Job Discussion Forums

[matttheboy]

http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,5500,1393206,00.html

Apparently teaching kids basic grammar does not increase writing ability.

What do you think? Personally i think that grammar should be taught from an early age. I believe that not learning grammar is like (horrible cliche coming up) building a house without the foundations.

I have also found it a lot easier to learn Spanish after teaching English for a while because i now understand what grammar means. i.e When i started teaching myself Spanish my grammar book said things like:

'the perfect tense is used for blah blah blah'

'adjectives should agree with the noun'

The more i understand English grammar the easier i find it to understand foreign language grammar.

If learning English grammar helps English people with a foreign language later in life then so much the better i reckon.

[moonraven]

The central point of the article is:

"The study undertaken by researchers at the University of York found that teaching children old-fashioned grammar was not as helpful as teaching them skills such as how to combine short sentences into longer ones."

The article doesn't explain what is meant by "old-fashioned" grammar--which leaves at least this poster somewhat asea.

However, since writing is precisely the development of coherent sentences which reflect fluidity of ideas, I believe harping on grammar is not the key factor in the process.

That doesn't mean that grammar should not be taught. I always stress to students that since the purpose of language is communication, it's necessary to conjugate verbs. If the person you are speaking with can't tell whether the event you are describing took place last month, is taking place right now, or will take place next week--you haven't communicated.

The writer of the article would have been prudent to have titled it using "properly", rather than "proper"--that would have made it more credible.

[Twisting in the Wind]

This is an argument that makes the rounds every few years in ESL Classrooms and teaching colleges that offer MA TESOLs.

Should we or shouldn't we re grammar?

I've taught at schools where each idea was espoused and practiced. I've also been around long enuf to see it come full circle in the ESL world.

I remember when I took hs Spanish. It was a heavily grammar-based approach. If I hadn't had that grammar, I would've had nowhere to "hook on" my later Spanish vocab that I learned when I was in Latin America. If I had not spent hrs conjugating verbs and knew what stem-changing verbs were, I couldn't have put any new verbs in the right categories when I learnt them.

So, I'm a big advocate of grammar in the ESL Classrom, with somess. Others don't seem to learn well with it (Hispanic ss don't seem to like it or want it, so I play it down with them) Asian ss really like it and ask for it.Generally, ss from more literate societies will want more grammar.I try to walk a middle road of doing maybe 30 min a day of a book like GrammarWorks or Betty Azar's book (s).

"Embedded" grammar was a buzzword for awhile. I taught for years from a text that gave the ss grammar, but "hid" it in the lesson, and the ss were supposed to just pick it up by osmosis. And the teachers were supposed to be cheerleaders for this approach. Well, it didn't work that well, IMO> The grammar was so embedded in many lessons that the ss couldn't find it. Their teacher (me) couldn't even find it half the time.

Presumably ss are supposed to be learning English as naturally as they did their first language, and they didn't have any grammar when they originally learned their first language, so they shouldn't need any grammar now. I think that's what's behind the anti-grammar bandwagon. But it just doesn't work like that in the classroom.

[Glenski]

I found the article sadly lacking in many details. MANY!

What students were they talking about, for one. They mention 5 and 7 year-olds, but I've never heard of teaching grammar to kids that age. (I started learning about nouns and verbs when I was 11 or 12.) And, combining sentences is something you just don't expect kids that age (5-7) to be thinking about, do you? Like moonraven, what did they mean by "old-fashioned" grammar? Were they slamming old grammar, or were they using that term just to be folksy?

The study details were pretty much described as...

[matttheboy]

Yep, using 'proper' in that way is a long-standing 'joke' in British English because it's very often used by what one would term as 'lower-class' persons.

There's another article on the site that mentions teaching 6-8 year olds (i think).

This was reported by most UK 'papers today but not in much more detail than that article. I guess if you want more info the York Uni website would have it.

[SueH]

As well as ESOL I also teach beginners' Italian here in the UK at an FE college. I don't use too much technical language but still find it very frustrating when students profess not to know what a verb is.

[leeroy]

Correct me if I'm wrong - but this article is referring to formal grammar instruction for native speakers of English (albeit native children), right?

