Decomposition and pattern recognition work together. Use decomposition to break each sentence down into its different parts, and pattern recognition to uncover the similarities and differences among those parts. Look at an example of how decomposition and pattern recognition can work together. Look at the following sentences from The Game with no Instructions.
- I have two orange fish.
- I have three orange cats.
- I have two orange chairs.
- I have four orange hats.
- I have no orange zebras.
What do you notice that’s similar among these sentences? What do you notice that’s different? How do they all start? What’s the nature of the next word? And the nature of the next word after that? And the next next word? And the final word? Where does change occur, and what kind of change is it? If you were to write a template sentence, that included the common components, as well as blanks for the differences, what would it look like?