Sentence Combining
Learning Objectives
In this workshop, you will focus on the following objective:
Grammar: Understanding how to combine sentences.
Sentence Combining
Too many short sentences can make writing sound choppy or boring. In “Stray,” Cynthia Rylant combines sentences in a variety of ways to make her writing lively and clear. She includes simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentence structures.
Simple Sentences
A simple sentence has only one main clause—also called an independent clause—and no dependent, or subordinate, clauses. Main clauses have a subject and a predicate and can stand alone as a sentence. Look at this simple sentence from the story:
“She set down the shovel.”
Compound Sentences
When you have written a few simple sentences that are closely related in meaning, try combining them to form compound sentences. A compound sentence contains two or more simple sentences. You can combine two or more related simple sentences into a compound sentence by using conjunctions such as and, but, or or. Look at this sentence from the story:
“She cried herself to sleep, and her dreams were full of searching and searching for things lost.”
Rylant uses the coordinating conjunction and to join the two closely related main clauses. Other coordinating conjunctions include but, so, or, nor, for, and yet.
Watch Out!
When you use a coordinating conjunction to combine two main clauses, remember to add a comma before the conjunction.
Complex Sentences
A dependent clause, also called a subordinate clause, has a subject and a predicate, but it makes sense only when attached to a main clause. Look at this sentence from the story:
“Because the roads would be too bad for travel for many days, Mr. Lacey couldn’t get out to take the puppy to the pound in the city right away.”
The first clause is dependent—it does not make sense on its own. Subordinating conjunctions, words such as after, as, when, where, or because, often begin dependent clauses. If a dependent clause begins the sentence, put a comma after the clause.
Helpful Hint
Recognizing common subordinating conjunctions can help you to identify subordinate clauses: after, although, as, as if, as though, because, before, if, since, so, that, though, till, unless, until, when, where, whereas, while.
Compound-Complex Sentences
Look at the following sentence from the story:
“They looked at her when she came in, but she kept her head down.”
Look at each clause in the sentence and identify it as a main clause (independent) or as a subordinate clause (dependent).
They looked at her (main clause)
when she came in, (subordinate clause)
but she kept her head down. (main clause)
A compound-complex sentence contains two or more main clauses and one or more subordinate clauses. Notice that the main clauses in the sentence from the story express complete thoughts. The subordinate clause depends on the rest of the sentence to make sense and contains the subordinating conjunction when.
Watch Out!
A dependent clause may appear at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of a sentence. Put a comma after a dependent clause when it begins a sentence. Put a comma before and after the dependent clause when it appears in the middle of a sentence.