Quill Connect
Help your students advance from writing fragments and run-ons to composing complex, well-structured sentences with Quill Connect. By combining sentences, students learn how to demonstrate relationships between ideas. Then, they receive instant, custom feedback designed to help them improve the clarity and precision of their sentences.
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Activity Summary Report
Teachers can use their activity summary report to see which concepts the student has mastered and which ones they need to practice.
Concept Reports
Teachers see reports that state exactly which errors the student made and which concepts the student mastered.
Common Core Language Standards
Teachers have access to over 200 exercises aligned with the Common Core language standards.
What Skills Are Being Targeted
Adjectives
Appositive Phrases
Articles
Commonly Confused Words
Complex Sentences
Compound Sentences
Conjunctive Adverbs
Nouns
Open Combining
Parallel Structure
Participial Phrases
Prepositions
Pronouns
Questions
Relative Clauses
Subjects, Objects, Predicates
Verbs
How Quill Connect Works
Students are prompted with four ideas and asked to join them together. There are many different ways of combining them, and Quill serves feedback on hundreds of potential answers. Here is a student's progression from their first attempt to a strong sentence.
Prompt:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes.
He gave a speech.
The speech was powerful.
The speech was to inspire the colonists.
1st Attempt
Write Concisely
The student used and to join multiple ideas together. This is a very common pattern for emerging writers. Quill breaks this pattern by challenging students to revise their work.
Prompt:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes.
He gave a speech with a powerful impact.
The speech was powerful.
The speech was to inspire the colonists.
Student’s Response:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes and he gave a speech and the speech was powerful to inspire the colonists.
Quill Feedback:
Revise your work. Put powerful in front of the word it describes to make your sentence shorter and more concise.
2nd Attempt
Show Relationships
While using and to join the two main ideas is grammatically correct, it is not the strongest way of conveying the relationship between these ideas. Students are prompted to use a conjunction that expresses a cause and effect relationship. This is an important step towards conveying complex ideas.
Prompt:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes.
He gave a speech with a powerful impact.
The speech was powerful.
The speech was to inspire the colonists.
Student’s Response:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes and he gave a powerful speech to inspire the colonists.
Quill Feedback:
And makes sense, but there is a stronger way of joining the ideas. Which joining word helps tell why or give a reason?
3rd Attempt
Use Punctuation
The student showed the correct relationship but left out the comma. Quill provides feedback and shows a model sentence to help guide the student.
Prompt:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes.
He gave a speech with a powerful impact.
The speech was powerful.
The speech was to inspire the colonists.
Student’s Response:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes so he gave a powerful speech to inspire the colonists.
Quill Feedback:
Good work! Now correct your punctuation.
4th Attempt
Strong Sentence!
The student wrote a clear and concise sentence!
Quill provides additional feedback to reinforce what the student learned.
Prompt:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes.
He gave a speech with a powerful impact.
The speech was powerful.
The speech was to inspire the colonists.
Student’s Response:
Patrick Henry opposed new British taxes, so he gave a powerful speech to inspire the colonists.
Quill Feedback:
That’s a strong sentence! “So” helps tell why Patrick Henry gave a speech.
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Why Sentence Combining?
Sentence combining is an evidence-based practice proven to help students master grammar concepts and improve their writing.
How Quill Gives Feedback
In this article, we’re going to look underneath the hood at how Quill generates this immediate, targeted feedback for students.
Best Practices: How to support students during independent-practice activities
By engaging with students while they practice their writing skills, teachers can provide the impactful intervention that students need to become the best writers they can be.
Best Practices: Use Quill to support students with IEPs
Read about Quill's best practice recommendations for using Quill with students with IEPs.
"Quill has been a wonderful tool for my third graders, many of whom are second language learners. We especially love the immediate feedback provided after each practice; it has definitely made us pay closer attention to detail. Quill has greatly contributed to our growth mindsets this year!"
Laura Marshall, Caswell Elementary School