Designing for Student Engagement and Comprehension

Arranging text to reduce distractions:

Single words or short phrases left to sit alone at the end of a paragraph are called widows. If they are left to sit alone at the beginning of a paragraph, they are called orphans. Both draw unnecessary visual attention to themselves, which can distract the reader.

As you can see in the "before" picture, the word Emily sits on a line all by itself, potentially distracting the reader; whereas in the "after" picture, Emily is no longer left dangling to distract the reader.