Module 7 · Advanced Grammar & Spiral R&UoE · Lesson 27

Nominalisation & Cohesion

Density and flow in long texts

CEFR C245–60 minNominalisation & cohesionCore

Teacher Notes

Warm-up · Section 1

4 min

Get talking

reflection

Dense or dead?

'The implementation of the policy resulted in a reduction in absence.' vs 'When we brought the policy in, absence went down.' Which is denser? Which is clearer? When does each one serve you better?

discussion

Cohesion without density

'First, we changed the policy. Then, absence went down. After that, productivity improved. Finally, the team was happier.' Why does this READ AS WEAK even though it's grammatically fine?

activity

The link goes both ways

Take a 4-sentence paragraph. Highlight the LAST noun of each sentence and the FIRST noun of the next. If they connect, the paragraph flows. Does yours?

Grammar focus · Section 2

8 min

Nominalisation paired with cohesion

Quick rule

NOMINALISATION turns a verb or adjective into a noun: 'we implemented' → 'the implementation'; 'absence fell' → 'a fall in absence'; 'employees were happy' → 'employee satisfaction'. It packs more information per clause and is the default register for Reports and Proposals. COHESION is the explicit linking that keeps dense prose readable: (1) RECYCLED-NOUN cohesion ('this fall', 'such an outcome'), (2) LOGICAL CONNECTORS ('consequently', 'in turn', 'by contrast'), (3) END-FOCUS chaining — the new information in sentence A becomes the GIVEN at the start of sentence B. The C1 move is using density and cohesion TOGETHER. Dense without cohesion = opaque. Cohesive without density = primary-school.

Examples

✓

Verb-heavy: 'We changed the policy. As a result, absence went down. This let us reinvest the saved budget.'

✓

Nominalised + cohesive: 'The policy change produced a sustained fall in absence rates. This fall, in turn, freed up budget for reinvestment.'

✓

Recycled-noun cohesion: 'The proposal carries significant up-front cost. THIS COST, however, is recovered within two years.'

✓

End-focus chaining: 'The redesign improved week-1 retention. Week-1 retention, in turn, drove month-3 referrals.'

Quick check

Question 1.Best nominalised cohesive rewrite of 'We changed the policy and absence went down':

Question 2.Which sentence has correct RECYCLED-NOUN COHESION?

Question 3.What is END-FOCUS chaining?

Question 4.Why is DENSE-WITHOUT-COHESION weak prose?

Question 5.In Reading P7 (Gapped Text), the WRONG paragraph usually fails on:

Answer all items, then check.

Vocabulary · Section 3

6 min

Words & phrases to own

in turn

consequence connector — A leads to B, B leads to C

e.g. The fall in absence freed up budget. This, in turn, enabled reinvestment.

Use it now

Build a 2-sentence chain with 'in turn' on a real cause-effect from work.

↻ Recycled in writing

by contrast

contrastive connector, mid-paragraph

e.g. The pilot region exceeded targets. The control region, by contrast, lagged.

Use it now

Use 'by contrast' to introduce a counter-example without losing flow.

↻ Recycled in writing

this/such + recycled noun

cohesion device — 'this fall', 'such an outcome'

e.g. The team adopted the new tool. This adoption was faster than expected.

Use it now

Rewrite a paragraph swapping 'it' for 'this + recycled noun' twice.

↻ Recycled in writing

to translate into

consequence verb in nominalised prose

e.g. The reduced workload translated into a measurable drop in errors.

Use it now

Use 'translates into' to link a change to its consequence.

↻ Recycled in writing

underpinning

the structural reason behind a result

e.g. The underpinning factor was process simplification, not headcount.

Use it now

Use 'underpinning' to name the cause beneath a visible result.

↻ Recycled in writing

to give rise to

formal causal connector

e.g. The merger gave rise to a sharp increase in cross-team requests.

Use it now

Use 'gave rise to' in place of 'caused' in a report sentence.

↻ Recycled in writing

Activate the language

Pair / group discussion

Which of today's cohesive devices do you UNDER-USE — and which do you OVER-USE (e.g. 'firstly… secondly…')?
When does nominalised prose feel ALIENATING in your first language, and how does that translate to English?

Complete each stem about yourself

The change produced ______. This ______, in turn, ______.…
The pilot exceeded targets. The control, by contrast, ______.…
The underpinning factor was ______ , not ______.…
The merger gave rise to ______.…

Rank & justify

Rank by how often they appear in strong P2 Reports.

in turn
by contrast
such + noun
firstly/secondly
to translate into

Quick write (60 seconds)

Take this sentence: 'The deadline moved and the team had to re-plan and morale dropped.' Rewrite as ONE densely nominalised, cohesive sentence ≤ 25 words.

