Many of our students get stuck in their writing and use:

• run-on sentences,
• sentence fragments, or
• primarily simple sentences.

Students have complex ideas that require a working knowledge of  clauses: main and subordinate.  Knowledge of what clauses are and how they can be used give our students a tool for creating complex sentences in their own writing.

Topic:

Grade Level: 9-10
Student Lesson name and URL:

           Reading/Language Arts 9-10

Curriculum Standard Three: 
The students will write and speak with a command of standard American
 English conventions. 

 3.1 correctly use clauses (e.g.  main and  subordinate) 

Students will be able to:

• define specialized terminology involving parts of speech
• identify main and subordinate clauses
• create complex sentences

edit and revise writing to incorporate complex sentences 

Introductory Activity

Create cards enough for every student to have one.   On the front of the card have a word; on the back of the card have its part of speech.  Focus on nouns, verbs, direct objects, conjunctive adverbs, and coordinating conjunctions.   Hand out one card to each student.  Give students a short amount of time to get together with as many persons as possible linking their cards to make sense.  The winners are those who have the most in their groups and can explain how and why they all connect.  Give prizes for the top three groups. 
 

Activities need to be geared toward being able to identify parts of speech and their function in relationship to each other.  Students will need a portfolio of writing from which to draw pieces for editing and revision.
 

Students will be able to revise their writing incorporating more complex structure to convey the depth of their ideas.
 
 
  

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Introductory Activity
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Enabling Activity
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Culminating Activity
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Last Revised: 06/30/2000 (insert and update last revision date every time you work on this page.)