Dr. Len Unsworth
The following pieces of writing represent the work done by two students in the same year level following an excursion to the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences (in Melbourne). The students were asked to write about the three things that interested them most in the museum.
What is it that distinguishes these pieces of work in terms of effective deployment of the grammatical resources of written English. The first student is able to use the grammar of written English - appropriate "book" language. The second student writes and s/he speaks. What do you, as teachers, need to know about the grammar of written English to effectively support the work of the second student so that s/he can learn to produce work that is comparable with that of the first student?
In this session we will make a start on exploring just what you will need to understand about the grammar of written English to be able to make an educational difference for children like the student who produced the second text above. The following headings will guide our work in this session:
Clauses and sentences
Clause complex
Embedded clauses
Finite and non-finite clauses
Included clauses
The clause is a fundamental unit for the analysis of English text. An understanding of what a clause is and of the different kinds of clauses in English is an important starting point for understanding how written language is different from spoken language and how the language of some genres is different from the language of other genres. This is clearly crucial to teaching children how to comprehend and compose different forms of written language.
Clauses in spoken and written English
The following text is an example of talk in an everyday casual conversation:
First she told me about the wedding and then she just kept going on about their families and she even told me about the cars and all that but she never even asked me one question and so I got fed up and I interrupted her and I said "Mavis, Look, I've just got to hang up now" and I just sort of put the phone down.
Notice here that we have one sentence which consists of ten clauses:
First she told me about the wedding || and then she just kept going on about their families || and she even told me about the cars and all that || but she never even asked me one question || and so I got fed up || and I interrupted her || and I said ||"Mavis, Look, I've just got to hang up now" || and I just sort of put the phone down.
Now this is very typical of our use of spoken language - even in teaching. The following is a transcript of a year five teacher telling the class how they will work in groups to prepare for their writing of an argument genre:
...we'll give you a minute || to find a group,|| and sit with your group || don't talk about it now || and just give your group thirty seconds || to think || if they would like to start with for or against || and if we have about an even number || that's fine || and if not || we might have to ask || ...but it won't matter || because eventually everyone is going to have to write on both sides of the issue || and eventually you're going to have to make your mind up anyway.|| (extract courtesy of Eveline Chan)
Written language typically uses fewer clauses with a greater density of lexical items (content words). This is illustrated by Eggins (1994:59) using the following printed information about extensions on university assignments:
Formal extensions of time are not granted as such, || but if, through misfortune or bad planning, an assignment cannot be submitted on time, || it may be submitted with the next 14 days... || If it is late because of some unforeseen disability || it will not be penalized, || provided that (i) documentary evidence of the disability is attached to the essay || and (ii) the nature of the disability and of the evidence is acceptable to the Late Essay Committee. || Full details of penalties are provided in the "Submission of Essays and Assignments" document.
Note that this written text has two sentences and eight clauses. The following spoken version also has two sentences but sixteen clauses.
We won't formally extend the time you have to do your assignments, || but if you can't hand in your assignment in on time || because something has gone wrong || or because you didn't plan properly, || then you can submit it within the next 14 days... || If it is late || because something happened to disable you || and you couldn't have foreseen || that that would happen, || then it will not be penalized, || provided that (i) you attach a document || which proves what happened to you to the essay || and (ii) the Late Essay Committee accepts || what you say you had wrong with you || and the way you prove that to us ...|| Look in the booklet about submitting essays and assignments || if you want to find out more about how we penalize you.
As children progress through the education system they need to learn to deal with the distinctive grammar of written texts with their proportionately lower number of clauses and greater complexity within the clause. Consider for example these single sentence, single clause extracts from an information book for primary children (Killing for luxury, Bright, 1988):
Many of the wild animals traded in the luxury market have been so reduced in numbers that they are in danger of extinction (p.5)
Behind the elegant facade of the multimillion dollar fashion fur industry is the reality of the killing (p.6)
Different cultures have a variety of attitudes to the killing of wildlife (p.29)
If you were telling someone this information, how many clauses would you need to use in each case? Consider the following example of "talking out" the first sentence above:
Hunters kill some wild animals ||so that they can sell them to traders ||who then sell them to manufacturers || who make luxury products out of parts of the animals bodies.|| The hunters have killed so many of these wild animals that there are hardly any of them left ||and there is a danger that they will die out completely. (2 sentences and 6 clauses)
Compare the following beginning segments from the examples of writing we looked at initially by year six children after they had visited the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences:
|
I like the Strasburg clock because it was a real clock and it was a good clock because it had the apostles were moving around |
At the museum a lot of things interested me but three things interested me the most they were the Planatarium, the Railway engines and the Mineral Wealth of Australia. |
|
1 sentence - 4 clauses |
2 sentences - 3clauses |
Notice that the first child writes as s/he speaks - and the way s/he deploys clauses reflects this.
