{"id":2904,"date":"2018-08-11T19:44:30","date_gmt":"2018-08-12T02:44:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/patternbasedwriting.com\/elementary_writing_success\/?p=2904"},"modified":"2018-08-12T08:23:16","modified_gmt":"2018-08-12T15:23:16","slug":"paragraph-length-best-student-writers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/patternbasedwriting.com\/elementary_writing_success\/paragraph-length-best-student-writers\/","title":{"rendered":"Paragraph Length: How the Best Student Writers Create Paragraphs on State Writing Assessments"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you ever glanced at the paragraphing on a piece of student writing and had a gut reaction? How accurate was your gut reaction? My guess is that your gut reaction was surprisingly accurate. I did not say perfectly accurate or even accurate, just surprisingly accurate. If researchers did a study, I suspect that gut reactions based on paragraphing style would be highly accurate statistically speaking. In fact, I doubt there is any single metric that is more revealing for making accurate gut reactions than paragraphing style. By and large, if students get<\/em> paragraphing, they get<\/em> writing. If they don\u2019t, they don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

I wrote an entire free ebook on students\u2019 paragraphing style called The Ten Stages of Paragraph and Multi-Paragraph Mastery<\/a><\/strong>. To create that ebook, I examined two kinds of independent student writing:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 daily writing across the curriculum<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 state and district writing assessments<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To write that ebook, I put paragraph theory aside and examined real student writing. I examined the best student-paragraph writing and the worst student-paragraph writing and everything in between. As I examined, I asked these questions:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 What makes excellent student-paragraph writing excellent?
\n2.\u00a0 What makes terrible student-paragraph writing terrible?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To bring objectivity to my process, I considered four metrics (among other things):<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 words per sentence \/ average words per sentence
\n2.\u00a0 words per paragraph \/ average words per paragraph
\n3.\u00a0 sentences per paragraph \/ average sentences per paragraph
\n4.\u00a0 paragraphs per whole composition<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When we have a gut reaction over a writers\u2019 paragraphing style, those are the numbers we are looking at whether we realize it or not. Of course, when writing The Ten Stages of Paragraph and Multi-Paragraph Mastery<\/a><\/strong>, I was not using gut reaction. I analyzed independent student writing. One collection of independent student writing that I analyzed was from the Oregon State Writing Assessment.<\/p>\n

The Oregon State Writing Assessment Paragraph Metrics<\/h3>\n

Below you will find a paragraph count<\/em> for an entire collection of student essays. These essays are examples of independent student writing\u2014i.e., this is how students write. The sample essays I examined are released student-writing samples from the Oregon State Writing Assessment<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

What grade do you teach? Well, I probably did a paragraph count for your grade, as I did a paragraph count for 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, 6th grade, 7th grade, 8th grade, and 10th grade.<\/p>\n

I used these three metrics in my paragraph counts, and they tell a surprisingly interesting and complete story:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 number of paragraphs in the whole composition
\n2.\u00a0 number of sentences in each paragraph
\n3.\u00a0 average number of sentences per paragraph<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A Paragraph Count Example: Understanding the Numbers and the Math<\/h3>\n

Clearly, you will need to understand THE NUMBERS<\/em>, so please take a close look at this example and explanation. Here are THE NUMBERS<\/em> for the highest scoring 3rd-grade essay:<\/p>\n

\u2022<\/strong>\u00a0 4\/3\/1\/2\/5 [ 15 sentences \/ 5 paragraphs = 3.0 average ]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This high-scoring essay was composed of 5 paragraphs of varying lengths; the average length of the paragraphs is 3 sentences. This is pretty simple math. However, this simple math reveals a number of important truths about student writing.<\/p>\n

Oregon\u2019s Scoring System<\/h3>\n

We have examined the number system for the paragraph counts. However, we have one more number system to examine\u2014the number system for the Oregon State essay scores. Here it is:<\/p>\n

