Vary your sentence structure.
How many times have you heard you have to vary your sentence structure? What does that mean? How do we do it? Well, you have come to the write place! Today we talk about seven different sentence openers we can employ to avoid dull writing.
Also, just going to say: Andrew Pudewa, head of the Institute for Excellence in Writing, teaches these seven sentence openers. He’s my inspiration for varied writing. Because of his instruction, I never forgot them. If you are serious about learning to write or teaching others to write, I highly recommend his resources.
1. Subject
This is the standard “the subject did the thing” sentence structure.
Jason chased his dog across the park, gripping his coffee mug so tightly the hot liquid sloshed out all over the grass.
This is how we normally talk and thus how we automatically structure our writing. Noun first, then verb. It is acceptable, but it gets boring pretty quickly. Read on to see how to shake things up a bit and vary your sentence structure.
2. Preposition
Before I go into this one, a preposition is a word that links other words. To define further, a preposition “shows the relationship between a noun or pronoun and other words in a sentence.” Notice that I just employed prepositional sentence openers for both of these sentences—multi-tasking for the win! Examples of prepositions include by, between, of, to, from, and before.
In a desperate attempt to catch his dog, Jason dashed across the park, gripping his coffee mug so tightly the hot liquid sloshed out all over the grass.
3. WWWASIA
When we begin sentences with one of these words, it adds variety to our writing. WWWASIA is the acronym Andrew Pudewa uses to help students remember them: when, while, where, as, since, if, although.
While Jason pursued his runaway dog, he gripped his coffee mug so tightly the hot liquid sloshed out all over the grass.
4. Be-clause
Because I enjoy *trying* to be clever, I named the “because clause” sentence opener the be-clause. Why? Be-clause when you have the chance to make a lame pun, you should definitely take it.
Because Jason propelled himself at such a high velocity and gripped his coffee mug with such fervency, the hot black liquid sloshed out all over the grass.
5. -ly/-ed
Normally, our speech doesn’t begin with adverbs or adjectives. Fortunately, however, it isn’t hard to incorporate this style into our writing, and it does add a fun touch.
Desperately, Jason flew across the park after his dog, spilling coffee over the warm grass.
Panicked and preoccupied, Jason sped across the park after his dog, his coffee mug sloshing liquid left and right.
Understandably perturbed, Jason chased his spirited dog across the park, leaving a trail of spilled coffee behind him.
Check out that double-prize -ly AND -ed sentence right there. Boom. ^^
6. -ing
Using this sentence opener, be careful to avoid dangling modifiers. In other words, make sure the thing doing the ing-ing is the closest to the -ing word (another great Pudewa-ism).
Incorrect: Gripping his coffee mug tightly, the dog ran from Jason, always staying just out of his reach. [Jason’s dog is NOT gripping the mug; Jason should be the closest to the -ing word.]
Correct: Gripping his coffee mug tightly, Jason chased his dog across the park, only succeeding in spilling more of his beverage with every step. [Jason is the one gripping the mug.]
7. The Very Short Sentence
Write to convey emotion. Write with sincerity. Write dramatically. Throwing in a very short sentence (VSS, according to the IEW) once in a while is a great way to keep things engaging and grab your readers’ attention. It is also a good way to remember to vary your sentence lengths throughout the work, sometimes using long, winding sentences like this one and other times using very short sentences. Like this one. (Which is not actually a sentence, but sometimes you can break rules [GASP!]…we talk about that here!)
Hearing a commotion, Jason glanced up. With horror, he realized that was his dog lighting across the park as if it were being chased by a monster. Well, it was about to be chased—whether or not by a monster remained to be seen. Clutching his coffee mug, Jason flew over the grass, sloshing hot black liquid with every step, and hollering for his mutt. Abruptly he halted. His dog had run right into the pet store. Helplessly, Jason watched as a succession of cats careened out of the shop, whining like bacon on a saucepan that’s too hot.
Vary Your Sentence Structure: Your Turn
We have quite the variety of options when it comes to sentence structure. So there is no excuse for boring, monotonous writing.
Get creative! Treat writing like the art form it is. Also, have fun with it and send me some samples of how you vary your sentence structure. Who knows? You could be published!
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