If we are to understand what is involved in children's developing more effective writing and in their learning to comprehend the language of written texts, the first step is to understand what a clause is and how clauses are deployed differently in spoken and written language.
¥ It is a pattern of wording built up around a 'going-on' of some kind, which is called a Process. The 'going-on' may be an action of some kind, but it may also be a 'saying', a 'thinking' or a 'relation'. A Process is a term describing the function of verbs in constructing experience. 'Process' and 'verb' are similar concepts, but the terms are not synonymous. A Process is a particular way of describing a verbal group.
Example 1:
Mr Piggott lived with his two sons, Simon and Patrick, in a nice house with a nice garden, and a nice car in the nice garage.
Inside the house was his wife.
"Hurry up with the breakfast, dear," he called every morning, before he went off to his very important job ...
Mrs Piggott washed all the breakfast things
Example 1a: Processes
Mr Piggott lived with his two sons, Simon and Patrick, in a nice house with a nice garden, and a nice car in the nice garage.
Inside the house was his wife.
"Hurry up with the breakfast, dear," he called every morning, before he went off to his very important job ...
Mrs Piggott washed all the breakfast things
¥ The Process is the 'nucleus' of the clause.
¥ Participants are elements involved in the 'going-on'. These are not necessarily human participants. They are grammatical Participants and can be abstract concepts as well as human figures.
¥ There may be (optional) circumstantial information about where, at what time, how frequently, with whom, in what manner ...
¥ Because the 'nucleus' of the clause is variable, there is a potential for different types of relations within the clause. For example: relations between things, possession of things, 'doings', 'happenings', 'sayings' ...
Example 2:
After they left the house, Mrs Piggott washed all the breakfast things . . .made all the beds . . .vacuumed all the carpets . . .and then she went to work.
Example 2a: Process analysis
After they left the house, Mrs Piggott washed all the breakfast things . . .made all the beds . . .vacuumed all the carpets . . .and then she went to work.
Example 2b: Clause boundaries
|||After they left the house,|| Mrs Piggott washed all the breakfast things|| . . . made all the beds||. . .vacuumed all the carpets|| . . .and then she went to work.|||
Example 3: (for collaborative analysis - identify the processes and determine the clause boundaries)
As soon as they had eaten, Mrs Piggott washed the dishes . . . washed the clothes . . . did the ironing . . . and then she cooked some more.
¥ Clauses and sentences are different concepts.
Working Example
The children read their novels and then they finished the computer assignment.
¥ There are two clauses in this sentence. (Collaborative analysis)
¥ In the following sentence there is just one clause.
The children went into the playground.
¥ Sentence and clause complex are closely related. For our purposes they can be regarded as equivalent. In fact, a sentence is a sub-type of clause complex. A sentence is a unit of writing, but a clause complex describes structure in both speech and writing.
|||Greenpeace went in inflatable boats close towards the Japanese boat ||to prevent the killing.|||
|||Another Indonesian language is Balinese,||(which is) used only by the Balinese people.|||
An embedded clause is one that does not have the rank of a clause but functions at a lower rank within the clause structure. To understand this we need to explain the rank scale of units for grammar analysis
The functional rank scale of units for grammar analysis
(There is some very helpful discussion of these issues in Halliday (1994), Introduction to Functional Grammar. ch 2)
¥ Two ways of dividing clauses into parts (constituents):
¥ from Geoff Williams' research data on work done in Ruth French's class, a way of introducing children to the second type of description
¥ Ranking the units of analysis
clause complex
.................................
clause
group, phrase
word
morpheme
Example: Kim used to give the appropriate books to the group.
clause: Kim used to give the appropriate books to the group.
group: used to give (verbal group), the appropriate books, Kim (nominal groups)
phrase: to the group
word: ... (individual words, in the everyday sense, in this example)
morpheme: (book)(s)
Embedded clauses then are clauses which shift their rank position, from 'clause' to become either:
1) part of a group
2) a whole Participant
1) part of a group
Working examples: (Processes are in boldface)
(The purpose is to distinguish 'full' ranking clauses from 'embedded' clauses.)
