THE BECAUSE TEST
As a check on paragraph coherence try using the “because” test:
Read the topic sentence and mentally insert the word because after it. Then read each succeeding sentence in the paragraph.
Ex: topic sentence, "because," sentence 2
topic sentence, "because," sentence 3
If you can logically join each sentence with the topic sentence, then you know each sentence is a logical outgrowth of the topic sentence.
Compare the following two Paragraphs:
Modern managers ought to be teachers, too. While college professors frequently lack business experience, they have had experience in teaching. Managers in business, however, do not normally think of themselves as teachers, but they are. Many young people starting their careers wish that their first supervisors had been better teachers. Their whole career might have been different if only their supervisors had learned to train them properly. In fact business wastes time, money, and future potential by not learning to teach.
Modern managers ought to be teachers, too. In reality, managers have two major functions--training an understudy for their job and helping young employees to start their careers effectively. In both these functions they are essentially a teacher. By learning to instruct those they supervise, they can save time for themselves and money for their company. In training an adequate understudy for themselves, they are actually preparing themselves for greater responsibilities in the future; in helping young men and women to start their careers properly, they are developing the potential human resources of the company.
1. Which paragraph is easier to understand? Test each paragraph using the because test.
2. What other methods of coherence have been used to help make the paragraph easier to understand?
Whenever you are writing an expository paragraph (one which explains), try using the because test to improve your paragraph coherence.