Lesson video

Hi, it's grammar with myself, Ms Richards.

So this is our grammar meets non-fiction writing.

We're looking at how do we use those elements of grammar in our writing.

Can you believe we are on lesson five already? So far, you've been amazing writing your introductions, you've done your for paragraphs.

You've thought about the reasons that your audience might be against something and argued against it.

Now we're going to look today at how to be balanced in it.

So how we show both sides.

Before we can begin though, let's get ourselves ready.

So if you've got your notes from the last few lessons that's really helpful because you've still got the task there.

You're going to need pen and paper, 'cause we're going to be writing again today.

And if you can, try and be somewhere nice and quiet, switch all your notifications off on your devices so there's no distractions.

If you need to, pause the video now, go and get yourselves ready, press play when you're ready to start.

If you haven't already, pause the video now and go and get everything you need.

Press play when you're ready.

Let's have a look, then at our overview of today's lesson.

We're going to start by recapping, as always, looking at what you did in the last lesson.

So today we're going to recap conditionals.

Then I'm going to introduce subordinating conjunctions to you.

Again, this might be something you're familiar with in which case it's a recap.

It might be something brand new.

We're going to look at how we use subordinating conjunctions to create balance.

And then you'll have a go at adding your balanced paragraph to the piece of writing that we've been working on during this series.

As always, there's a quiz at the end.

Just as a reminder of where this fits, you've done your introduction.

You've done your supporting paragraph.

We've done our counter paragraphs.

Now we're adding in balance.

Before we can get to that balance point though, before we can add that paragraph, we're going to start by recapping conditionals from last lesson.

As always with all our grammar things, I know I keep saying it, You don't need to remember the name of the technique unless you're going on to do A-level language but it is important that you understand it so that you can make sure all your tenses match and that you use it appropriately.

So our zero conditional was our permanent truth.

This is factual based, it's 100% true and we have a guarantee in it.

As a reminder then, what that means is that if an action happens 'cause our conditionals all focus around if, then there's 100% certain response.

So the example I gave you last time was "If I go to the cinema, I get popcorn." So we're in that present simple.

There's 100% certainty that that outcome will happen if the first bit does.

Our first conditional, are realistic situations that happen in the future.

If you go to the supermarket, we can make brownies later.

So as long as number one happens, then the second half of our construction can.

We can also read between the lines there, can't we, that maybe there's something missing or something that.

Something can't happen, part two can't happen unless part one happens.

But it's not entirely certain.

In the second, conditional, these are improbable or impossible situations in the present or the future.

Again, I'm jumping straight to the examples there 'cause I think it's the examples and how these work that really helps us.

But the second conditional uses the past simple and the would plus a verb or could plus verb.

So if I had more money, I'd buy a new car.

If I could give up work, I'd run my dog sanctuary.

If I mentioned this a few times now I'd love to.

But within our second conditional, again we have 100% certainty the second part of our construction is 100% certain.

But there's a really low possibility of that first bit happening.

Finally, our third conditional, these were our impossible ones.

The kind of hindsight ideas.

If you could go back, then you'd change something.

So when we look at our examples here there was a 0% chance of the first part of our construction from happening because you can't have known what the outcome was already.

So if I'd known I was going to fail the test.

If I hadn't forgotten my lunch.

If I'd responded to that message.

If I'd remembered to post my letter.

These are all things that have already happened so you can't go back in the past and change them.

But at the second part of our construction is that we can be 100% certain of what would have happened if we had been able to go back.

Here's a task for you then, you're going to pause the video and have a go at adding in the second half of our conditional phrases to each of these examples.

Take your time, pause the video, press play when you're ready to start.

Here are some possible answers then, these are just my answers.

There are so many possibilities.

Yours might look very different.

If we go to the shop, we can make lasagna for lunch.

Number two, if we'd known it was going to rain we would have worn our coats.

Three, I'm back on it, if I ever win the lottery I will run a dog rescue centre.

four, if you throw your litter on the ground, you could get £100 fine.

Five, if you checked the pizza order carefully, you'd have known you forgot garlic bread.

So those are just possible answers.

Those are the ones that I came up with, yours might be very different and that's okay.

But again, we've just got to check our tenses, making sure that it all aligns the whole way through.

So number four, if you throw your litter on the ground, you could have said an imperative there, you will get £100 fine or you could get £100 fine.

You might put something all together different about how it is damaging the environment.

And that's okay too.

There's loads of different answers.

