Craig invoked the memory of Francis Christensen, who preached the mantra of "similar things in similar ways." By beginning a series of sentences with similar vocabulary and/or similar grammar, the writer signals organization, connections, sequence, and parallelism. Here are two paragraphs from Bruce Catton's "Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts" that show this technique in action:

And that, perhaps, is where the contrast between Grant and Lee becomes most striking. The Virginia aristocrat, inevitably, saw himself in relation to his own region. He lived in a static society which could endure almost anything except change. Instinctively, his first loyalty would go to the locality in which that society existed. He would fight to the limit of endurance to defend it, because in defending it he was defending everything that gave his own life its deepest meaning. 

The Westerner, on the other hand, would fight with an equal tenacity for the broader concept of society. He fought so because everything he lived by was tied to growth, expansion, and a constantly widening horizon. What he lived by would survive or fall with the nation itself. He could not possibly stand by unmoved in the face of an attempt to destroy the Union. He would combat it with everything he had, because he could only see it as an effort to cut the ground out from under his feet.  

Just try messing around with those "He" sentence openers and watch how the whole thing dissolves into mush.

Don Stewart  

On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 6:48 PM, Susan van Druten <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Craig,
Unless you have taught average students in high school (or younger grades), I think you should rethink your stance. Don't just trust me on this.  Maybe others who are on this list will chime in: Is teaching struggling writers to consider varying their sentence start is a helpful strategy?  If you were intimately familiar with that type of student writing, you would know that I am not exaggerating just how robotic their essays can be.

When I cover parallel structure in AP and honors classes, we talk about the difference between purposeful repetition (emphasis, humor, known-new, hooks, etc.) and repetition born by uninspired, lazy writing.




On May 18, 2009, at 8:30 AM, Craig Hancock wrote:

Susan,
  If I saw the same writing, I might very well agree that change is
needed, but I wouldn't use "sentence variety" as a motivation. I'm sure
we can find many instances where good writers maintain subjects for
longer stretches than that. The last time this came up on the list, I
was teaching Frost's "Acquainted With the Night" and observed that ALL
the sentences in that poem begin with "I have." Look closely at Obama's
acclaimed speech on race, and you'll see many instances of sentence
openers repeated many times. I kn ow that because my grammar class
worked on a passage as an optional final.
  Francis Christensen deals with many of these issues in "Notes toward a
new Rhetoric" in an essay called "Sentence Openers." (Among other
things, he reports in his samples that 8.75% of sentences in expository
writing for professional writers start with the fanboy conjunctions. In
fiction, it was 4.55%. He called it a sign of "a mature style.") The
essay is largely an argument against calls for unique sentence openers
for purposes of variety.
  He ends the essay in this way: "What we need is a rhetorical theory of
the sentence that will not merely combine the ideas of primer
sentences, but will generate new ideas. In such a rhetoric, sentence
elements would not be managed arbitrarily for the sake of secondary
concerns such as variety. They would be treated functionally and the
variety--and its opposite, parallelism and balance--allowed to grow
from the materials and the effort to communicate them to the reader."
  since Ed brought up the issue, I would add that he found about 28.5% of
sentences in professional expository writing open with adverbials. The
number is smaller (20%) for fiction. There is great  variability,
though, byu author. The highest he found was for Rachel Carson's "The
Sea Around Us", 79/200, almost 40%. The most common subject in fiction,
by the way, is a pronoun.

Craig>

Craig,

Varying sentence starts and known-new are different concepts.
Students should do both.  You have nicely analyzed my writing, but
your analysis is irrelevant to my point.

My students start their sentences with "He" five times in a row.  Or
"There is" or "It is" five times in a row.


On May 17, 2009, at 7:13 PM, Craig Hancock wrote:

Susan,
  I honestly didn't get the point. But let me try again to
describe your
own writing. "We" brings you and I into focus. "a teacher" is the
subject of the subordinate clause that starts sentence two. "I" is
main
clause subject. "That" refers back to the previous two sentences
and is
hardly "stylistic" in its choice. Do you start the second paragraph
with "but" to prove a point? It seems a very good example of what I
was
talking about earlier. "A teacher" heads that sentence, a carryover
from the previous paragraph and very much a given. Students then come
into play, with "they" in the subordinate clause subject slots. "A
teacher" is again the subject of the next sentence. "I" is the subject
of the next two sentences, and "they" (standing in for students) ends
the paragraph. You are doing what I am talking about, making the
starts
of your sentences "given", even repeating subjects ("a teacher",
"they", "I")to build coherence. In almost every case, there is nothing
about the subject itself that calls attention. It's "given", with
attention on the new information to follow.
   If you are speaking/writing about your own understandings (your
surprise at what I believe, what you have noticed, your intentions and
expectations), then "I" is the natural choice of subject. The "new"
information comes in the second part of the sentences. I suspect that
the sentences in the third paragraph are short and clipped because you
want them to sound simple, but the "I" subjects don't pose a problem.
  I do not vary my subjects. If anything, I work hard to keep a
topic in
focus for longer stretches of text, something I'm told the computer
assessments are designed to pick up as a sign of sophistication.
  Inexperienced writers jump topics (and subjects) much too
quickly, and
it's not unusual for them to say they have been taught to do that.
(Notice how "Inexperienced writers" is followed by "them" and
"they" in
the above compound sentence. "It's" is a dummy subject. "They" also
starts the sentence to come.) They may be naturually coherent, but
have
been advised against following those instincts when they write.
  If you pick up a collection of award winning essays, you'll find
the
point verified essay after essay. Good writers repeat. They sustain
subjects for long stretches, building in new information as they go.
You also seem to do that when you write, at least in your recent post.
  I always spend time with classes looking at exactly this coherence
building in effective texts. I underline the subjects in a
paragraph of
student writing just to direct attention to how quickly a topic is
shifting in their text. They see it right away and adjust.
  Our advice should be based on observations about how meaning
happens
and on how effective writing works.

Craig



On May 16, 2009, at 9:20 PM, Craig Hancock wrote:
You don't help students by giving them
a false description of language because you believe they aren't
capable
of the truth.


Maybe we don't actually disagree.  If a teacher actually told her
students that good writers never start sentences with the word
"because" or an essay that doesn't have a thesis at the end of the
first paragraph is wrong and an example of bad writing, then I am
with you.  That is false information.

But a teacher who tells her students that they can only write in
pencil, or that they must show their work, or that their essay must
have 5 paragraphs is not giving them false information.  Should a
teacher clarify that the rule about "because" is only for this class
and that when they are older they may break this rule?  Yes.  I think
that probably does happen.  I think it is too much for some students
to process, and what they retain is just the rule itself.

"Vary sentence starts" would be another example of bad advice.

I am surprise that you believe this.  I notice you vary your sentence
starts.  I do too.  I would only break that rule to prove a point.  I
hope I have proved it.  I am not sure if I have.  I hope you will let
me know.

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface
at:
    http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/


To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface at:
    http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface
at:
    http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/


To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
    http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
   http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/



--
Don Stewart
Write for College
______________________
Keeper of the memory and method
of Dr. Francis Christensen
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/