CRAFTING SENTENCES IN NARRATIVE FICTION

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CRAFTING SENTENCES IN NARRATIVE FICTION

• Teaching GRAMMAR FOR WRITING

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Word class?

• cold
• striking
• escape
• wind
• swirl

This is the third cold Ive had this
winter. Thats a very striking coat youre
wearing. Any attempt at escape is
useless. You really know how to wind me
up! Finish with a swirl of cream.
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Word classes in context

• It was a bright cold day in April, and the
  clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith, his
  chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to
  escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the
  glass doors of Victory Mansions, though not
  quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust
  from entering along with him.
• Nineteen
  Eighty Four, George Orwell

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Aims

• To explore ways of teaching students about
  sentence construction and sentence variation
• To consolidate teachers subject knowledge about
  sentences
• To plan for teaching sentence variety in the
  context of narrative fiction

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• Grammar is what gives sense to language
  Sentences make words yield up their meanings.
  Sentences actively create sense in language and
  the business of the study of sentences is the
  study of grammar.
• 
  David Crystal, Rediscover Grammar
• Conscious manipulation of syntax deepens
  engagement and releases invention.
• 
  Ted Hughes

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Some basics

• What is the difference between a phrase, a clause
  and a sentence?

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Finite Verbs

• Necessary to create a main clause and therefore a
  sentence.
• They are inflected for person, number and tense
  (so changing the tense of a passage is an easy
  way to find most of them).
• Modal verbs are also finite (would, could, may
  etc).
• Imperatives are finite (Stay! Sit! Eat!).
• In a string of verbs, the first verb is the
  finite one.

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Find the finite verbs

• It was a bright cold day in April, and the
  clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith, his
  chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to
  escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the
  glass doors of Victory Mansions, though not
  quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust
  from entering along with him.
• Nineteen Eighty Four, George Orwell

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The Sentence

• Simple sentence
• one clause containing a finite verb (main clause)
• Compound sentence
• two or more coordinated main clauses
• Complex sentence
• one main clause and one or more subordinate
  clauses

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Simple sentence

• One clause containing a finite verb.
• A simple sentence can be any length.

The detective hurried along the street. The
detective hurried along the rain-swept streets,
his hands deep in his pockets. With his hands
deep in his pockets one cold November night, the
detective from New York hurried anxiously along
the half-deserted, rain-swept streets, a troubled
frown on his face.
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Identify the simple sentences

• I was just pushing the lower half of the
  ladder back up when I heard it. There was someone
  at the front door. I held my breath. It was OK.
  They couldnt get in. I slid my hand into my
  pocket to make sure the key was still there. It
  wasnt. Id left it in the front door. I could
  hear it turning in the lock now. I raced back up
  the ladder and hauled it after me. When I reached
  down to pull the hatch back up, I could hear
  someone coming up the stairs. I quickly pulled
  the hatch back into place and scrabbled over to
  the water tank, holding my breath.
• (From Millions by Frank Cottrell Boyce)

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Can you add more detail to this sentence so that
we have a clearer picture of the setting,
characters and events? Use only one verb.

• Choose more interesting nouns
• (e.g. teenager, pavement)
• Choose a more interesting verb
• (e.g. crouched, were curled up)
•  
• Add more information to the verb with an adverb
• (e.g. despairingly, together)
•   
• Add more information to the noun with an
  adjective
• (e.g. hungry, exhausted)
•  
• Add more information with an adverbial phrase
  that tells you where, when or how something
  happens
• (e.g. outside the supermarket, on a cold winters
  day, in despair)
• Change the order of words for emphasis (e.g. by
  moving the adverb to the start of the sentence)

A boy and his dog sat in the road.
The house was near a road.
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Coordination

• andbut...or
• words bread and butterphrases
  all the kings horses and all the kings
  menclauses Its getting late and
  Im tired.words tired but
  happyphrases out of sight but
  not out of mindclauses I like
  coffee but love tea.words
  heads or tailsphrases
  table dhôte or à la carteclauses
  We can eat in or we can go out.