These are just some examples.

So have a look through yours, give yourselves lots of ticks.

Check your commas are all in the right place.

And you put your full stops there too.

Fantastic.

Hopefully those have come back to you again.

You don't need to remember if you're on the first, second or third conditional, or is zero conditional.

But you do just need to know how it works so that you're creating this sense of what is possible or what might happen as a result.

But today's focus is going to be on subordinating conjunctions.

You might be really confident on these.

You might have never heard of that phrase before but I think when we get going, you'll know exactly what they are.

So our sentence construction, this time looks like this.

We start with an independent clause.

Now you should know these from some of the earlier units but independent clauses are when we have a subject, a verb an object.

So a noun, a verb and some extra information.

That's the green in this example.

Students are no longer allowed to leave sites at lunchtime.

So we've got our subject.

We've got our verb and we've got our extra information to make it make sense.

We then add a subordinating conjunction in this case because, and then we add a subordinate clause.

So this is our additional information that gets added on to provide more detail, but we could remove it and everything still makes sense.

So this looks like, "Students are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime because too many are returning to school late." What I can do with subordinate clauses and subordinating conjunctions is I can invert it.

So you can see here, that what I've done is moved my subordinate clause from the end to the beginning.

So it reads like this.

Because, starting that subordinating conjunction, Because too many are returning to school late, comma, small S now, students are no longer allowed to leave sites at lunch time.

Now with this, what you can see is that here I had because too many are returning to school late and then students came in the second construction.

So actually I can flip that, because too many students are returning to school late, they, or you, are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime.

So when I invert and I bring my subordinating conjunction and subordinate clause to the start of my sentence construction, then what I want to do is make sure I change the noun and the pronoun around.

But you'll notice now that my subordinating conjunction and my subordinate clause are separated from the independent clause by a comma.

If I go back, when it's the independent clause, subordinating conjunctions, subordinate clause, there is no comma.

So if the subordinate clause comes after the subordinating conjunction, there is no comma.

If it comes before, we put in a comma.

I told you this one would be really familiar to you.

Subordinating conjunctions are loads of words that you probably already use in all your writing and you probably known how to use for a really long time.

So on the screen now is lots of different subordinating conjunctions.

Probably worth pausing the screen and writing these down.

So you've got them to use in your writing.

When you're ready, press play and we'll look at some more examples.

Here's another example then.

I'm going to stick with the same independent clause, the whole time and just change the subordinate clause or the subordinating conjunction.

So you can see how this works.

So it's the same independent clause.

Students are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime.

And I've put in although.

Although they may start school late, if they have a free period one.

Again, I can invert this.

So if I've moved my subordinating conjunction to start the construction and then I've separated my subordinate clause with a comma from the independent clause.

Although they may start school late if they have a free period one, students are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime.

And again, just switching those pronouns around.

Although students may start school late if they have a free period one, they are no longer allowed to leave sites at lunchtime.

So either construction is completely correct and it's worth varying it so that sometimes you use your subordinating conjunction at the start of a sentence, sometimes you use it in the middle.

Another example for us then, still with that same independent clause.

This time the subordinating conjunction is now.

Students are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime now their exams have started.

Switching it round, Now their exams have started, comma, students are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime.

And again, if I swap my pronoun, now students exams have started, comma, they are no longer allowed to leave site at lunchtime.

It's just making sure that I name the noun in the first bit.

And then I use the pronoun in the second bit.

You notice here, that because I changed it to students exams, it's the exams belonging to, I've had to put in my possessive apostrophe.

Do you watch how your punctuation changes when you play around with your sentence structure? Your turn then.

I've given you the same independent clause.

And I've told you the conjunction that I want you to use.

You're going to have a go at creating your own subordinate clauses for each of these examples.

Pause the video, press play when it's all done.

Did you think you were going to get some answers? Not yet.

What I'd like you to do is now switch this around.

So using the sentences that you've just written I want you to invert the order.

So I've given you the conjunction at the start and I've put that comma in for you so it's in the right place.

Remember, the subordinating conjunction coming after the independent clause, there's no comma.

But this way, when we flipped it to the start, there is a comma.

I'd like you to now invert using your examples.

You don't need to come up with anything new.

Just use the ones that you wrote in the previous task and flip them around.

So pause now, press play when you're ready.

How'd you get on? Here are some possible answers.

So these were mine.

Now that we've had to cancel visiting the restaurant, students must bring a packed lunch for the trip.