Next we saw another computer game that was around the corner.
This game taught me many things I didn't know
The room that is at the top of the stairs is hers.
2) a whole Participant
Working examples:
One important advantage was the fact that she knew the kids so well.
One of the questions was 'Are you Australian?'
Embedded phrases
Similarly, phrases can be embedded in groups, thus 'down-ranking' in the rank scale.
Working examples
Serve as an accompaniment to white rice.
The children in the playground are Year 6 kids.
Convention for display of analysis:
Serve as an accompaniment [to white rice].
Compare with:
Put the cellophane noodles into a bowl
More working examples
The pig in the brick house was a model of industrious behaviour.
The pig in the straw house was dumber than a rattlesnake.
Review Examples:
1. Clause
||The pig| escaped| to his brother's house.||
2. Clause with an embedded clause in a nominal group
||The pig [[who lived in the straw house]]| escaped| to his brother's house.||
3. Clause with an embedded phrase in a nominal group
||The pig [in the straw house]| escaped| to his brother's house.||
Finite clauses select for either primary tense or modality realized through a Finite modal such as 'must' or 'should'. Nonfinite clauses do not select these features.
Examples:
|||Examining the issue further,|| they did find some interesting evidence.|||
'Examining the issue further' is a nonfinite clause.
Notice the effect when the primary tense is varied in the dominant clause:
Examining the issue further, they will find some interesting evidence.
Examining the issue further, they had found some interesting evidence.
Examining the issue further, they must find some interesting evidence.
(The boldface words are those which realize the meaning of primary tense or modality.)
Text Example:
from Nadine Gordimer, The Kindest Thing to Do.
In the warm stupor of early Sunday afternoon, when the smell of Sunday roast still hangs about the house, and the servants have banged the kitchen door closed behind them and gone off ... to visit at the Location the family comes out dreamily, slackly, to lie upon the lawn. ... The little world is still running, where the birds peck, stepping daintily on their twigs of claws in the flower beds.
(Nonfinite clauses are in bold italics.)
In the warm stupor of early Sunday afternoon, when the smell of Sunday roast still hangs about the house, and the servants have banged the kitchen door closed behind them and gone off ... to visit at the Location the family comes out dreamily, slackly, to lie upon the lawn. ... The little world is still running, where the birds peck, stepping daintily on their twigs of claws in the flower beds.
Working examples:
Fill the egg whites, shaping filling to a rounded shape
Having hit the wicket, he was given out.
The ball having hit the wicket, he was given out.
Put all the ingredients for the filling into a bowl and mix thoroughly with the hand, adding the coconut milk last of all and kneading until it is absorbed by the other ingredients.
Included clauses are ranking clauses which interrupt another clause. (They are quite distinct from embedded clauses.)
Example:
They thought that they would, having got so far, continue the project for now.
There are three ranking clauses in this sentence:
1. They thought
2. that they would continue the project for now.
3. having got so far
The convention for displaying an analysis of an included clause is << >> :
|||They thought|| that they would, <<having got so far>>, continue the project for now.|||
In spoken language long chains of clauses in sentences are very common. How are those clauses within sentences (clause complexes) linked together? To begin to answer this question let's consider the following exchange between a mother and her pre-school child:
Child: Mummy, I shall grow up before Anna, won't I?
Mother: Not much darling, she's about the same age as you.
Child: Oh, 'cos I'm bigger than her.
Mother: Yes, but Anna will probably always be a bit shorter than you, 'cos Anna's Mummy and Daddy are much shorter than Mummy and Daddy, so Anna will probably never be as tall as you even when she's grown up.
Child: Why?
Mother: It doesn't mean to say she won't be as grown up as you, she just won't be as tall as you.
(Walkerdine, 1988:18)
The longest stretch of the mother's explanation consists of five clauses in one sentence and unfolds, as follows, in five steps. The child's mother agrees with her, but immediately counters (but) that Anna will always be a bit shorter; she then gives the reason for this ('cos) and goes on to restate her thesis (so), which in closing this chain of clauses, she temporally qualifies (even so).
