Varying Your Sentence Structure
When writing longer texts, it is important to vary the length and structure of your sentences. This is partly because sentences with the same structure and length will become monotonous for readers. With a bit of variation, you will eliminate repetition that may dull your reader's interest. Also, varying sentence style and structure will make your text easier to understand, it can reduce complexity, and it will help you emphasis important ideas that you want the reader to remember.
Let's take a look at three different ways that you can create a more dynamic text.
First of all: remember to vary the length of your sentences. Take a look at this paragraph. What is wrong here?
During my time in office, I have reached several goals. I have helped increase funding for the local hospital. I initiated the building of our new school. I have helped reduce crime rates in this town. The unemployment rate has gone down. My competitor argues that he is the better choice in this election. I believe that it is not necessary to fix something that isn’t broken. If you reelect me this year, I promise I will continue to serve this community.
In this extract from a campaign speech, the writer uses short, simple sentences of similar length and style, many of them starting with the first-person pronoun 'I'. Writers sometimes mistakenly believe that this will make the text clearer for the reader, but the result is a choppy, unsophisticated, and monotonous paragraph that doesn’t grab the reader’s attention.
In this revised paragraph, more variety has been added:
During my time in office, I have increased the funding for the local hospital and initiated the building of our new school. Also, I have helped reduce the unemployment rate, as well as the crime rate. Why fix what isn’t broken? If you reelect me this year, I promise I will continue to achieve great things for this community. Don’t take a chance on a contender you don't know; vote for the proven success.
This paragraph is much more interesting to read. The sentences vary in length, and a rhetorical question has been added. This makes it easier to hold the reader’s attention, and it also creates a pleasing sound to the ear.
Another way to create a more dynamic language is to vary your sentence patterns.
We usually divide sentences into three different types: simple, compound, and complex sentences.
Simple sentences have the most basic elements that make it a sentence: a subject, a verb, and a completed thought. This sentence type is often referred to as an independent clause.
Example:
My dog loves to play fetch.
Compound sentences consist of two independent clauses (or simple sentences) joined together by a coordinating conjunction, which is usually preceded by a comma.
Examples:
My dog loves to play fetch, so we play fetch quite often.
My dog loves to play fetch, yet she never brings the ball back.
My dog loves to play fetch, and she often plays in the back yard.
Complex sentences consist of
an independent clause (which forms a complete sentence on its own) and
at least one dependent clause (which needs another clause to make a complete sentence).
These sentences always have a relative pronoun or a subordinator.
Examples:
My dog, who is only two years old, loves to play fetch.
Whenever she's outside, my dog wants to play fetch.
My dog loves to play fetch, although she never brings back the ball.
Becoming aware of the different types of sentences – simple, compound, and complex sentences – can help you vary the language of your writing. They have their strengths and their weaknesses, and should be used accordingly:
Simple sentences are usually short, concise, and to the point, and they can help eliminate wordiness and provide clarity. However, too many simple sentences strung together can also make your text sound disconnected and choppy.
Compound and complex sentences, on the other hand, are a good help if you want to show a connection between various ideas. However, too many long sentences can make your writing too complicated and difficult to follow.
Therefore, the most effective writing normally uses a variety of the different sentence types.
A writer should avoid starting too many sentences in a similar fashion, especially if the first word is 'the', 'it', 'this', or 'I'.
Below are alternative openings for a fairly standard sentence. Notice that different beginnings can alter not only the structure but also the emphasis, tone, and mood of the sentence. They may also require rephrasing of sentences, meaning that one change could lead to an abundance of sentence variety.
Example sentence:
I went to the supermarket to buy milk because my father forgot to go shopping yesterday.
Alternative structures:
Since my father forgot to go shopping yesterday, I went to the supermarket to buy milk.
Shopping at the supermarket, I picked up a bottle of milk because my father forgot to buy one yesterday.
Annoyed by my father’s forgetfulness, I grudgingly went to the supermarket to buy milk.
Irritated, I went to the supermarket to buy milk because my father forgot to go shopping yesterday.
A busy person, my father forgot to go shopping yesterday, so I went to the supermarket to buy milk.
As a consequence of my father forgetting the shopping, I had to go to the supermarket and pick up a bottle of milk.
My father, who usually goes shopping, forgot to do so yesterday, so I went to the supermarket to buy milk.
These are just a few ways you can vary your language to create a more exciting, interesting, and dynamic text. Move on to the tasks to practice how to vary your sentence length, sentence structures, and sentence introductions.
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Tasks that will help you vary your language, making it more dynamic and interesting.