Sentence

Source: Ann Hague's Guide to Academic Writing (see p.8, p.33, p.38, p.73)

DEFINITION OF SENTENCE

A sentence is a group of words that contains a subject and a verb and expresses a complete thought (see p.6). A sentence ends with a period (.), an exclamation point (!), or a question mark (?). Plus, remember that the verb in a sentence can be action verbs e.g. They EAT bananas or linking verbs (see p.10) e.g. They ARE monkeys.

Regarding the 4 kinds of sentences, you can look back on the given copied paper or the Lesson-1 Sentence Structure on this blog. Please be familiar with the use of coordinator and sentence connector for compound sentence as well as of subordinator for complex sentence! You are assigned to make your own simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences in the mid-term exam. To make it understandable for you, just remember that the principle of independent clause (ID) is that the clause is meaningful, finished and not floating; whereas the principle of dependent clause (DC) is that the clause is not finished, floating, and can be only meaningful when it is attached to another clause, that is IC.

In relation to Writing-1 Class, making a good and grammatically correct sentence is a must. Students have to pay a careful attention to their sentence structures. Although their main goal for this semester is making a good paragraph, it doesn't mean that they may overlook the structure of a sentence. It's because the paragraph itself consists of a series of sentences. Therefore, the readability of their paragraphs in a writing, in many ways, depends on the readability of each of their sentences. The careful and readable performance of a single sentence of a writing counts for the excellence of the writing as a whole.

For more information on the kinds of sentence, please check Lesson-1 on Sentence Structure. It is a brief overview of basic knowledge concerning English sentence structure in general. For a maximum result, firstly, students should analyze the given short guide in Lesson-1 section deeply and carefully. It is also important to put into mind the "image" of sentence structure and construction in English. Since you are learning English, you have to switch your mindset into English mindset. You should put aside the mindset of Bahasa Indonesia or any other languages. Although actually sentence construction in Bahasa is not so different from that of English. Secondly, students should alsopractice and apply their analysis by making their own simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences. This second step is much more important and significant. That way, it is highly recommended that whenever you have spare time, please practice making sentences. It may sound difficult and be seen as a burden, but I guarantee you'll see the valuable benefit in the end.

Like speaking, writing is also one medium of communication. Similar to speaking, it is intended to be understood. In speaking, there is a communication between the speaker and the listener. In writing, there is a communication between the writer and the reader, Similar to speaking, so long as the reader can understand what is being talked about, then it can be said the communication process is successful. However, the duty to succeed this is more difficult in writing because in many cases this written form is not conducted directly and mostly only in one way direction. Accordingly, the writer should be more careful and make his or her own writing clear and readable so that the readers don't feel any confusion.

The most immediate way for the students of writing to improve their competence in writing is by frequent practices. They should learn by doing. The more mistakes they make, the more they will learn. They can develop their own style of writing. Frequent practice can also help them make their ideas come out fluently.

One thing to note, please re-read, analyze, and understand each sentence of a paragraph to check whether there is still any grammatical mistake or any confusing sentence that makes the writing not readable for the readers. If there's still time, it's much better if the students dopeer-check.