Grammar and Academic Writing in Secondary School: The 7 Structures Students Need Most

Every secondary writing rubric distinguishes proficient from advanced writing partly through grammatical sophistication. But which grammatical structures actually matter? If you teach all of them, you teach none of them well.

Based on corpus analyses of secondary academic writing (notably Biber's University Language and his work with the BAWE corpus) plus a decade of teaching writing in middle and high school, seven grammatical structures consistently distinguish proficient from advanced student writing.

Teach these seven well. Skip the rest until students are proficient. This post is the framework.

Why Not Just 'Teach Grammar'?

Two problems with comprehensive grammar instruction:

1. Time. You have maybe 30 minutes a week dedicated to grammar. You can't cover everything.
2. Transfer. Most grammar doesn't transfer to writing without explicit bridging. Better to teach 7 structures deeply than 30 structures shallowly.

Focus is the multiplier.

The 7 Structures

1. Complex Sentences with Subordinating Conjunctions

Example: Although the experiment failed, the data revealed an unexpected pattern.

Why it matters: Complex sentences signal nuanced thinking. They allow students to subordinate one idea to another, which is the foundation of analytical writing.

Mini-lesson: Teach the AAAWWUBBIS subordinating conjunctions (after, although, as, when, while, until, because, before, if, since). Drill front + back placement and the corresponding comma rule. Two weeks of focused instruction, then ongoing review.

See How to Teach Sentence Structure for the full sequence.

2. Appositive Phrases

Example: Marie Curie, a Polish-French physicist, won two Nobel Prizes.

Why it matters: Appositives are the workhorse of analytical writing. They let writers define, clarify, and add information without breaking the flow.

Mini-lesson: Display 5 sentences. Add an appositive to each. Then students do their own. Five days.

3. Participial Phrases (Present and Past)

Example present: Walking through the empty hallway, she felt the weight of the silence.
Example past: Stunned by the news, he sat motionless for an hour.

Why it matters: Participial phrases create sentence variety and add descriptive density without padding.

Mini-lesson: Mentor sentence study. Imitate the pattern. Apply to current writing assignment.

4. Compound Predicates

Example: The students gathered data, analyzed results, and presented findings in three weeks.

Why it matters: Compound predicates condense action and signal sophisticated sentence economy.

Mini-lesson: Sentence combining — take 3 short sentences with the same subject, combine into one with a compound predicate.

5. Cohesive Transitions (Conjunctive Adverbs)

Example: The first hypothesis failed. However, the second produced clear results.

Why it matters: Transitions signal the relationships between ideas — and signaling relationships is what academic writing is.

Mini-lesson: Teach the top 10 conjunctive adverbs (however, therefore, moreover, furthermore, nevertheless, consequently, similarly, in contrast, for instance, in addition). Drill with sentence-combining.

6. Hedging and Modal Language

Example: The results suggest that exposure to lead may affect cognitive development.

Why it matters: Academic writing requires appropriate uncertainty. Overclaim and your argument fails. Underclaim and your argument disappears.

Mini-lesson: Teach hedging verbs (suggest, indicate, imply, appear) and modal verbs (may, might, could). Show students how to revise overclaiming sentences into hedged versions.

7. Nominalizations

Example: Verb form: The government decided to act. Nominalized: The government's decision to act prompted criticism.

Why it matters: Nominalizations compress information and shift focus from action to concept. Heavy nominalization is the style of academic writing.

Mini-lesson: Show 5 verbal sentences. Transform to nominalized versions. Discuss when each is appropriate. (Warning: over-nominalization produces dense, unreadable prose. Teach with restraint.)

A Quarterly Sequence

Don't try to teach all 7 in one unit. Spread them across the year:

Q1: Structures 1 and 2 (complex sentences, appositives).
Q2: Structures 3 and 4 (participial phrases, compound predicates).
Q3: Structures 5 and 6 (transitions, hedging).
Q4: Structure 7 (nominalizations) + integration of all seven.

By spring, students have explicit access to seven structures and consistent practice using them.

Assessment: The Sentence Sophistication Rubric

Score student writing samples each quarter on the 7 structures:

• 0 = doesn't appear
• 1 = appears with errors
• 2 = appears correctly

Total possible: 14 points per sample. Track per student per quarter. Growth is visible.

This rubric is not for grading individual papers — it's for tracking sentence sophistication over time. Different purpose, different use.

What Research Says About Sentence Sophistication

1. Sentence-level complexity correlates with writing quality at the secondary level. Biber and Gray's 2010 work on academic writing development shows clear progression markers — and the 7 structures above are central.

2. Explicit instruction in syntactic structures transfers to writing. Saddler and Graham (2005) and a wide body of sentence-combining research show that explicit syntactic instruction produces measurable writing gains.

3. Focus beats breadth. Studies in Research in the Teaching of English repeatedly find that teaching fewer structures deeper produces more transfer than teaching many shallow.

Common Pitfalls

Pitfall 1: Teaching nominalization too early. Nominalizations are the most sophisticated of the 7. Students need control of the first 6 before adding this. Otherwise their writing becomes a fog of nominalized nouns.

Pitfall 2: Marking everything. Pick one structure per writing assignment. Mark that one. Other improvements come from other assignments.

Pitfall 3: Treating these as separate. The structures interact. A great sentence often uses 2 or 3 at once. Show students how they combine.

Pitfall 4: Teaching definitions before patterns. Don't ask students to define 'appositive.' Show 5 examples. Have them find the pattern. Then name it.

Adapting for ELLs

All 7 structures work for ELLs at all levels with appropriate scaffolding:

• Newcomers: Focus on structures 1 and 4 (complex sentences and compound predicates). These unlock the most production.
• Intermediate: Add structures 2, 3, 5 (appositives, participial phrases, transitions).
• Advanced: All 7 with stylistic refinement.

Frequently Asked Questions

What about other 'sophisticated' structures (subjunctive mood, inversion, cleft sentences)? They're rare in secondary academic writing. Skip until college.

How does this fit with state writing standards? Most state writing rubrics test sentence variety and command of conventions. These 7 structures cover both.

Can I add more structures over the year? Yes — once students show command of the 7, add structures like absolute phrases and noun clauses.

How do I keep students from over-using these structures? Teach restraint as a craft principle. Show examples of overuse and how it disrupts reading.

What if my students struggle with simple sentences first? Then start there. The 7 are for students who already control simple and compound sentences.

Where to Go Next

Three concrete next steps:

1. Score 5 writing samples on the 7-structure rubric. Note which structures are missing.
2. Pick the first 2 structures to teach this month based on what's missing most.
3. Build the full sequence. Grammar Spy Membership includes a quarterly sentence sophistication sequence with built-in assessment.

Seven structures. Four quarters. Taught well, this is the entire grammar curriculum that distinguishes proficient from advanced secondary writing.