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Compound sentence

• It was a bright cold day in April, and the
  clocks were striking thirteen.
• She was startled and looked at her son.
• She looked at her son and was startled.
• Coordinating conjunctions and, but, or
• BOYFANS but, or, yet, for, and, neither, so

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Sentence variety

• Some findings from research
• Weaker writers tend to chain together finite
  clauses, (most frequently joined with and or by
  comma splicing).
• Stronger writers use a wider range of non-finite
  clauses to add detail, create mood and rhythm.
• However, stronger writers also use simple
  sentences for effect.
• (QCA, 1999 Myhill, 2001)

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Subordination

• Subordinating conjunctions join a dependent or
  subordinate clause to a main clause to create a
  complex sentence
• e.g. after, although, as, as if, as long as,
  before, if, in case, since, unless, while,
  when(ever), where(ever), whereas, because
• Make up a subordinate clause to precede the
  following main clause
• We didnt wear our coats

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How many different ways can you join the main
clauses to the subordinate clauses? Which
sentences sound the scariest?
the house seemed empty
slowly decaying
its windows boarded up
covered with ivy
a woman stood in the doorway
smiling
holding a flickering candle
beckoning me to follow her
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Complex sentence

• A subordinate clause is formed from
• A subordinating conjunction finite verb
• As she slid down towards the edge....
• .....when I heard it.
• A relative pronoun finite verb
• Winston, who was thirty-nine....
• A non-finite verb (present/past participles the
  infinitive)
• Holding my breath....
• Trapped in the attic....
• To make sure the key was still there....

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Sentence combining

• The boy bit his lip. He kept back the tears. He
  advanced. The man raised his arm.
• Combine
• to make compound sentences
• to make one complex sentence

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• The boy, biting his lower lip so as to keep back
  the tears, advanced, and the man raised his arm.
• From The Breadwinner, Lesley Halward

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Identify subordinate clauses

• That was when Iorek moved. Like a wave that has
  been building its strength
• over a thousand miles of ocean, and which makes
  little stir in the deep water,
• but which when it reaches the shallows rears
  itself up high into the sky,
• terrifying the shore-dwellers, before crashing
  down on the land with irresistible
• power so Iorek Byrnison rose up against Iofur,
  exploding upwards from his
• firm footing on the dry rock and slashing with a
  ferocious left hand at the
• exposed jaw of Iofur Raknison.
• It was a horrifying blow. It tore the lower part
  of his jaw clean off, so that it flew
• through the air scattering blood-drops in the
  snow many yards away.
• (Description of the bear fight in Northern Lights
  by Philip Pullman)

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How did Philip Pullman do that?

• Iorek Byrnison rose up against Iofur
• Like a wave that has been building its strength
  over a thousand miles of
• ocean, Iorek Byrnison rose up against Iofur
• Like a wave that has been building its strength
  over a thousand miles of
• ocean, and which makes little stir in the deep
  water, but which when it
• reaches the shallows rears itself up high into
  the sky, terrifying the
• shore-dwellers, before crashing down on the land
  with irresistible power
• so Iorek Byrnison rose up against Iofur,
  exploding upwards from his
• firm footing on the dry rock and slashing with a
  ferocious left hand at
• the exposed jaw of Iofur Raknison.

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Conscious control for effect

• And it seemed to happen so slowly, but there
  was nothing she could do her weight shifted, the
  stones moved under her feet, and helplessly she
  began to slide. In the first moment it was
  annoying, and then it was comic she thought how
  silly! But as she utterly failed to hold on to
  anything, as the stones rolled and tumbled
  beneath her, as she slid down towards the edge,
  gathering speed, the horror of it slammed into
  her. She was going to fall. There was nothing to
  stop her. It was already too late.
• 
  The Amber Spyglass, Philip Pullman

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Putting verbs in their place

• A squat grey building of only thirty-four
• storeys. Over the main entrance the
• words, CENTRAL LONDON HATCHERY
• AND CONDITIONING CENTRE, and, in a
• shield, the World State's motto,
• COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY.
• Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

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What the Dickens?

• LONDON. Michaelmas Term lately over, and the
  Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincolns Inn Hall.
  Implacable November weather. As much mud in the
  streets as if the waters had but newly retired
  from the face of the earth, and it would not be
  wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long
  or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up
  Holborn Hill. Smoke lowering down from
  chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with
  flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown
  snow-flakes gone into mourning, one might
  imagine, for the death of the sun. Dogs,
  undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely
  better splashed to their very blinkers. Foot
  passengers, jostling one anothers umbrellas in a
  general infection of ill-temper, and losing their
  foot-hold at street-corners, where tens of
  thousands of other foot passengers have been
  slipping and sliding since the day broke (if the
  day ever broke), adding new deposits to the crust
  upon crust of mud, sticking at those points
  tenaciously to the pavement, and accumulating at
  compound interest.

