br />
but he did. So he got working on it<br />
but before it was almost done he<br />
fell asleep. That night a squirrel<br />
came out and fixed it and then<br />
went away. In the morning he<br />
woke up and said, Wow. Then he<br />
got in and went home. The End.<br />
Ms. Asaro used sentence-combining<br />
exercises as one component in a wellrounded<br />
writing program that included<br />
ample time for writing, conferencing<br />
between peers and teachers, minilessons<br />
to increase skills, teacher modeling,<br />
and choice in assignments to fill a<br />
much needed void in her instruction.
Figure 1. <strong>Sentence</strong>-<strong>Combining</strong> Skills for Specific <strong>Writing</strong> Needs<br />
Student writing has<br />
short, choppy sentences<br />
Student writing uses<br />
first, second, third,<br />
then, and next as the<br />
only transitions<br />
Student writing<br />
overuses but and so<br />
Student writing is<br />
unsophisticated and<br />
simplistic<br />
➙<br />
➙<br />
➙<br />
➙<br />
The time invested in direct skill instruction<br />
on the sentence level benefited<br />
Pete, as his sentences were more varied<br />
and interesting and the overall quality<br />
of his stories improved.<br />
Although writing sentences can test a<br />
writer’s ability, by supplementing your<br />
writing curriculum with sentence-combining<br />
instruction, you can help your<br />
students craft sentences that are varied<br />
and interesting. <strong>Through</strong> sentence-combining<br />
instruction, the “Petes” in your<br />
classroom can learn and practice an<br />
important writing skill that will help<br />
improve their writing performance.<br />
References<br />
Anderson, P. L. (1982). A preliminary study<br />
of syntax in the written expression of<br />
learning disabled children. Journal of<br />
Learning Disabilities, 15, 359–362.<br />
Combs, W. E. (1975). Some further effects<br />
and implications of sentence combining<br />
exercises for the secondary language arts<br />
Teach how to make compound<br />
subjects, predicates, and<br />
adjective modifiers<br />
Teach how to make compound<br />
sentences using and, but, and or<br />
Teach how to make complex<br />
sentences using subordinate clauses<br />
that express time relationships,<br />
using before, after, when, while,<br />
by the time, until, whenever, as,<br />
and as soon as<br />
Teach how to make complex<br />
sentences using subordinate<br />
clauses that express cause and<br />
effect relationships using because,<br />
since, so and even though<br />
Teach how to make complex<br />
sentences using subordinate<br />
clauses that express conditional<br />
relationships, using unless, if,<br />
although, and otherwise<br />
Teach how to use adjective phrases<br />
using who, whom, whose, that,<br />
and which; appositives; and<br />
participle phrases<br />
curriculum. Dissertation Abstracts International,<br />
36, A1266.<br />
Frank, M. (1993). Using sentence-combining<br />
to teach sentence structure. A demonstration<br />
given at TESOL meetings and at<br />
meetings abroad, New York, NY. (ERIC<br />
Document Reproduction Service No. ED<br />
366 208)<br />
Gale, I. F. (1968). An experimental study of<br />
two fifth grade language arts programs<br />
(Doctoral dissertation, Ball State University,<br />
1968). Dissertation Abstracts International,<br />
28, A4156.<br />
Graham, S., & Harris, K. (1989). <strong>Improving</strong><br />
learning disabled students’ skills at composing<br />
essays: Self-instructional strategy<br />
training. Exceptional Children, 56, 201–214.<br />
Harris, K., & Graham, S. (1996). Memo to<br />
constructivists: Skills count, too. Educational<br />
Leadership, 53, 26–29.<br />
Hillocks, G. (1986). Research on written composition.<br />
Urbana, IL: ERIC Clearinghouse<br />
on Reading and Communication Skills.<br />
Lindemann, E. (1995). A rhetoric for writing<br />
teachers. New York: Oxford University<br />
Press.<br />
Myklebust, H. R. (1973). Development and<br />
disorders of written language, Vol. 2:<br />
Studies of normal and exceptional children.<br />
New York: Grune & Stratton.<br />
Nemans, B. S. (1995). Teaching students to<br />
write. New York: Oxford University Press.<br />
Ney, J. W. (1966). Applied linguistics in the<br />
seventh grade. English Journal, 25,<br />
895–897.<br />
O’Hare, F. (1973). <strong>Sentence</strong> combining:<br />
<strong>Improving</strong> student writing without formal<br />
grammar instruction. Champaign, IL:<br />
National Council of Teachers of English.<br />
Pritchard, R. (1987). Effects on student writing<br />
of teacher training in the National<br />
<strong>Writing</strong> Project Model. Written Communication,<br />
4, 51–67.<br />
Saddler, B., & Graham, S. (2005). The effects<br />
of peer-assisted sentence combining<br />
instruction on the writing of more and less<br />
skilled young writers. Journal of Educational<br />
Psychology, 97(1), 43–54.<br />
Smith, W. L., & Combs, W. E. (1980). The<br />
effects of overt and covert cues on written<br />
syntax. Research in the Teaching of<br />
English, 14, 19-38.<br />
Strong, W. (1976). Close-up: <strong>Sentence</strong> combining.<br />
English Journal, 24, 56–65.<br />
Strong, W. (1986). Creative approaches to<br />
sentence combining. Urbana, IL: ERIC<br />
Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication<br />
Skills and the National Council of<br />
Teachers of English.<br />
Wechsler, D. (1974). Wechsler Intelligence<br />
Scale for Children-Revised. New York:<br />
Psychological Corp.<br />
Wilkinson, G. (1993). WRAT-3: Wide Range<br />
Achievement Test, Wilmington, DE: Wide<br />
Range, Inc.<br />
Wilkinson, P. A., & Patty, D. (1993). The<br />
effects of sentence combining on the reading<br />
comprehension of fourth grade students.<br />
Research in the Teaching of English,<br />
27, 104–121.<br />
Bruce Saddler (CEC NY Federation), Assistant<br />
Professor, Department of Educational<br />
and Counseling Psychology, Division of Special<br />
Education, University of Albany. Jennifer<br />
Preschern, Reading and Language Specialist,<br />
LEAP Learning Systems, Evanston, Illinois.<br />
Address correspondence to Bruce Saddler,<br />
Department of Educational and Counseling<br />
Psychology, University of Albany, Albany, NY<br />
12222 (e-mail: bsaddler@uamail.albany.<br />
edu).<br />
Author’s Note: “Pete” and “Ms. Asaro” are<br />
pseudonyms for an actual third-grade student<br />
and his teacher.<br />
TEACHING Exceptional Children, Vol. 39,<br />
No. 3, pp. 6–11.<br />
Copyright 2007 CEC.<br />
TEACHING EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN ■ JAN/FEB 2007 ■ 11