Job Discussion Forums

[gaijinalways]

I recently heard an interesting comment from spiral78 related with grammar;

[caromdweller]

I spend alot of time teaching my students grammar that I learned in Brooklyn. Instead of saying "I misplaced that" I teach them to say "Foget bout it" and instead of saying" That eggroll was quite tasty Ming" I teach them to say " That sheet was the sheet son" So as you can see grammar is quite important when educating charlie. Good luck on your grammar adventures chumsy.

[spiral78]

I was wondering if he ever considered that what students might want or consider familiar might not always be the best thing to give them.

Uh, yes, indeed I have, thank you very much.

My university teaching contexts are both in schools where active/participatory/etc learning is essentially mandatory. Traditional teaching is very rarely practiced here, and an explicit, PREPLANNED focus on grammar would never be considered appropriate. Here, we may highlight a pattern or 'rule' on an as-needed basis, to support other goals.

However, a teacher who is consistently unable to explain or answer questions from students regarding patterns they notice in the course of other work will not be successful. Further, it does happen that we encounter grammatical 'errors' typical to our learner's L1. In this particular context, two items that spring instantly to mind are progressive/present tense errors and when/if confusion. Again, grammatical awareness on the part of a teacher is useful to supporting the goals of the students.

We work to transition students from mostly traditional learning contexts to a pure PBL system. Prescriptive grammar would not fit our/their goals.

[gaijinalways]

Sorry Spiral, your earlier comment led me to a different conclusion. Saying that students like a 'grammatical' framework would lead most people to think there was more 'grammar' involved in your teaching.

[Sashadroogie]

Certainly teachers should have a certain minimum level of grammar knowledge (walking grammar book?), but you do realize that it is also okay to have students to attempt to discover the rule(s) on their own (with your help of course) or to tell a student that this will be covered in the next class (assuming this is not a common error shared by many students in the class, and thus also give yourself time to research clear examples and be able to deliver a more detailed explanation).

I also have to wonder how often you're interrupting your students to point out errors and give explanations (always a bone of contention, error correction, the whens, hows, etc). I sometimes do it, but often will note some errors to address later rather than interrupt student fluency, especially if they are more common ones shared by the class.


Ah there you go Spiral! Now you know how to handle these situations. However ever did you manage before without the benefit of this sage advice?

[scot47]

I am myswelf looking at acquiring another language (Scottish Gaelic) and I will actively search out a teacher who can teach me the same way that I learned Latin more than 50 years ago. Reactionary ?

None of this "communicative" BS for scot47 !

Well it has served me with
French
German
Arabic
and
Bulgarian

so why change now ?

[spiral78]

Sorry Spiral, your earlier comment led me to a different conclusion. Saying that students like a 'grammatical' framework would lead most people to think there was more 'grammar' involved in your teaching.

This, and the rest of your post, is a classic case for live classroom observation and feedback. It's abundantly clear that you can have no educated opinion on my teaching approaches and methods without hands-on observation.


Certainly teachers should have a certain minimum level of grammar knowledge (walking grammar book?), but you do realize that it is also okay to have students to attempt to discover the rule(s) on their own (with your help of course) or to tell a student that this will be covered in the next class (assuming this is not a common error shared by many students in the class, and thus also give yourself time to research clear examples and be able to deliver a more detailed explanation).

Gee, thanks. I write materials including text analysis. Reckon I grasp the basics, O mentor from afar.

I also have to wonder how often you're interrupting your students to point out errors and give explanations (always a bone of contention, error correction, the whens, hows, etc). I sometimes do it, but often will note some errors to address later rather than interrupt student fluency, especially if they are more common ones shared by the class.

Wonder all you like, but you certainly don't 'have to.' I can't actually remember the last time, but, again, you'll have to come see for yourself before you can give accurate advice.


I think PBL (problem-based learning) is very similar to TBL (task-based learning, which is the method I primarily use already. Interesting that you work to get students to a pure PBL system. For some reason I have always found that to really learn to swim, you do actually have to go in the water.