Yes,
but Anna will probably always be a bit shorter than you,
'cos Anna's Mummy and Daddy are much shorter than Mummy and Daddy,
so Anna will probably never be as tall as you
even when she's grown up.
The conjunctions shown in bold link the clauses and realize the reasoning in the explanation through the logical links they construct between each clause and the next.
In abstract written text the same argument is more likely to be packed into a single clause:
Genetic inheritance increases the probablity of your adult height being greater than Anna's.
Nobody would talk to a young child like this, but some written explanations, even in books for primary school children, do use structures of this kind. However spoken explanations and many written explanations need to make use of chains of clauses in sentences (clause complexes) to achieve the logical links that form the reasoning neccessary to achieve the purpose of the explanation. You can see this again in the following excerpt from a primary school child's explanation of why rainwater isn't salty:
Although the seas is salty, and most rainwater comes from the sea, the sun's heat does not evaporate the salt in the water of the oceans, so when rain or snow fall on the earth it is not salty.
Conjunctions can join clauses in clause complexes (sentences) in two ways. The first way is in a hypotactic relationship. English K-6 refers to clauses joined in this way as forming a complex sentence.
Examples of hypotactic clause relations or complex sentences:
Although the sea is salty, most rainwater comes from the sea.
When the rain or snow falls on the earth it is not salty.
Note that you can easily reverse the order of these hypotactically related clauses in complex sentences:
Most rainwater comes from the sea, although the sea is salty.
Rain or snow is not salty when it falls on the earth.
The second way clauses can be joined is paratactically. English K-6 refers to clauses joined paratactically as compound sentences.
Examples of paratactic clause relations or compound sentences:
The sea is not salty and most rainwater comes from the sea.
The sun's heat does not evaporate the salt in the water so the snow or rain is not salty.
Note that in the case of paratactically related clauses in compound sentences, the order of the clauses cannot be reversed.
Of course within a clause complex (sentence) some clauses may be joined hypotactically and some may be joined paratactically as in the student's text about why rainwater isn't salty:
Although the seas is salty, and most rainwater comes from the sea, the sun's heat does not evaporate the salt in the water of the oceans, so when rain or snow fall on the earth it is not salty.
[Is this sentence then both complex and compound?]
Note that both paratactic and hypotactic relations occur between clauses in sentences in the following explanation for upper primary school children about how an electromagnet works [Lafferty, P. (1989) Hands on science: Magnets to dynamos. London: Gloucester Press (p.22)]:
1 An electromagnet can be made
2 by wrapping plastic-covered wire around a steel nail.
3 If you connect the ends of the wire to a battery
4 the nail will become a magnet
5 and will attract pins and paperclips.
6 If you switch off the current,
7 by disconnecting the battery
8 you will probably find
9 that the nail still acts as a magnet.
10 This is because steel keeps its magnetism.
11 If, instead of steel, you use soft iron,
12 you will find
13 that the magnetism disappears
14 when the current is turned off.
15 Soft iron does not keep its magnetism like steel.
16 So most electromagnets use soft iron.
17 You can make soft iron
18 by heating a nail to red heat
19 and letting it cool slowly.
20 If you increase the number of turns of wire around the nail,
21 you will find
22 the electromagnet becomes stronger.
23 It will also pick up more pins or paperclips.
24 Also, if you connect two batteries,
25 so that a greater current flows through the coil,
26 the magnet becomes stronger.
The two sections in italics are ones where the hypotactic, enhancing clauses that have been placed in first position in the clause complex. Because they are hypotactic, they could all be written with these dependent clauses in the final position:
4 the nail will become a magnet
5 and will attract pins and paperclips.
3 If you connect the ends of the wire to a battery
12 you will find
13 that the magnetism disappears
14 when the current is turned off.
11 If, instead of steel, you use soft iron,
But notice that they are not written this way in the original text. This is because by putting the b clause first, as in the original, the cause actually precedes the effect and the ordering of the language is iconic with the ordering of events in the material world. This clearly enhances the effectiveness of the written explanation. When reading and deconstructing explanation texts with children, it is useful to point this out and in jointly writing explanatory texts with them, teachers alert to this resource, can model its use and make it explicit to the children.
