$4.$ Composing the First Draft with Effective Sentences

Once you have researched, organized your information, and selected an organizational pattern, you are ready to compose your message. To compose a successful message, you must use effective sentences.

Being able to understand sentence structure and identify sentence types will help you write more effectively.

Read the following sentences, and then fill in the blanks.

The CEO will visit the New York office in May.

This is a sentence. The subject of the independent clause is $,$ and the predicate verb is $.$

The intern drafted tweets for the company, and then his supervisor reviewed them.

This is a sentence. The subjects of the independent clauses are and $,$ and the predicate verbs are and $.$

During the composition process, focus on drafting clear sentences that avoid common sentence faults.

Read the following excerpts from business e$-$mails, and identify the sentence faults.

The latest draft of the marketing copy looks good. Especially compared to the first draft.

This message contains $.$

We will host focus groups on Thursday afternoon to hear from you firsthand, and we will summarize employee input for the CEO. Your participation is appreciated.

This message contains $.$

You work in the Human Resources department of a large company and are asked to send a company$-$wide e$-$mail about an upcoming career development workshop. You have completed your first draft of the e$-$mail.

Read the draft below, and then answer the question that follows.

The Human Resources department is happy to announce a career development workshop. Led by Joseph Pelletier. He has $20$ years of experience in career development training. Joseph will help you gain a clearer understanding of your career goals. He will discuss tools to work toward those goals. The workshop will take place November $10$ and $11.$ From $9$:$30$ a$.$m$.$ to $5$:$30$ p$.$m$.$ There will be coffee and tea, lunch will also be provided. If you are interested, please respond to this e$-$mail to sign up$,$ only $40$ spaces are available.

How could you improve this message? Check all that apply.

Do not use simple sentences.

Increase sentence lengths.

Correct comma splices.

Correct fragments.

Vary sentence types.