Writing Stronger Sentences — Part 1: Meet the Conjunctions

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Heather Adams: All right, welcome back. Did you have a good lunch?

Students: Yes.

Heather Adams: Awesome. Alright, well, Jeff's here to start writing with us. Say hi.

Students: Hi, Jeff.

Heather Adams: Hi. Jeff is ready. Our class pet is ready and today what we're going to be talking about is sentence combining and we're going to try to answer two questions. Why should I combine sentences and how do I do it?

Narrator: Today, Heather Adams is teaching her third graders at Oak Street Elementary how to transform simple sentences into more complex and interesting ones. They will be combining sentences using conjunctions or connector words.

Heather Adams: So what we're going to talk about is some connector words. And these connector words are called conjunctions. What are they called?

Students: Conjunctions.

Heather Adams: And I know when I talk about conjunctions, I like to think about them as connectors.

Narrator: Knowing when and how to use conjunctions isn't always obvious to students. That's why Ms. Adams is breaking down the role of four key connector words today: and, but, or, and so.

Heather Adams: They all have slightly different jobs to do. So we're going to go through and just understand what job does each one of these conjunctions do, and how can I use them when I'm combining ideas or simple sentences. So we're going to start with this first one. And I know you've used this word lots of times when you've been speaking, when you've been writing, you've seen it in your reading. It's the word and it's used for putting related ideas together. And is for combining two ideas that are the same. So Jeff ... If you are going to share that, Jeff likes tacos and Jeff likes ice cream. These are two related ideas. There are two things that Jeff ...

Students: Likes ...

Heather Adams: Likes, exactly! So we can use that connector word, that conjunction and to make a compound sentence. I think this sounds better. Jeff likes tacos and ice cream. Do you see what and is doing in that sentence? Connecting two similar ideas.

Narrator: Ms. Adams is diving deep into how each conjunction works with explicit and direct instruction. Focusing on these details now will make choosing the right conjunction more automatic for students later on.

Heather Adams: Sometimes though you have two ideas that are different, two things that are not the same. And we want to show that they are contrasting, different ideas and we would use the conjunction but. See this picture, it kind of helps me remember these ideas are not the same. So here's what these simple sentences might sound like. Jeff enjoys sledding. Me too. Jeff doesn't enjoy shoveling. Actually, me neither. So if we wanted to kind of combine these two simple sentences, but they're not the same thing, we might combine them with but. Jeff enjoys sledding, but he doesn't enjoy shoveling. Does that make sense?

Students: Yeah.

Heather Adams: Awesome. Our next one is or, and this is when we might put two options together. We just had lunch. Can you think of a situation where you might use "or" when you're talking about two different choices or two different options? Molly?

Molly: Would you like a chicken patty or a salad?

Heather Adams: Yeah, Molly. Exactly. So we would probably have a choice between a chicken patty or a salad. We weren't eating both of them. They were two options. Exactly. So let's check out Jeff's example of two options. Jeff can read at his desk, or Jeff can read at the library. We know these are two options for Jeff, but combining it with this conjunction or just makes it sound more interesting and sophisticated. Jeff can read at his desk or in the library. And we have one final conjunction left. This one's my favorite. It's so sophisticated because if you notice this last conjunction, what is it?

Students: So.

Heather Adams: So is such an interesting conjunction because it shows how one thing might lead to another thing. How one thing might cause something else to happen. And that's a relationship that we might use a lot in our writing. So let's look at Jeff's example. Jeff listens to directions. Good job. So Jeff understands what to do. Because he listens to directions, he understands what to do. And we might see the conjunction so in lots of places, because we know a lot about cause and effect.

Narrator: Now that they know the role, each conjunction plays, students are ready for the next step. They'll practice picking the right one to create more complex sentences.

Heather Adams: So what we're going to do is we're going to try to put our conjunction knowledge to the test. We're going to try to choose a conjunction connector word that connects some simple sentences.