Close Reading Skills

Close Reading Skills Sentence Structure

Do you have your… • Jotter? • Planner on the desk? • Pen or pencil? Once you have these items on your desk, we can begin learning

Learning Intention We are learning to: Success Criteria I can identify: Short sentences Long sentences Lists Colons Brackets or dashes Questions Repetition • Identify and select examples of sentence structure.

Sentence Structure • Sentence Structure refers to when a writer tries to emphasise certain words or ideas through the way that sentences are set out.

In Close Reading passages… • The question will usually ask you to: • - identify unusual sentence structure features; • - explain which words or ideas are emphasized because of them; • - connect what is emphasized with the question.

Sentence Structure Features: Short Sentences • Short sentences draw our attention to and emphasise the words/ideas in them. • I used that bat the entire summer and a magical season it was. I was the best hitter in the neighbourhood. Once, I won a game in the last at-bat with a home run, and the boys just crowded round me as I were a spectacle to behold, as if I were, for one small moment, in this insignificant part of the world, playing this meaningless game, their majestic, golden prince. • But the bat broke. Some kid used it without my permission. He hit a foul ball and the bat split, the barrel flying away, the splintered handle still in the kid’s hands.

Sentence Structure Features: Long Sentences • Long sentences often build up to a climax, drawing our attention to and emphasizing what is at the end of them, which is therefore emphasized. • Example: • I used that bat the entire summer and a magical season it was. I was the best hitter in the neighbourhood. Once, I won a game in the last at-bat with a home run, and the boys just crowded round me as I were a spectacle to behold, as if I were, for one small moment, in this insignificant part of the world, playing this meaningless game, their majestic, golden prince. • But the bat broke. Some kid used it without my permission. He hit a foul ball and the bat split, the barrel flying away, the splintered handle still in the kid’s hands.

Sentence Structure Features: Varied Sentence Length • Varied sentence length is used to add emphasis to ideas, usually in the short sentences, e.g. if you have a few long sentences then all of a sudden there is a short snappy sentence, you pay attention to the words/ideas in the shorter sentence.

Sentence Structure Features: Lists • Lists often draw our attention to what is actually listed, often to emphasise how much of something there is. • Example: What overwhelms you about this man from such a violent trade are the goodness, sincerity and generosity that have survived a lifetime of controversy, racial hatred, fundamental religious conversion, criminal financial exploitation, marital upheavals, revilement by many of his own nation and, eventually, the collapse of his own body.

Sentence Structure Features: Colons • Colons often create a pause for emphasis, drawing our attention to what follows immediately after the colon. They are also used to divide sentences into two equal parts, allowing us to compare or contrast different ideas or qualities mentioned in each half. • Example: Some argue that the ultimate result of global warming will be a paradoxical but even more catastrophic development: global cooling.

Sentence Structure Features: Brackets or Dashes • Brackets or dashes are used to separate something from the rest of the sentence, thus emphasising what is in parenthesis, e.g. example, additional information, change of tone, important ideas. • Example: • The Scottish race has been variously - and plentifully - accused of being dour, mean, venal, sly, narrow, slothful, dirty, immoderately drunk, embarrassingly sentimental, masterfully hypocritical, and a blueprint for disaster when eleven of them are together on a football field.

Sentence Structure Features: Exclamation marks • The use of exclamation marksemphasises how passionately a writer feels about something. Examples: I hate this! This is amazing! How dare you! I can’t believe this!

Sentence Structure Features: Questions • Using a series of questions might emphasise confusion. The use of questions that directly involve the reader can help emphasise the ideas in the question, as we pay more attention to them due to an increased sense of involvement. Look out for rhetorical questions, which are used to make a point and do not need an answer. • Example: How could he do that to me? What did this mean? Could I have been wrong about the whole situation?

Sentence Structure Features: Repetition • Repetition – any word or phrases which are repeated, automatically stand out, emphasising certain ideas. • Example: I looked around the corner and panic creeped up onto my face. Panic coarsed through my veins as my legs began to tremble with panic.

Sentence Structure Features: Word Order • Word Order – Another name for word order is syntax. Look out, in particular for a technique called inversion, which takes what would usually be at the end of a sentence and places it at the start, e.g. “Horrified I was.” or “Being two-faced was the thing she was best at”. We pay attention to the word “Horrified” in the first example and “being two-faced” in the second. This is mainly due to the fact that they are so clearly placed in a strange position within the sentence.

Paired Task • In pairs, you are going to read a past paper. • In your jotters, you are going to write examples of: • Short sentences Long sentences • Lists Colons • Brackets or dashes Questions • Repetition

Feedback

How to Answer a Sentence Structure question: • Identify the use of sentence structure and quote it. • Explain its function with regards to the sentence it is in (not a vague explanation of what a colon does!) • Explain the effect of its use

Answer Structure • The writer uses….. (example of sentence structure)…..which emphasises….QUOTE. This is effective because… Using this structure, answer Question 1B from the past paper with your partner.

Feedback

Model Answer • 1) The writer uses a semi colon which emphasises “pillaging our punctuation; savaging our sentences.” This is effective because it links these two similar sentences together and creates a sense of repetition. • 2) The writer uses alliteration which emphasises “pillaging our punctuation; savaging our sentences.” This is effective because it creates a violent and aggressive sound which conveys the anger people feel towards text language.

Close Reading Skills