Important Writing Facts - How to Use Sentence Transformation and Build Complex Sentences
July 30, 2009
When learning English or any other language for that matter, one good exercise is to perform sentence transformations. In a nutshell, this is the process of taking one sentence and rewriting it using a different grammar construct.
Essentially, you will look to express the exact same idea. However, you will be presenting it in a different way. If you need an example, look at these following sentences:
Example 1:
This is my first time in the US.
I am here in the US for the first time.
Example 2:
The course I finished took me over 3 years to complete.
It took me three years to finish the course that I took.
Notice that while the two sentences on each example are differently constructed, they say essentially the same thing.
Language Tests
The ability to rewrite sentences in such a way that they have the same meaning as the original is a major sign of your progress in learning a new language. In fact, almost all major ESL and EFL examps include this as part of their tests, a major testament to its importance.
Practicing
If you want to practice on this end and don’t have an instructor to grade you, try using a language software to help you out. Open your favorite English blog, for instance, and copy several sentences off it, rewriting them one by one. Then, run a grammar software to find out the correctness of your rewrite.
For many English learners, getting to a point where you’re stringing complex sentences typically signals a major advancement in your mastery of the language. Spouting simple sentences, for the most part, is a dead giveaway that you’re new to the vernacular, while complex sentences easily make you sound like a native speaker - whether you’re still only a quarter of the way in your language software or not.
From Simple Sentences To Complex
“I owned a camel. His name was Hank. That animal ate more food than my pig.”
While there is nothing grammatically wrong with the above series of sentences (even your grammar software might approve), they have one distinct problem: they don’t sound natural. People, during actual interactions, don’t pause after expressing each of those ideas in that manner. If you want your text to sound well, try turning it into a complex sentence, such as the following:
“I owned a camel named Hank who ate more food than my pig.”
Basic Rules
When combining simple sentences to form complex ones, always follow the following guidelines for an easier time:
1. Add or change words to connect each idea. In the above example, we used “name” as a verb instead of a “noun” as in the original. Similarly, we introduced the word “who” to connect the last idea with the rest of the statements.
2. Eliminate duplicate ideas. If two sentences express the same idea, ditch one of them when combining into a complex sentence.
3. Avoid repeating words. Words repeated across consecutive sentences sound bad enough (though, sometimes unavoidable). Repeating them in the same sentence sounds even less ideal - avoid it, if you can.
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