This exercise will give you an opportunity to apply the techniques discussed in the article Coherence Strategies: Transitional Words and Phrases. If you haven't practiced sentence combining before, you may also find it helpful to review Introduction to Sentence Combining.
Instructions
Combine the sentences in each set into two clear and concise sentences, eliminating any needless repetition. As you do so, add a transitional word or phrase (in italics at the head of each set) to the beginning of the second sentence to show how it relates to the first.
After you have completed the exercise, compare your sentences with the originals. Keep in mind that many combinations are possible, and in some cases you may prefer your own sentences to the original versions.
- Instead
Retirement should be the reward for a lifetime of work.
It is widely viewed as a sort of punishment.
It is a punishment for growing old. - Therefore
In recent years viruses have been shown to cause cancer in chickens.
Viruses have also been shown to cause cancer in mice, cats, and even in some primates.
Viruses might cause cancer in humans.
This is a reasonable hypothesis. - In fact
We do not seek solitude.
If we find ourselves alone for once, we flick a switch.
We invite the whole world in.
The world comes in through the television screen. - On the contrary
We were not irresponsible.
Each of us should do something.
This thing would be of genuine usefulness to the world.
We were trained to think that. - However
Little girls, of course, don't take toy guns out of their hip pockets.
They do not say "Pow, pow" to all their neighbors and friends.
The average well-adjusted little boy does this.
If we gave little girls the six-shooters, we would soon have double the pretend body count. - Next
We drove the wagon close to a corner post.
We twisted the end of the wire around it.
We twisted the wire one foot above the ground.
We stapled it fast.
We drove along the line of posts.
We drove for about 200 yards.
We unreeled the wire on the ground behind us. - Indeed
We know very little about pain.
What we don't know makes it hurt all the more.
There is ignorance about pain.
No form of illiteracy in the United States is so widespread.
No form of illiteracy in the United States is so costly. - Moreover
Many of our street girls can be as vicious as any corporation president.
Many of our street girls can be as money mad as any corporation president.
They can be less emotional than men.
They can be less emotional in conducting acts of personal violence. - For this reason
The historical sciences have made us very conscious of our past.
They have made us conscious of the world as a machine.
The machine generates successive events out of foregoing ones.
Some scholars tend to look totally backward.
They look backward in their interpretation of the human future. - However
Rewriting is something that most writers find they have to do.
They rewrite to discover what they have to say.
They rewrite to discover how to say it.
There are a few writers who do little formal rewriting.
They have capacity and experience.
They create and review a large number of invisible drafts.
They create and review in their minds.
They do this before they approach the page.
After you have completed the exercise, compare your sentences with the originals. Keep in mind that many combinations are possible, and in some cases you may prefer your own sentences to the original versions.
For an alternate version of this exercise, without prompts, see Coherence Exercise: Building & Connecting Sentences.
