1. Writing to Achieve Cohesion
Known to new
Modifiers and transitions
Review A
Review B

2. Known to new Good writers lead the reader gently and
clearly from known to new information.
Cohesion is achieved when each sentence delivers new information clearly related to information that the reader has been given.
To achieve cohesion, sentences may 1.
refer to known information, and then 2.
introduce new information.

3. Known to new
Consider how writer Bill Bryson’s essay takes you from one sentence to another in this passage:
Sometime about a million and a half years ago, some forgotten genius of the hominid world did an unexpected thing. He (or very possibly she) took one stone and carefully used it to shape another. The result was a simple teardrop-shaped hand axe, but it was the world’s first piece of advanced technology.

4. Known to new Bryson first uses pronouns to refer back to
known information.
Sentence 1
Sometime about a million and a half years ago, some forgotten genius of the hominid world did an unexpected thing.
Sentence 2
He (or very possibly she) took one stone and carefully used it to shape another.
The pronouns refer to the “forgotten genius” mentioned in the previous sentence. Thus, the subject of Sentence 2 refers to the subject of Sentence 1.

5. Known to new
The predicate of Sentence 2 also explains the predicate of Sentence 1.
Sentence 1
Sometime about a million and a half years ago, some forgotten genius of the hominid world did an unexpected thing.
Known
What did the genius do?
Sentence 2
He (or very possibly she) took one stone and carefully used it to shape another.
New

6. Known to new
The predicate of Sentence 2 then sets up the subject of Sentence 3.
Sentence 2
He (or very possibly she) took one stone and carefully used it to shape another.
Known
Sentence 3
The result was a simple teardrop-shaped hand axe, but it was the world’s first piece of advanced technology.
The result was a simple teardrop-shaped hand axe, but it was the world’s first piece of advanced technology.
New
The pronoun it creates cohesion within Sentence 3.

7. Modifiers and transitions
Writers also achieve cohesion by choosing key modifiers and using transitions.
In his essay “Bang!” Bill Bryson prepares the reader for a surprising situation.
People knew for a long time that there was something odd about the earth beneath Manson, Iowa. In 1912, a man drilling a well for the town water supply reported bringing up a lot of strangely deformed rock—“crystalline clast breccia with a melt matrix” and “overturned ejecta flap,” as it was later described in an official report. The water was odd too. It was almost as soft as rainwater. Naturally occurring soft water had never been found in Iowa before.

8. Modifiers and transitions
Bryson’s choice of modifiers achieves cohesion by
emphasizing the theme of strangeness.
People knew for a long time that there was something odd about the earth beneath Manson, Iowa. In 1912, a man drilling a well for the town water supply reported bringing up a lot of strangely deformed rock—”crystalline clast breccia with a melt matrix” and “overturned ejecta flap,” as it was later described in an official report. The water was odd too. It was almost as soft as rainwater. Naturally occurring soft water had never been found in Iowa before.
People know for a long time that there was something odd about the earth beneath Manson, Iowa. In 1912, a man drilling a well for the town water supply reported bringing up a lot of strangely deformed rock—”crystalline clast breccia with a melt matrix” and “overturned ejecta flap,” as it was later described in an official report. The water was odd too. It was almost as soft as rainwater. Naturally occurring soft water had never been found in Iowa before.
Repeating the key word odd links the strange features of the earth to those of the water.

9. Modifiers and transitions
Transitional words also achieve cohesion in the paragraph by creating a “time line” of events and connecting ideas.
People knew for a long time that there was something odd about the earth beneath Manson, Iowa. In 1912, a man drilling a well for the town water supply reported bringing up a lot of strangely deformed rock—”crystalline clast breccia with a melt matrix” and “overturned ejecta flap,” as it was later described in an official report. The water was odd too. It was almost as soft as rainwater. Naturally occurring soft water had never been found in Iowa before.

10. Modifiers and transitions
Transitional words and phrases are used to show relationships between ideas and to make connections in time and place.
Comparing Ideas
also and
another
similarly
Contrasting Ideas
still but
in spite of
however
Chronological Order
after then
next
first
Spatial Order
into over in
here
Order of Importance
first last
mainly
to begin with
Cause and Effect
for since
so that
therefore

11. Modifiers and transitions
On Your Own
For each pair of sentences, identify any words in the second sentence that create cohesion with the first.
1. Malcolm Taylor visited yesterday. He attended our school and is now running for mayor.
2. The river is spanned by a graceful bridge. This ancient structure was built twelve hundred years ago.
3. Many visitors comment on the city’s cleanliness. Weekly scrubbings leave the streets spotless.
4. The book turned out to be much different than I had expected. Still, I enjoyed it.
[End of Section]

12. Review A
Connect each pair of sentences by writing in the blank an appropriate noun, pronoun, modifier, or transition, as indicated.
1. This box is too heavy. Let me help you lift ________. (pronoun)
2. All winter and fall the store has sold mostly apples and pears. Summer has brought a welcome change in ________. (noun)
3. Elegies are poems that reflect on some kind of personal loss. Emotion-packed words express this ________ theme. (modifier)
4. These mountains used to be giant sand dunes. Over time the ________ hardened into solid rock. (noun)
5. This is the screening lab. ________ technicians test over one hundred samples a day. (transition)

13. Review B
Write a one-paragraph explanation of an interesting phenomenon of science. Lead your reader gently from one sentence to the next by progressing from known to new information. Use transitions and modifiers to relate ideas.

14. The End