Tips For Fixing Choppy Paragraphs In Middle School
- 22 hours ago
- 2 min read
As middle school students develop their writing style, they often struggle with creating paragraphs that flow smoothly. Their writing can often sound choppy, and stilted. This choppy writing is often due to a lack of transitions and an overreliance on simple sentences. Thankfully, these are issues that can be addressed with explicit writing instruction. Here are some tips to help your students fix their choppy paragraphs.
Use Transitions
One of the easiest ways to help paragraphs flow is to use transitions. Transitions are words or phrases that act like links between sentences. They help the readers to follow the writer’s train of thought. Take a look at the examples below.
Sentences Without Transitions
Roller skating is my favorite hobby. I only like to roller skate on weekdays because the rinks are too crowded on the weekends.
Sentences With Transitions
Roller skating is my favorite hobby. However, I only like to roller skate on weekends because the rinks are too crowded on the weekends.
By including the word “however” as a transition, the writer removes the choppiness and confusion from their paragraph. The transition helps the reader to see the connection between the two sentences. If you find that your students’ paragraphs seem to be made up of random sentences with no clear connections, teach them the importance of transitions. Here is a list of some of my favorite transitions. They help the writing flow smoothly while adding a touch of sophistication to the paragraph.
On the other hand
As a result
Nevertheless
For example
Therefore
Clearly
In summary
Transitions can make the difference between confusion and clarity for your readers.
Vary Sentence Structures
In addition to using transitions, students can improve their paragraphs by using a variety of sentence structures. I have found that students who write choppy paragraphs tend to rely on simple sentences. They need to be explicitly taught how to create compound sentences, complex sentences, and compound-complex sentences. They also need to be taught how to use appositives and relative clauses to enhance their writing.
Once you have taken the time to teach your students how to form these sentence types, revision is easy. You can simply tell your students that they need to add appositives to their paragraphs, or that they should turn their simple sentence into a complex sentence. When students have already been taught these foundational writing skills, it is easier for them to transform their choppy writing into robust paragraphs that showcase their sentence writing skills.
If you need more help creating explicit sentence writing lessons, check out this post. I have also created no-prep sentence writing lessons and activities that are fun and easy to use. All the work has already been done for you. Click here to check out those resources.
Final Thoughts
If your students’ writing seems choppy and lacks cohesiveness, don’t despair. Try teaching your students to use transitions and vary their sentence types, and you should see a marked improvement.
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