Hi friend!
This post is a quick overview of conjunctions and why they're important for tackling comprehension and expression goals in speech language therapy.
A conjunction is a word that connects parts of a sentence together.
There are different kinds of conjunctions:
Why should we utilize conjunctions in speech therapy
Before we jump into conjunctions, let's back up one step to identify why we need to be supporting syntax skills in our therapy sessions.
Syntax impacts a student's receptive language skills, specifically the ability to comprehend texts and utilize skills that rely on comprehension:
“The inability to comprehend key sentences in a text will undermine finding the main idea, drawing conclusions, making inferences, or answering many comprehension questions” (Balthazar & Scott, 2023).
Syntax also impacts expressive language skills that allow them to engage with others and explain their way of thinking:
“Students are expected to engage in oral discussion of topics and issues where complex ideas require complex sentences to explain, elaborate, and debate” (Balthazar & Scott, 2023).
Now let's get back to conjunctions:
Conjunctions are key components to target when supporting syntax skills, because they have an impact on goals like:
🌟 Produce grammatically correct sentences with 2+ clauses
🌟 Utterance expansion
🌟 Responding to wh- questions (e.g. Why did the house break? The house broke because....)
🌟 Formulating compound sentences
🌟 Formulating complex sentences
🌟 Retelling stories, narrative generation
🌟 Summarizing
COORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS
A coordinating conjunction is a word that combines two words, phrases or sentences.
Using coordinating conjunctions:
helps to present information succinctly
supports summarizing skills
makes what you say less choppy
shows relationships between thoughts, ideas, actions, people
Coordinating conjunctions are for, and, nor, but, or, yet, and so. You can remember these (and help your students to remember them) with the acronym FANBOYS.
For - explains why
And - to make two similar points, to connect two items
Nor - to make two similar negative points
But - to show contrast
Or - to provide an alternative
Yet - to show contrast in spite of something
So - to show the result of something, to explain or give a reason for something
SUBORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS
A subordinating conjunction is a word or phrase that combines one independent clause and one dependent clause.
Using subordinating conjunctions:
provide an explanation
communicates time
gives more information about the sentences main idea
provides a cause and effect relationship
changes the time and place of 2 clauses
There are many subordinating conjunctions: after, although, as, as if, because, before, how, if, since, than, though, unless, until, when, where and while.
correlative CONJUNCTIONS
Correlative conjunctions are conjunctions used to illustrate how two words or phrases within a sentence relate to each other.
Correlative conjunctions always come in pairs. Here are some common ones:
CONJUNCTIve adverbs
Conjunctive adverbs are transition words or phrases. Conjunctive adverbs are also called connective adverbs or linking adverbs.
Here are some common conjunctive adverbs and their purposes or uses:
Addition - additionally, also, besides, furthermore, moreover
Consequence - consequently, accordingly, therefore, thus
Comparison - alternatively, similarly, likewise
Contrast - if not, however, nevertheless, otherwise, conversely
Emphasis - certainly, definitely, indeed, of course, naturally
Clarification - for example, for instance, namely, i.e., notably
If you're looking for ideas on how you can target conjunctions using books in literacy-based therapy sessions, check out this blog post.
I hope this has been helpful! 😊