\n

1 = Low; 2 = Medium Low; 3 = Medium; 4 = Medium High; 5 = High.<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Oregon\u2019s Genres: Why Just Expository and Persuasive Writing?<\/h3>\n

The Oregon State Writing Assessment samples<\/strong><\/a> are from four genres: 1) narrative, 2) imaginative, 3) expository, and 4) persuasive\/argument. However, the imaginative samples are all narratives, so in effect, we have three genres.<\/p>\n

I only analyzed the expository and persuasive writing samples. Although many narrative paragraphs use the same principles as expository and persuasive paragraphs, many more don\u2019t. Additionally, narrative writing often includes dialogue, and that changes the nature of the paragraphing. As you probably know, with dialogue, we begin a new paragraph with each new speaker. In the Oregon writing samples, many students used dialogue in their narratives, and many others didn\u2019t. For this reason, a paragraph count of narrative and imaginative writing would be confusing and misleading. As such, I have not included a paragraph count for either of these types of writing.<\/p>\n

Expository and argument paragraphs use the same principles and the same basic structure. In short, writers construct the paragraphs around a main idea or main point. This is not always the case with narratives.<\/p>\n

The Truth About Paragraphs: It\u2019s Not What You Think!<\/h3>\n

Be sure to read The Ten Stages of Paragraph and Multi-Paragraph Mastery<\/a><\/strong>. Also, go to the library and check out a large collection of newspapers, magazines, journals, and books from different genres and for different audiences. Now compare and contrast how these writers create their paragraphs. If you run THE NUMBERS<\/em>, you are going to find a wide variety of paragraph styles.<\/p>\n

For the most part, we teach students how to write one type of paragraph\u2014formal paragraphs based on traditional paragraph theory. This style of paragraphing works great in formal academic writing, but students also write in the real world and for many different purposes. The best student writers figure out how to use traditional paragraph theory as a foundation for creating effective writing. But they also know when they have changed the topic, so they indent. In short, the best student writers know that paragraph<\/em><\/strong> is both a noun and a verb!<\/p>\n

The truth of the matter is this: Paragraph style in real writing is a result of many aspects of writing: 1) personal writing style, 2) genre, 3) audience, 4) content, 5) tone, and 6) length of the whole composition. Many of these aspects are interconnected.<\/p>\n

Analyzing What Follows<\/h3>\n

The paragraph numbers alone tell a revealing story. Of course, you may also want to download a few or all of the released student-writing samples from the Oregon State Writing Assessment<\/a><\/strong>. I would love to explain and comment on what I see below, but that would be nine or more additional pages of text, and I covered most of what I see in The Ten Stages of Paragraph and Multi-Paragraph Mastery<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

A Few Questions and Concepts to Ponder as You Analyze:<\/h3>\n

1.\u00a0 Look for the patterns and trends. What do the best writers do and what to the struggling writers do? How do the paragraphs change from the low scores to the high scores?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Compare across grades. What do you see? Two things are surprisingly clear: The best writer in third-grade paragraphs the same way that the best paragraph writers in the higher grades do. The lowest scores are always poorly paragraphed text, and often unparagraphed text.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 How does what you teach your students about paragraphs relate to what you see? Does what you teach your students about paragraphs create writing success across the curriculum and on state writing assessments? Or does what you teach your students about paragraphs cause problems and confusion because it\u2019s simply not how the best writers create paragraphs?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

By the way, if you need to improve your students\u2019 paragraph and multi-paragraph writing, be sure to check out Pattern Based Writing: Quick & Easy Essay<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. It\u2019s the fastest, most effective way to teach students organized multi-paragraph essay writing\u2026 Guaranteed!<\/p>\n

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/h3>\n

Let\u2019s Look at the Students\u2019 Paragraphing Styles!<\/h3>\n

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/h3>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t

Paragraph Length: 3rd Grade Writing Samples<\/span><\/h3>\n

Score 1:<\/span> Expository \u2013 Score: Low \u2013 Title: \u201cA Monkey or a Tiger\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n