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• I believe the road to hell is paved with
  adverbs
• - Stephen King On Writing

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• Create a word bank of verbs to describe this
  picture.
• Write a short paragraph using your verbs
  effectively.

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Phrases

• I lived alone for a long time in the house at
  the end of the street.
• Noun phrase the house at the end of the street
• Verb phrase I lived alone
• Prepositional phrases in the house at the end
  of the street
• Adjectival phrase the house at the end of the
  street
• Adverbial phrase I lived alone for a long time
  in the house at the end of the street

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Aaagh! Beam me up!

• Dont panic!
• Descriptions of grammar or syntax operate on many
  levels concurrently.
• e.g. A group of words can be a finite subordinate
  clause and also an adverbial clause at the same
  time.
• e.g. A prepositional phrase can also be an
  adjectival phrase.
• e.g. A subordinating connective (who) can also be
  a relative pronoun.
• This is not a cause to despair.
• You dont need to know everything!
• Concentrate on a few specific points to help
  students writing.
• Agree them with each other and what to call
  them.

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Teaching adverbials

• Generic term for words/phrases/clauses that add
  detail of when, where and how something happens
• Time I walked in the dusky evening.
• Place I walked through the shadowy forest.
• Manner I walked on, feeling afraid

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Teaching Adverbials

• Create atmosphere (melodrama, foreboding,
  melancholy).
• Change verbs, add adverbials (words, phrases or
  clauses).
• I walked through the city. The sun shone.
  Wispy clouds moved across the sky. People crowded
  the streets. Still, I was alone.

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The power of punctuation

• The way a sentence is punctuated communicates the
  relative importance and relevance of points and
  can create or solve ambiguities for the reader.
• How many different ways can you punctuate the
  following
• A woman without her man is nothing

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Teaching punctuation

• Punctuation is about awareness of grammatical
  chunks to split up texts into sentences
  indicating clearly where each major chunk of
  meaning begins and ends we use capital letters
  and full stops within the sentence we use a
  variety of punctuation marks to show breaks
  between phrases clauses and sometimes words

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Teaching punctuation

• Punctuation is about awareness of grammatical
  chunks. To split up texts into sentences,
  indicating clearly where each major chunk of
  meaning begins and ends, we use capital letters
  and full stops. Within the sentence, we use a
  variety of punctuation marks to show breaks
  between phrases, clauses and, sometimes, words.

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Punctuate for meaning

• Speakers use tone of voice to shape meaning.
  Writers use punctuation marks. David Crystal
• Its not there.
• Its not there!
• Its not there?

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Writers choices

• I listened and at last I heard it a tiny
  squeaking sound far off like it was coming from
  another world.
• I listened, and at last I heard it a tiny
  squeaking sound, far off, like it was coming from
  another world.

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Writers choices

• Black shapes were emerging out of thin air all
  around them blocking their way left and right
  eyes glinted through slits in hoods a dozen lit
  wand tips were pointing directly at their hearts
  Ginny gave a gasp of horror
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,
  Chapter 35
• Black shapes were emerging out of thin air
  all around them, blocking their way left and
  right eyes glinted through slits in hoods, a
  dozen lit wand tips were pointing directly at
  their hearts Ginny gave a gasp of horror.

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Using commas

• We use commas
• before but in a compound sentence
• to separate the subordinate clause from the main
  clause when the subordinate clause comes first
• after a connective that links across or between
  sentences
• to separate items in a list
• round additional information in a sentence that
  can be removed without affecting meaning.

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Writing conversations

• Talking about patterns and features of language
  helps pupils to become more aware of them and so
  to use them better as tools for thinking and
  expression.

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Rhetorical grammar rules

• Linked to students own reading and writing, not
  studied separately.
• Teaching features and patterns of language and
  how they create meaning or effects.
• Detailed and explicit discussion about language
  in context using real examples, not simplistic
  descriptions such as adjectives create good
  description short sentences create impact.
• Not focused on accuracy.
• Always support technical terminology with
  examples.

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Final Recap

• Grammar, as a word, has many shades of meaning.
• When it comes to attempts to describe language,
  there are many different grammars.
• Language came first grammar is just an attempt
  to describe it!
• You already have expert implicit knowledge about
  language.
• When teaching, remember to focus on language in
  context and on how any features you teach can be
  used in students own writing.
• Have fun!