Although there will be a chance to buy snacks and ice cream, Students must bring a packed lunch for the trip.

Unless you have free school meals, students must bring a patronage for the trip.

These are just options.

They're just examples.

Yours might be different and that's okay.

If there are any that you're not sure of, then you can pause the video now to copy down my example.

Fantastic.

The focus though of this session is to create balance, to look at that non-fiction paragraph with the piece that we are building over this course of lessons.

So let's think about what balance means and what that looks like in non-fiction.

Balance are like my scales.

Things are equal on both sides.

So whatever I've put on one side on my for, I need to have something of the same weight of argument on the other side as well.

I've got to make sure that they feel equally matched.

Let's look at some examples.

In the example, students should be allowed to wear non-uniform to school.

I can have my for, that students would feel more relaxed in their own clothes.

To make this balanced.

I've got to have a counter-argument that has the same level of weight and argument behind it.

So they might struggle to concentrate if they're too relaxed.

It's no good if I said, "Students would feel more relaxed in their own clothes, they might not like it." They don't feel very balanced.

We've got to keep the level of effort in our for side the same as the level of effort in our against side.

So that there's equal consideration.

Let's try another one.

Pizza should be free for all.

I think that's an excellent idea.

Let's look at the balance behind it though.

In favour, we could say that food would be available for families who struggle with money but we do need to consider that there is a risk of rising obesity.

So a plan like pizza being free for all, would increase that.

These are balanced in their argument.

They've got an equal weight to them.

So a new shopping centre being built.

So planning permission going in, we might have a risk to the other shops that are already in the area.

So that's a more negative side of it, but positively, we might have an increase in jobs available for local people.

Again, these are balanced.

Your turn to have a go then.

Then I'd like you to pause the video now and have a go at completing this table.

There are three scenarios for you.

I'd like you to find for and against for each one.

If you've got more than one idea, fantastic.

As long as you can come up with one per scenario, that's fine.

Press play when you're ready.

Here are my examples.

As always, yours might look different.

If there are any that you couldn't get then you can pause the video and use mine.

Or if I've got some that are different, you could pause add mine to yours, so that you've got even more ideas.

So for school is not starting until 10:00 AM each day, our for might be that students would get much better sleep to concentrate.

But we could argue against that, 'cause it might just encourage students to go to bed later.

A Mobile phone company is giving all students free data.

We can support that and be for it, by saying it allows students to access educational resources.

But our balance is we know that some students might just use it for social media rather than education.

And we know that the mobile phone companies or people who are against it, that would be what they would bring up.

That's what they would be worried about.

And university education being free for all, well, for that would make university accessible and not off-putting.

But against, we'd have to consider how did the universities make their money to pay all their staff? So we've got some balance.

Now I said to you this was about using subordinating conjunctions, and we're going to create balance.

So what I'm going to do is I'm going to add an extra column to my table.

If you're drawing it, you can just add an extra column at the end or use a different colour and write over the top.

But let's have a look now at what my table looks like.

Here I've put subordinating conjunctions in the middle.

So I could say students would get better sleep to concentrate more.

Although this could just encourage them to go to bed later.

Giving all students free data on their mobile phones would allow students to access educational resources, but it may just be used for social media rather than education.

And lastly, university education being free for all which would make university accessible and not off-putting, though how would they make their money? I've used my subordinating conjunctions to add the balance, add that counter argument.

You know what this looks like now? We're going back to that same task that we've used over the course of these lessons.

Here we go then, here's a reminder.

You should have this written down in your notes by now and be really familiar with it.

If you're not then of course, pause and write it down again.

We're still thinking about that speech for a local council arguing that there should be more funding to create local community spaces for teenagers.

And in our scheme, in where we've come from, we've done our introduction.

We've done our supporting paragraphs, our counter paragraphs.

Now we're going to add in some balance.

Your turn then.

On the next slide, you're going to see the task again.

You're going to plan and come up with all the different balanced arguments that you can before you write your paragraph.

Remembering to use subordinating conjunction.

Here we go then.

Press pause now and give it your best shot.

Well done.

Look how far through we are now.

We're on lesson five.

So we've got a conclusion to do for lesson six.

And then lesson seven, we're going to look at how we switch this all around.

Really well done today.

Creating balance can be quite difficult 'cause we often want to argue one side or the other.

So you've done really, really well.

I can't wait to see you for less than six, but before we do that, don't forget to do your quiz.

Bye.