Transition words and phrases

Students will learn to combine sentences using two kinds of transition words: time transitions and thought (logical) transitions. Transition words link related ideas and hold them together. They can help the parts of a narrative to be coherent or work together to tell the story. Coherence means all parts of a narrative link together to move the story along. Think of transition words as the glue that holds a story together. Using transition words helps avoid the "listing" problem in stories.

A lesson plan for grades 4–5 English Language Arts

By DPI Writing Strategies

Learn more

Related pages

• Meanwhile...: Transition words that connect ideas: Students will identify transition words in picturebooks that they can use in their own writing. Transition words are the glue that holds sentences and paragraphs together. They signal that this is a new part of the story.
• Synonym word bags: The purpose of Word Bags is to give students a resource for finding synonyms for overused words that they use in their writing on a daily basis. Students will fill Word Bags with synonyms for frequently used words.
• Rest in peace, dead words!: “Dead words,” by my definition, are words students “use to death” in their writing samples. As Language Arts teachers, we can generate a list of such words a mile long. Examples would include: pretty, nice, bad, a lot, and good. This cooperative learning activity is designed to eliminate those repetitious words by providing students with a word bank/wall they can refer to when given a writing assignment.

Related topics

• Learn more about language arts, transition words, word choice, and writing words.

Help

Please read our disclaimer for lesson plans.

Legal

Learning outcomes

Students will:

• combine provided sentences using two kinds of transition words: time transitions and thought (logical) transitions.
• incorporate time and thought transitions into their own work to help their narratives move along.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

1 hour

Materials/resources

• Transition Words Sentence Strips with transitional words and phrases and prepared sentences pdf | rtf
• Pocket Chart

Activities

Modeling/Mini-lesson

1. Tell students that there are different kinds of transition words. Explain that one kind of transition word is time transitions, which helps the reader know the order of events in a story.
2. Discuss how using different transition words changes the meaning of a sentence. Put the following 2 sentence strips in the pocket chart:

• Dad and I went fishing.
• Mom made our lunch.

Show students how you can connect the sentences by adding transition words. For example:

• Dad and I went fishing. / Meanwhile / Mom made our lunch.
• After / Dad and I went fishing, / Mom made our lunch.
• Before / Dad and I went fishing, / Mom made our lunch.
• Dad and I went fishing / after / Mom made our lunch.
• While / Dad and I went fishing, / Mom made our lunch.

Discuss how the different transition words change the meaning of the sentences by changing the sequence (order) of events.

Guided Practice

3. Put the following 3 sentence strips up on the pocket chart.
• Marty saw the puppy.
• He recognized it.
• He picked it up.
4. Give 3 student volunteers three cards with 3 transition words on them (First, Then, After that). Tell students that the transition words on the cards will help them put the sentences in the correct order:
   
   First, Marty saw the puppy. Then he recognized it. After that, he picked it up.
5. Give students other transition words on cards and ask them how the words change the meaning of the sentences:
   
   After Marty saw the puppy, he recognized it, and he picked it up.
   As soon as Marty saw the puppy, he recognized it and immediately picked it up.

Time Transitions
Shortly after that	Meanwhile	Soon
Along the way	Before long	Earlier
After all of that	Later on	Eventually
An hour later	Without delay	Immediately
At that very moment	At last	Next
Later that same day	During all of this	As soon as
Not a moment too soon	While this was happening

6. Point out that other transition words link related thoughts on a subject. Use the following 3 sentence strips:

• The puppy shivered.
• It was afraid.
• Marty spoke in a gentle voice.

Have students select transition strips to make the sentence come to life. For example:

• The puppy shivered / because obviously / it was afraid / even though / Marty spoke in a gentle voice.
• Although / Marty spoke in a gentle voice, / the puppy shivered / because / it was afraid.
• Without warning / the puppy shivered, / even though / Marty spoke in a gentle voice. / Obviously, / it was afraid.

Independent Practice

7. Have students select a draft from their writing folder. Have them highlight the transition words they used. Then have them choose a paragraph to revise by adding 3-5 transition words. Have students read their revised paragraphs to a partner.

Assessment

• Can students make a list of time transition words and thought transition words?
• Can students select the appropriate time transition words to link three sentences?
• Can students select the appropriate thought transition words to link three sentences?
• Can students identify time and thought transition words in their own writing?
• Can students revise their own writing to link related sentences with the appropriate transition words?

Supplemental information

• Writing Feature: Organization
• Writing Process Stage: Revising
• Writing Environment: Expressive, Informational, Critical, Argumentative, Literary
• Writing Genre: Personal Narrative