One of the key principles of Hochman and Wexler's 'The Writing Revolution' is that sentences are the building blocks of all writing. Even the more competent writers among our students benefit from practising how to write better sentences. The beauty of the methods in ‘The Writing Revolution’ is that they’re content-driven; they’re designed not only to improve students’ writing abilities but also to develop their thinking around the topic they’re writing about. The fragments into sentences task just does that.
A fragments into sentences task requires students to rewrite a fragment so that it becomes a complete sentence. Completing fragments into sentences has multiple purposes in the classroom:
It reminds students how to write complete sentences.
It teaches them to use different sentence structures, e.g. starting with a subordinating conjunction.
It helps embed content they’ve been taught in the lesson.
It develops writing confidence.
It encourages them to be concise.
Fragments can be placed at the start, middle or end of the sentence and can be used to hone in on specific sentence structures.
Example 1: at the start of sentences to practising starting with subordinating conjunctions
In a lesson on Charles Dickens (taught at the start of an Oliver Twist unit), previously we might have asked these questions after reading some text about Dickens, asking students to answer the questions in full sentences.
What happened to Dickens when he was twelve?
What did Dickens experience while working in a blacking factory?
What happened to Dickens three years later?
How would you describe Dickens’s childhood?
Some students would tackle this task well, answering confidently in full sentences. Others would struggle to answer the questions in full sentences. Even those who answered confidently, may not vary their sentence types or sentence structures. Using a fragments into sentences task to achieve the same outcome enables us to guide the students’ writing more explicitly, encouraging them to start their sentences with subordinating conjunctions:
Turn the fragments into sentences:
Model: (could be modelled live by the teacher)
When he was only twelve,...
When he was only twelve, Dickens lost his parents because they were sent to debtors’ prison.
Your turn:
While working in the blacking factory, Dickens ...
After three years of working in the factory, ...
Whereas many children had a happy childhood, Dickens…
Example 2: in the middle of sentences to practise writing complex or compound sentences
When used in the middle of sentences, fragments can guide students towards writing better complex and compound sentences. For example, in a lesson on Act 1 Scene 2 of Romeo and Juliet, we’ve identified in our core knowledge and unit plan that we want students to know these things about this key scene:
Lord Capulet begins to arrange Juliet’s marriage to Paris.
Paris is keen to marry Juliet straight away.
Lord Capulet asks Paris to wait for two years.
Lord Capulet wishes to protect Juliet, still seeing her as young and a ‘stranger to the world’.
Lord Capulet asks Paris to woo Juliet and try to win her heart first.
Having identified that this is the knowledge we want students to practise through their writing task, we would then consider how to use the writing task to develop their writing of compound and complex sentences. For example:
Turn the fragments into sentences:
Model: (could be modelled live by the teacher)
...discusses Juliet’s marriage with Paris, who…
Lord Capulet discusses Juliet’s marriage with Paris, who is keen to marry Juliet straight away.
Stretch model: (also modelled live by the teacher)
To create a stretch model, we might, for example, encourage students to add an appositive into their sentence (having previously taught what an appositive is).
Lord Capulet, the patriarch of the Capulet household, discusses Juliet’s marriage with Paris, who is keen to marry Juliet straight away.
Your turn:
...wait for two more years because…
...is protective over Juliet, since…
...requests that Paris ‘woo’ her in order to…
Example 3: at the start and in the middle, to practise using key vocabulary
Fragments into sentences tasks can be used to guide students in deliberate practice of tier 2 or 3 vocabulary taught in the lesson. In a lesson on Maycomb’s prejudice towards the Radley family, for example, we’d identified this as the core knowledge we want students to practise and embed:
The Radleys experience prejudice because:
they don’t go to church on Sundays
they keep their windows and shutters closed
they don’t socialise with others in the town
Harper Lee repeats the words ‘people said’ through Scout’s speech to indicate that people in Maycomb gossip about the Radleys, perpetuating prejudiced attitudes.
Having identified that this is the knowledge we want students to practise through their writing task, we would then consider how to use the writing task to develop their writing while also using the tier 2 word ‘prejudice(d)’, which we have explicitly taught:
Turn the fragments into sentences:
Model (could be modelled live by the teacher)
...are prejudiced against the Radleys because…
The people of Maycomb are prejudiced against the Radleys because they do not take part in the town’s activities, such as attending church on Sundays.
Your turn:
...become victims of prejudice as a result of...
...is perpetuated by…
...emphasises the prejudiced attitudes through repeating…
Key Takeaways:
Writing paragraphs and essays over and over again is unlikely to lead to improved paragraphs and essays. Practising writing at sentence level and bringing these sentence structures into paragraphs will.
Sentence level tasks require students to refine their thinking and be concise.
A fragments into sentences task can teach students, intuitively, how to write more sophisticated sentences, while advancing their thinking about the subject content.
Check out the resources section of my blog for writing booklets that contain more examples of these tasks.
Morning! Could you direct me towards your resources section, please? Thanks for an interesting read!