Hi friend!
Do you have students who struggle with reading comprehension, listening comprehension, following directions, summarizing stories, or writing?
They might need support with syntax!
"In comparison with age peers, there is considerable evidence that school-age children and adolescents with SLI find complex sentences
more difficult to comprehend and produce" (Balthazar & Scott, 2018).
Simply put, syntax refers to the rules for how words are arranged to build sentences.
Why does syntax matter?
Understanding syntax helps students make sense of how sentences are constructed, which directly supports their ability to comprehend language at the sentence level.
Comprehension at the sentence level is a foundational skill. If a student can’t understand individual sentences, it becomes much harder to understand larger chunks of language—like paragraphs, stories, or classroom instruction.
“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, 2024).
Students also need to use complex syntax that allows students to engage across genres, including narrative, expository, persuasive, procedural, and conversational discourse.
“Investigations of both speaking and writing in these genres reveal reduced sentence length, fewer sentences with two or more clauses, less embedding depth, less noun phrase elaboration, and more frequent grammatical errors” (Balthazar & Scott, 2024).
When we target syntax expressively in therapy, we’re helping students improve the way they order and connect words—often by increasing sentence complexity.
So, now that we all agree how important syntax is—let’s talk about how to easily incorporate it into your therapy sessions!
How to Work on Complex Syntax in a Meaningful Way
Working on syntactic skills—like formulating compound and complex sentences, understanding clause types, and using conjunctions to build longer, more sophisticated sentence structures—doesn’t have to feel like drill work.
In fact, contextualized intervention, where grammar and syntax skills are embedded in meaningful language tasks, has been shown to be more effective than isolated or decontextualized approaches (Ukrainetz, 2006).
One of the most effective ways to do this is through the use of rich texts, including picture books and nonfiction articles.
Books provide a natural and engaging context for introducing a wide range of clause types, sentence structures, and conjunctions.
During interactive shared reading or story retell activities, we can:
🎯 Model and elicit compound and complex sentences
🎯 Highlight different types of conjunctions (e.g., temporal, causal) used to formulate more complex sentences
🎯 Identify clause types
🎯 Scaffold the use of embedded (i.e. dependent) clauses
—all within the meaningful and motivating context of a story!
"If You Give a..." Book Series
One of my favorite picture books to target complex syntax in a contextualized way is Laura Numeroff’s If You Give a...books.
I know what you're thinking... “These books are way too simple for my older students!”
Hear me out—these stories are actually rich in cause-and-effect relationships and follow a predictable structure that makes them ideal for targeting conjunctions like if, then, when, because, and, so.
The text includes both compound and complex sentence types, often broken into manageable chunks—either within a single clause or across 1–2 short sentences.
This format can help reduce cognitive load and decrease frustration for students who may struggle with longer or denser texts.
Here are a few ways to work on complex sentences to retell story events while reading the story or after:
If he gets a cookie, then...
After he drinks the milk...
Because his hair was long...
When he finishes coloring...
💡 Here are a few more syntax activity ideas:
Select a sentence from the text. Have students identify the clauses in the sentence as independent or dependent
Make two simple sentences about the story and provide the students with a target conjunction or bank of conjunctions to combine the sentences into one long sentence
Select a clause in the text and have students identify it as independent or dependent
Select a clause in the text. Use it as a sentence starter and have the student finish the sentence
Select a dependent clause from the text and have students idenfity the type (e.g., adverbial, relative, noun)
👉 Ready to get started?
Download my If You Give a Mouse a Cookie Book Companion and start targeting compound and complex sentences today!
Inside my book companion you'll find activities to help you:
🌟 Teach and identify independent and dependent clauses
🌟 Combine clauses and sentences to create compound and complex sentences
🌟 Use a variety of conjunctions to build more sophisticated sentence structures
So if you’re already using these books with your younger students, don’t hesitate to try them with your middle and upper elementary students too!
I hope this has been helpful! 😊
References
Balthazar, C. H., & Scott, C. M. (2018). Targeting complex sentences in older school children with specific language impairment: Results from an early-phase treatment study. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 61(3), 713–728. Link.
Balthazar, C. H., & Scott, C. M. (2024). Sentences Are Key: Helping School-Age Children and Adolescents Build Sentence Skills Needed for Real Language. American Journal of Speech Language Pathology, 33(2), 564-579. Link.
Ukrainetz, T. A. (2006). Contextualized Language Intervention: Scaffolding Prek-12 Literacy Achievement (1st ed.). Pro Ed.