This is a nice springboard as to the debate of "What role does grammar play in our classroom" - but I don't see how many of the points in the article relate to us directly.

I don't see how native speakers at high-school level would benefit much directly from understanding the complexities of adverbial participal clauses, or looking how main and conditional clauses change their verb structures depending on time reference and degrees of "realitiy".

(Staggeringly...) this stuff gets picked up by most native children - I learnt English fluently without ever knowing explicitly what the "Past Perfect Continuous" was. Teaching writing as a skill is quite separate to knowledge of discreet grammatical forms and functions - that, I think, was the point of the article.

[thelmadatter]

This is a subject near and dear to my heart as I am a composition teacher.

Grammar and composition style are different things that overlap sometimes. One can master grammar but be unable to write "good" sentences, paragraphs and essays. The reason for this is that there is more to composition than grammar. Correct grammar is necessary, of course, but other variables such as correct punctuaton, word choice and choice of content are just as important, if not more important. Correct grammar is basic, but the writer needs to master more.

Secondly, "good" sentence, paragraph and essay structure varies from culture to culture. (One of my biggest gripes about the Spanish program I earned one of my B.A. in was that it never taught me how to write an essay or even a business letter in the style(s) accepted by those in Spanish-speaking countries. These are IMHO very essential skills!) A simple example of how what is "good" in one language is not "good" in another is connecting 2 independent clauses (sentences). Spanish allows 2 independent clauses to be connected simply with a comma. Formal English writing never allows this (run-on sentence/comma splice). The two independent clauses, if they are to be connected at all, need to be connected with a coordinating conjunction (such as "and") or sometimes with a semi-colon or better yet with a subordinating conjunction (like "because").

It has been a long-time goal of mine (I've been teaching composition to native and non-native English speakers for 7+ years now) to explain as explicitly as possible what the rules of basic English academic composition are. I wasn't taught that way; I simply wrote and rewrote things since grade school until I learned to imitate the style being taught. That's fine for those who learn little by little from grade school to college (Actually, I tested out of English composition when I entered college). However, unfortunately, most students come into English 101/102 with little to no composition ability and little time to learn it. Similarly here in Mexico, I have only 1 or 2 semesters to help my students. Therefore, I try to break down basic academic/business writing into a series of rules and guidelines, sticking with what is most traditional. While those English teachers strongly concerned with "voice" and "expression" may cringe at my M.O., but I feel that this is best for my students as most are novices at writing in the English style and most will need to write for university classes and business, not for pleasure or creativity. Besides, I feel that "creativity" is knowing how to break the rules. However, if you don't know what the rules are, you won't be able to know how to break them.

[moonraven]

The problem that I have with your MO, Thelma, is that most of your students have been in bilingual schools since kindergarten--where at least from junior high on they have written essays in English.

I know, because I taught that population group for several years in junior highs here in Mexico. Most of them wrote better in English than in Spanish, and I found no need to stifle their creativity.

[matttheboy]

Leeroy the article is indeed referring to native English speakers

As native speakers we all learn to speak english without necessarily having formal grammar lessons but how many basic grammar error's do you see in england every day.?

Foreign student's often now more about english grammar than the english and i find this quite sad. we dont' even understand our own language. and if we don't understand our own language how are we going to teach it.? or correct our students mistakes.? if they stop teaching basic grammar to todays kid's whose going to teach in the future.?

its the same in every language of course. spanish speakers regularly make basic spelling mistakes (most commonly mixing up V and B) which i would never make.

[Glenski]

[moonraven]

Those employers aren't educators, Glenski.

They are also in it to make a quick "buck".

[matttheboy]

Good point Glenski about the degrees etc. A lot of people do get into this job for a bit of a laugh but many of us don't. I only have a CELTA but always try to do my job properly and have really good references that show this. I'm sure there are thousands of other teachers out there without degrees in linguistics doing a fine job.

Also the laws of supply and demand mean that there is no possibility of all elf teachers undertaking a 3 year degree.

[moonraven]

Maybe there should be a category for para-teachers, like there is for paramedics, paralegals, etc.?

[leeroy]