Strengthening Sentences: Rationale

Strengthening Sentences: Rationale for using Sentence Imitation, Combining, and other Related Exercises

1. ". . . using models in the teaching of writing can free students to concentrate on ideas, enabling them to concentrate on the content of what they are writing without being unduly restricted by concerns of form." (Butler)

2. “The first reason that we should reintroduce imitation in the composition classroom is that it would enable composition teachers to teach students what we expect them to write.” (Butler) [We should provide our students with clear expectations, clear learning targets.]

3. ". . . in some instances adherents of process approaches to writing create situations in which students ultimately find themselves held accountable for knowing a set of rules about which no one has ever directly informed them" (Delpit) [This especially, as Delpit and others point out, applies to our minority and lower income students.]

4. In their "For Teachers. . . " section of Sentence Composing for Elementary School, the Killgallons (vi) suggest that sentence imitation practices could also improve reading comprehension, and later quote (vii) from Francis Christensen the idea that work with sentence composing could help the student "thread the syntactical maze of much mature writing. . ." (137).

5. ". . . it seems that one objection to imitation, based on the idea that only an individual genius alone can produce a competent work, is unsound. When we write, we are not drawing exclusively upon what is within us but also upon many other factors in our lives: our environments, upbringing, past readings and writings, and conversations in many different contexts. All of these factors mix and match and affect what comes out on the page." (Butler)

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“Imitation is both sincere flattery, and profound pedagogy.” -- Don and Jenny Killgallon (viii)

"Even though imitation requires imagination, no one wants to admit it." -- Butler

"Imitate that you may be different" (190) -- Corbett