Pronunciation · Section 4

3 min

Reading nominalised prose aloud — chunking

Nominalised prose is read in LONGER CHUNKS than verb-heavy prose. The cohesive devices are the breath points: 'This fall ↘ , in turn ↘ , freed up budget ↘ .' Stress falls on the recycled-noun phrase ('this FALL') and on the cohesive connector ('in TURN'). Read aloud at moderate pace; rushing makes dense prose sound opaque, slowing makes it sound pompous. Practise the same 30-word sentence at three speeds — find the one that lands the meaning.

The POLicy CHANGE ↘ proDUCED ↘ a susTAINED FALL ↘ in ABsence RATES ↘.
THIS FALL ↘ , in TURN ↘ , FREED up BUDget ↘ for re-inVESTment ↘.
The PIlot reGION ↘ exCEEDed TARgets ↘. The CONtrol reGION ↘ , by CONtrast ↘ , LAGGED ↘.
The unDERPINning FACtor ↘ was PROcess SIMpli-fi-CAtion ↘ , NOT HEAD-count ↘.

Reading · Section 5

8 min

Reading P7 spiral — a gapped report (cohesion drives the gap)

Mock CPE Reading P7 · Gapped Text · cohesion focus

Reading P7 spiral — a gapped report (cohesion drives the gap)

A passage from a workplace report with ONE paragraph removed. Choose the right paragraph from three candidates — by cohesion, not by topic alone.

Annotated for cohesive ties · Pre-reading

PASSAGE (with gap marked [G]):

The four-day-week trial across the firm's three regional offices delivered a clear, replicable result. Across all three sites, week-1 absence fell by 14% and self-reported focus rose by 11 points on the internal index.

[G]

This pattern — short-term gains stabilising into durable change — is consistent with three earlier studies in the same sector, and gives the steering committee a defensible basis on which to recommend wider adoption.

CANDIDATE A. Monday-morning coffee consumption also fell, with the staff café reporting a 22% drop in espresso sales. Several baristas were redeployed to the lunchtime rush.

CANDIDATE B. The gains, however, were not uniform. The smallest office showed the strongest effect; the largest, by contrast, lagged on focus while matching on absence. What appears to underpin the difference is team size: smaller teams converted the policy into change faster. By month three, this gap had narrowed — a sign that the policy effect builds rather than fades.

CANDIDATE C. Four-day weeks have been trialled in many countries, with varying results. Some studies report strong gains; others report none. The literature is mixed.

Question 1.Which candidate fits the gap?

Question 2.What's the strongest cohesive tie pointing to Candidate B?

Question 3.Why does Candidate A fail?

Question 4.Why does Candidate C fail?

Question 5.The 'this pattern' phrase after the gap is an example of:

Answer all items, then check.

Listening · Section 6

8 min

Listening — an oral 'executive summary'

Notes

Pre-listen brief — nominalised speech

▸Listen for: where the speaker NOMINALISES instead of using verbs.
▸Note the COHESIVE connectors ('this', 'in turn', 'by contrast').
▸Decide: is the speech dense AND cohesive, or just dense?

Listening audio

Tap play to listen. Scrub the bar or use ± 5 s to jump.

Show transcript

Chair (English, m):Give us a thirty-second summary on the trial.

Aisha (Egyptian, f, operations lead):The four-day-week trial produced a sustained 14% reduction in week-1 absence and an 11-point rise in self-reported focus. This reduction translated into a measurable drop in shift-cover spend — roughly 9% across the quarter. The gains, by contrast, were not uniform: the smallest office showed the strongest effect, while the largest lagged on focus. The underpinning factor appears to be team size, and that gap narrowed by month three. This pattern — short-term gains stabilising into durable change — is what gives the steering committee a defensible basis to recommend wider adoption.

Question 1.Aisha's opening 'a sustained 14% reduction in week-1 absence' is:

Question 2.'This reduction translated into a measurable drop in shift-cover spend' shows:

Question 3.'The gains, by contrast, were not uniform' does what?

Question 4.'The underpinning factor appears to be team size' is best described as:

Question 5.The closing 'This pattern — short-term gains stabilising into durable change' is:

Answer all items, then check.

Visual stimulus · Section 7

3 min

Density/flow trade-off

Density without cohesion is opaque; cohesion without density is thin. The C1 sweet-spot lives in the upper-right.

Notes

Density vs flow — where do you sit?

▸HIGH density · LOW cohesion → opaque, alienating prose; reader gives up.
▸LOW density · HIGH cohesion → primary-school prose; many short sentences, little information per clause.
▸LOW density · LOW cohesion → choppy and weak.
▸HIGH density · HIGH cohesion → C1 target — Reports, Proposals, formal Reviews.
▸Diagnostic: count nominalisations per sentence (target 1.5–2) and cohesive devices per paragraph (target 2–3).

Discuss in pairs

Take a paragraph you've written. Mark every nominalisation in BLUE and every cohesive device in GREEN. Where is the imbalance?

