Forming Compound Sentences

There are three different types of sentences:

1. Simple Sentence

2. Compound Sentence

3. Complex Sentence

This article focuses on Compound Sentences: what they are, and how they are formed.

Before jumping to the main topic, we first need to define an Independent Clause.

INDEPENDENT CLAUSE

An Independent Clause is a group of words that contains a subject + a verb, and a complete thought. And it makes a Simple Sentence.

example:

"Toby washed his face."

"Toby" - subject

"washed" - verb

The subject and the verb needed to make a sentence are already present.

The final question, then, to be confirmed is,

does the clause have a complete thought? Yes.

Who washed his face? -Toby.

What did Toby do? -Washed his face.

The clause does not leave the reader hanging.

Since it contains a subject and a verb and also conveys a complete thought, then the clause is an Independent Clause and now can be considered a simple sentence.

It is considered a Simple Sentence because a Simple Sentence only contains one Independent Clause.

Now, what is a Compound Sentence?

COMPOUND SENTENCE

A Compound Sentence is a group of words that consists of two independent clauses or two simple sentences.

examples:

"Toby washed his face."

"He combed his hair."

These two sentences are both Simple Sentences.

Now, to make a Compound Sentence, we combine these two.

So, how do we combine two Simple Sentences to form a Compound Sentence?

FORMING A COMPOUND SENTENCE

There are three ways of making a Compound Sentence.

1. By using a Coordinating Conjunction with a comma before it.

Here are the seven Coordinating Conjunctions:

For

And

Nor

But

Or

Yet

So

The above seven Coordinating Conjunctions are abbreviated into FANBOYS. This abbreviation helps remember these seven conjunctions.

Now, let's combine the two given Simple Sentences using any of the conjunctions above.

Remember, though, that usage of conjunctions will depend on the thought we want to convey.

The sentence pattern is as follows:

Simple Sentence 1 + comma ( ,) + Coordinating Conjunction + Simple Sentence 2

example:

"Toby washed his face, and he combed his hair."

REMEMBER: When we combine two simple sentences using conjunctions to create a compound sentence, we always put a comma before the conjunction. Just like the above sentence.

2. By using Transition words.

Another way of combining two Simple Sentences to form a Compound Sentence is by using Transition words.

Here is the commonly used list of transition words:

therefore, in addition, however, thus, furthermore, otherwise, also, nonetheless, similarly, & then

Let's use some of these transition words to form a compound sentence.

example simple sentences:

"Britney broke her leg."

"She cannot walk."

These sentences are both independent clauses and stand-alone sentences (simple sentences).

If we combine them to form a Compound Sentence, we can use a transition word. Example transition word we can use: therefore

The sentence pattern is as follows:

Simple Sentence 1 + semi-colon (;) + transition + comma (,)+ Simple Sentence 2

example:

"Britney broke her leg; therefore, she cannot walk."

example simple sentences:

"She drew a big balloon."

"She colored it with yellow."

Example transition word we can use: then

So the Compound Sentence would be:

example:

"She drew a big balloon; then, she colored it with yellow."

REMEMBER: We should put a semi-colon before the transition word, and then a comma after the transition word.

3. By using a semi-colon.

The third way of combining Simple Sentences to form a Compound Sentence is by using a semi-colon.

In using this, we need to consider one point.

REMEMBER: When there are two simple sentences or dependent clauses that are closely related to each other and have the idea of “and”, we can use a semi-colon by itself.

The sentence pattern is as follows:

Simple Sentence 1 + Semi-colon (;) + Simple Sentence 2

example:

"The music was jolly; everyone was dancing."

We notice that they are related to each other, which is why we used a semi-colon to combine them. Everyone dancing is the result of having the jolly music played.