Combining SentencesEffectively

&Economically

…a Mash Up. Good sentences are composed so that they blend well.

Sentence Combining is like…

Compositional Strategies

Focus on word order to avoid confusion

Lists: Use commas and conjunctions to blend

“Clue” words: Because, However, Before/After, When, As, Next, etc.

Combine Effectively

a. The girls stood aside.b. The very small children rolled in

the dust.c. Some children clung to the hands

of their older brothers or sisters.d. The girls were doing two things.e. They looked over their shoulders

at the boys.f. They talked among themselves.

Based on a sentence by Shirley Jackson, “The Lottery”

The Master Mash-Up

The girls stood aside, talking among themselves, looking over their shoulders at the boys, and the very small children rolled in the dust or clung to the hands of their older brothers or sisters.

Combine Economically

Less is more.

Word Count ChallengeHow low can you go?

a. One day when I went out to my woodpile, something happened.

b. What happened was that I observed two ants.

c. They were both large.d. One was red.e. The other ant was much larger than the red

one.f. The larger one was black.g. The two ants were fiercely contending with

one another.Based on a sentence by Henry David Thoreau,

Walden

How many words did it take?

Thoreau did it in 26:

One day when I went out to my woodpile, I observed two large ants, the one red, the other much larger, fiercely contending with one another.