Exam skills · Section 8

3 min

Writing P2 — Report

Strategy

1.Headed sections (Findings · Analysis · Recommendations) — Reports are SCANNED, not read.
2.Each section opens with a NOMINALISED topic sentence ('The trial produced…' not 'We did a trial that…').
3.At least one cohesive 'this + recycled noun' per section.
4.End-focus chain within each section — last noun of sentence A re-appears at the start of sentence B.
5.Recommendations are MODAL-CALIBRATED (L26) — 'it is likely to' / 'we would recommend' — not certain.
6.Keep one short, sharp sentence per section to break the density and signal a key point.

Example

Sample opener: 'The four-day-week trial across the firm's three regional offices delivered a clear, replicable result. THIS RESULT — a sustained 14% reduction in week-1 absence — translated into a measurable drop in shift-cover spend. The gains, by contrast, were not uniform: team size appears to be the underpinning factor.'

Practice · Section 9

7 min

Fill in the blank

Question 1.The reduction in absence, ____ turn, freed up budget for reinvestment.

Question 2.The pilot region exceeded targets. The control region, by ____ , lagged.

Question 3.The merger ____ rise to a sharp increase in cross-team requests.

Question 4.The reduced workload ____ into a measurable drop in errors.

Question 5.The ____ factor was process simplification, not headcount.

Question 6.This pattern — short-term gains ____ into durable change — supports wider adoption.

Answer all items, then check.

Writing · Section 10

4 min

Put it in writing

Your task

Plan and draft a 120-word nominalised, cohesive paragraph on a workplace trial of your choice. Density target: 1.5–2 nominalisations per sentence; cohesion target: at least TWO cohesive devices from today's bank, including ONE recycled-noun reference.

• 120 words ± 10.
• Open with a nominalised topic sentence.
• Include at least ONE 'this + recycled noun' link.
• Include at least ONE consequence connector ('in turn' / 'translated into' / 'gave rise to').
• End with a calibrated claim (L26 calibration).

Before you submit

☐ Nominalised topic sentence at the open.
☐ At least one recycled-noun link.
☐ At least one consequence connector.
☐ End-focus chain visible across at least two sentence boundaries.
☐ Closing sentence at calibrated certainty (not over-claimed).

Show model answer

The four-day-week trial across the firm's three regional offices delivered a sustained 14% reduction in week-1 absence and an 11-point rise in self-reported focus. This reduction translated into a measurable drop in shift-cover spend — roughly 9% across the quarter. The gains, by contrast, were not uniform: the smallest office showed the strongest effect, while the largest lagged on focus until month three. What appears to underpin the difference is team size; smaller teams converted the policy into change faster. On the balance of the available evidence, the trial is highly likely to support wider adoption, subject to a phased rollout in the larger offices. (118 words)

Speaking · Section 11

6 min

Make it a real conversation

Speaking — paraphrase the dense version aloud (6 minutes). Partner reads a densely nominalised paragraph aloud. You paraphrase it in VERB-HEAVY conversational English — without losing any information. Then swap. The C1 test: can you HEAR the cohesive ties and rebuild them in informal prose?

After each paraphrase, partner names ONE missing piece (or 'complete').

Did the spoken paraphrase preserve all the COHESIVE LINKS of the written original?

Complete

Every nominalisation unpacked AND every cohesive link rebuilt. C2 reading-aloud comprehension.

Information loss

One or more nominalisations were skipped — slow down and unpack.

Link loss

Information was preserved but the logical links between were lost — rebuild the 'so', 'whereas', 'because'.

Paraphrase went too casual — informal is fine, but logic should still be visible.

Useful phrases

So basically, what happened was ______.
And THAT then led to ______.
Whereas in the other group, ______.
And the reason underneath it all is ______.
Which means, looking forward, ______.

Optional · Teacher-led

Teacher Activities

Stretches if time allows. ~18 min total

Homework · Section 12

Take-home

Take it home

writing

Write the full 220–260 word P2 Report on a workplace trial (real or modelled). Use headed sections, nominalised topic sentences, at least three cohesive devices, and a calibrated recommendation.

vocab

Build a personal cohesive-device bank: 5 consequence connectors, 5 contrastive connectors, 5 recycled-noun frames ('this + ___'). Memorise four of each.

reading

Find a Gapped-Text mock (provided in Teacher Mode). Time yourself at 12 minutes for 6 gaps. After marking, write one line per gap on WHICH cohesive tie chose the answer.

speaking

Record yourself reading your 120-word paragraph aloud at moderate pace. Listen back: do the cohesive devices fall at natural breath points? Re-record any sentence where they don't.

Recap · Section 13

Wrap-up

What you've learned

Nominalisation = density; cohesion = flow. Strong C1 prose pairs both.
Recycled-noun cohesion ('this + summary noun') is the most powerful link in formal writing.
End-focus chaining: new information of sentence A becomes the given information of sentence B.
In Reading P7, cohesive ties choose the gap — not topic match.
Reports use nominalised topic sentences, headed sections, and calibrated recommendations.

Lesson complete

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