We will now look at a more complicated example of clause connection to show how understanding this is integral to comprehending the text:
3 If you connect the ends of the wire to a battery
4 the nail will become a magnet
5 and will attract pins and paperclips.
Here clause 3 is the condition for both clauses 4 and 5 taken together as a unit, so clause 3 expands the unit of clauses 4 and 5. Then within that unit of clauses 4 and 5, clause 5 expands clause four by extension. This is indicated diagrammatically below:
As a further example, we will take another segment from our electromagnet explanation:
24 Also, if you connect two batteries,
25 so that a greater current flows through the coil,
26 the magnet becomes stronger.
Here clauses 24 and 25, as a unit, are the condition for clause 26. And within the unit of clauses 24 and 25, clause 25 is the consequence of clause 24. Again this is shown diagrammatically below:
The same kind of complex clause complexes can occur in narratives, as illustrated with the following segment from Aidan Chambers' The present takers:
1 "Morning Mrs Harris"
2 Melanie said
3 as the teacher hurried through the gate.
Here clause 3 gives the time for both clauses 1 and 2 taken as a unit. Then within this unit of clauses 1 and 2, clause 1 is projected by clause 2. This is shown diagramatically below:
The English Language and Literacy Assessement test was developed to assess the effectiveness of the writing of students in curriculum areas in their first year of secondary school in NSW. At the primary level we need to examine the extent to which the nature of the assessment tasks in the ELLA test reflect significant practices across the primary school curriculum and their articulation with the practices that will be valued the next year in the secondary school.
It is not at all clear that the initial assessment criteria for the writing tasks on the ELLA test in 1996 were appropriate. Here we will provide a brief indication of the kind of factors that teachers (and testers) need to know about grammar and genre if they are to assess writing appropriately.
The following is a sample response to one of the ELLA writing tasks and the sample scoring provided to schools in the booklet "Using the ELLA School Report Package".
This student's answer obtains the full score of three on criterion six, because the text uses simple, compound and complex sentences. But s/he scores only one out of a possible two because use of conjunctions, through correct, is not varied. Now I would like to revisit two pieces of children's writing which we looked at earlier. These were the texts about a visit to the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences:
|
I like the Strasburg clock because it was a real clock and it was a good clock because it had the apostles were moving around |
At the museum a lot of things interested me but three things interested me the most they were the Planatarium, the Railway engines and the Mineral Wealth of Australia. |
|
1 sentence - 4 clauses |
2 sentences - 3clauses |
How would these pieces fare on the ELLA criteria? It is fairly clear that the piece on the right is the more effective piece of writing, however it includes only one compound sentence with two clauses joined by "but", scoring two. The piece of writing on the left has a much more complex sentence structure with four clauses joined by both coordinating conjunctions ("and") and sub-ordinating conjunctions ("because"), so this piece would presumably get the full score of three. Note also that the piece on the left has greater variation in the use of conjunction than does the piece on the right. On these criteria the less effective piece of writing is scoring higher.
It is the case that certain types of written explantions are likely to make relatively high use of complex sentences, but this does not mean that a writer could not use alternative sentence constructions which are just as effective. Notice, for example, in the following explanations of aerofoils from books for primary children, that the sentences are predominantly simple rather than complex and that the only joining of clauses is by co-ordinating conjunctions.
If the criteria used for assessment in formal tests like the ELLA test and in informal teacher assessment do not tap into what we know from research are the linguistic features that characterise particular genres in particular discipline areas, we put the construct validity and possible diagnostic value of our testing at severe risk. We made a start at understanding the nature of these linguistic features of key text types. In future sessions we will explore more of the relevant research in this area. For example, we know that the patterning of Theme selection appropriate to a genre indexes effective text organisation. We know that lexical density and the use of nominalisation characterises many factual written genres in curriculum areas. We know that in these texts reasoning is often not realised by conjunctions but is frequently realised metaphorically by verbs like "depends on" and nouns like "the result". And we know what kinds of variation in the use of linguistic structures and features will actually make a difference to the effectiveness of particular text types and what kinds of variation do not make much difference. It is crucial that we draw on this kind of understanding as we further develop the scoring criteria of our diagnostic assessments - and as we resource ourselves as teachers to know explicitly what features of students writing we need to be addressing in our literacy teaching in curriculum areas.