We find (who actually do the job that we do, which you seem to feel you have the skills to judge based on....nothing....) that most students need some activation of their discussion skills to participate confidently and effectively in PBL classrooms. TBL is a useful tool in many segments of our early courses, but there are, in fact, some significant differences in the two approaches. By the time students get to second year and beyond, we have obviously moved on to other areas of competence.

Quote:
Again, grammatical awareness on the part of a teacher is useful to supporting the goals of the students.


Which usually are?

In Japan, it might be for future travel, possibly work, but more commonly to get credits. Motivated students are around, but the real work is getting the other ones to hang in there

Ours go into international workplaces and government jobs. They actually use English professionally in almost all cases later on. They get zero credits for learning English - in fact, the lowest levels we work with are CEF B2/Upper Intermediate/CBL 8. They do not come to us to learn English, but to learn to use it at high levels.

Overall, gaijin, it comes across as very presumptuous of you to question my classroom methods and offer specific advice (and the items you pick on are pretty low-level: I have an MA TESL/TEFL and 12+ years of experience in both teaching and teacher training - along with other items I'm not going to bother to list, but hopefully you get the overall message)

when you have zero experience in my specific
1. region
2. university setting
3. range of courses
4. students

[gaijinalways]

Spiral,

I was just wondering, if you had given more specifics earlier, I probably wouldn't have had to assume or guess nor ask questions that you felt were intrusive.

I personally feel there isn't that much difference between TBL and PBL, but of course if you disagree, that's fine. I'm still surprised that you would refer to you curriculum as grammar based, which would be highly unusual for anything approaching PBL.

[johnslat]

Dear gaijinalways,

"Actually if you reread my post, I didn't specifically offer anything as advice, but rather told you what I do and asked about your approach to dealing with the same matters. Interesting that you would refer to error correction and how you deal with grammar related content as 'low level' matters, though."

I'd say that this is either disingenuous, or I've got some serious reading comprehension problems.

And that doesn't even include the posts' "tone."

Regards,
John

[spiral78]

Thanks, john. I'm usually pretty good at detecting tone and implication, but I'm obviously biased here. I appreciate your confirmation of my impression.

I was just wondering, if you had given more specifics earlier, I probably wouldn't have had to assume or guess nor ask questions that you felt were intrusive.

Again, you have no obligation to assume or guess or ask anything about my teaching. Pure choice on your part, and the tone of your questions indicated that the purpose was to establish a superiority that you shouldn't assume.

I personally feel there isn't that much difference between TBL and PBL, but of course if you disagree, that's fine. I'm still surprised that you would refer to you curriculum as grammar based, which would be highly unusual for anything approaching PBL.

It's not a matter of disagreement or feelings - it's a concrete difference, which those of us who work regularly with both approaches are well aware of. PBL is most often more about researching and sharing ideas and information, while TBL tasks more often end in a concrete 'product' of some kind. I can refer you to the literature, but I'll assume you are already conversant with Ellis/Willis/Nunan and etc.

Quote:
This, and the rest of your post, is a classic case for live classroom observation and feedback. It's abundantly clear that you can have no educated opinion on my teaching approaches and methods without hands-on observation.

Yes, it would be nice if we all had time to observe countless teachers or observe your teaching that you had posted on the web (assuming their were no privacy issues and your employer, the clients and your students agreed). But since obviously that isn't the case...

You are still not obliged to judge my work, nor are you or anyone else qualified to do so from abroad. Again, you've got no context whatsoever to make such judgements.

I do not question your qualifications in your own teaching context, but I expect you to desist trying to judge mine unless you're ready to come to Europe and make informed judgements. In that case, my classroom door is always open, and I can assure you you will have company: I am a teacher trainer and my students are very used to observers.

[denise]

What's going on?!? Gaijinalways, you always seemed to be very level-headed. (I could be mistaken, of course... it's been years since I've even browsed the Japan forums... my memory of the posters there is quite rusty.) In this thread and in another one--the best places to teach thread--you seem to have put an awful lot of effort into lengthy posts, some of which carry an undercurrent of personal criticism. I hope everything's OK.

d

[Sashadroogie]

Time for a grammar camp? A camp is probably needed all right, but not for grammar. A short hair-cut and a spell here would do fine: Главное Управление Исправительно-Трудовых Лагерей и колоний