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Common Core ELA5th GradeLanguage

L.5.3: Expand, Combine and Reduce Sentences

Also written as CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.5.3 · Cluster: Knowledge of Language.

Scramble a Long SentenceAll 43 5th Grade ELA Standards

The Official Wording

Use knowledge of language and its conventions when writing, speaking, reading, or listening.

Common Core State Standards, Grade 5, Language · Read it at the source · Checked October 14, 2026

What L.5.3 Means in Plain English

Fifth graders reshape sentences on purpose: they add a detail to a flat one, join three choppy ones, or trim a bloated one. They also notice how characters talk, like a grandfather’s country dialect beside the narrator’s formal English, and say what it shows.

Fourth graders (L.4.3) chose precise words and punctuation for effect and told formal from informal settings. Fifth grade adds sentence combining and comparing the varieties of English in stories, dramas and poems. Sixth grade (L.6.3) varies sentence patterns and keeps style and tone consistent.

L.5.3 I Can Statements

  • I can combine short sentences without losing any facts.
  • I can expand a plain sentence or trim a wordy one.
  • I can compare how different characters in a story talk.

L.5.3 Worked Example

Four facts, two ways to write them down. The combined version keeps every fact and drops the thud.

Prompt

Combine these choppy sentences into one, keeping every fact.

Not YetThe storm hit at midnight. It was loud. It knocked out the power. The power was out until morning.Four sentences that keep restarting with the same subject, all about the same length. Every fact is there, but the rhythm thuds like a list.
Meets the StandardThe loud midnight storm knocked out the power until morning.Loud and midnight fold in as describing words, and until morning tucks onto the end. Four facts, one sentence, and the reader hears a storm instead of a list.
Moves to Use
Turn a sentence that only describes into a describing word: It was loud becomes loud storm.Merge sentences that share a subject, so the subject appears once.Tuck a time phrase like until morning onto the end.Read it aloud and check that no fact got lost.

Common Mistakes with L.5.3

Combining with and, and, and

“The storm hit at midnight and it was loud and it knocked out the power and…”

Try this: Ban “and” as the only joiner for one revision, and have students try a describing word, when, because or a comma phrase.

Thinking longer is always better

A clear eight-word sentence stretched to thirty words of adjectives

Try this: Have students read the sentence aloud and cut every word a reader would not miss, then compare the two versions.

Calling a dialect wrong

“Grandpa talks bad English in this story.”

Try this: Ask what the character’s way of speaking reveals, such as where they grew up or who they’re talking to, and compare it with the narrator’s.

Where L.5.3 Fits

Comes BeforeL.4.3Choose precise words and punctuation for effect, and tell formal settings from informal ones.
AlongsideL.5.1Use conjunctions and verb tenses correctly, the tools that do the combining.SL.5.6Switch between formal and casual speech, the same range students hear in characters’ voices.
Comes NextL.6.3Vary sentence patterns for meaning and interest, and keep style and tone consistent.

Practice L.5.3

Sentence Scramble GeneratorFree ToolScramble a combined sentence so students rebuild it and see where the describing words and the time phrase belong.Combined sentencesGrade 5
Make a Scramble

Quick Check

  1. What four facts does the strong sentence keep?
  2. Combine into one sentence: “The dog barked. The dog was small. It barked at the mail carrier.”
  3. In a story, a character says, “I reckon we ain’t got far to go now.” What might this way of talking tell the reader?

L.5.3: Other Names

L.5.3CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.5.3

Common Core State Standards © Copyright 2010. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers. All rights reserved. Official wording from the Common Core State Standards PDFs at corestandards.org, last checked October 14, 2026. The explanation, I can statements, example, mistakes and practice on this page are EMStudio’s own, written beside the official wording. They are not part of the standard.