Grammar and the Curriculum

Why Teach Grammar?

To expand students’ grammatical competence

To provide students with a metalanguage to discuss texts, including their own

Unlike other areas of the English curriculum, grammar is largely black and white

To support foreign language learning

Why Teach Grammar?

To develop thinking skills: metacognitive grammar is linked with concepts such as classification, causation, and time

Language is one of the most important skills we have, which makes it a valuable subject in its own right

It creates better writers?

Why Bother?

Divorced from reading and writing, it creates a fractured, disjointed approach that does not improve students’ reading or writing It’s an instant student turn-off

Many techniques used to teach grammar are artificial learning experiences (practice drills, diagramming sentences)

Why Bother?

Descriptive grammar does not provide students with a metalanguage for discussing language

Descriptive grammar makes stylistics obscure, and does not encourage revision

Most English teachers have a degree in literature, not linguistics

Teaching grammar is not a requirement of the NZC

Historical Context

The teaching of grammar can be traced back to Babylonian grammatical texts of about 2000 BC

the centrality of grammar in the school curriculum began to be questioned in England in the late 19th century

“[t]he distinction between the scientific study of a language as exhibited in its grammar and the attainment of the art of speaking the language is now generally recognised” (Adamson, 1907)

Parsing (yawn...)

Contemporary Debate

Student achievement in writing is lower than achievement in reading but no evidence to suggest that explicit teaching of grammar leads to the improvement of student writing.

Richard Andrews, et al (2004), collated research published in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, and NZ since 1900: ...the teaching of syntax . . . appears to have no influence on either the accuracy or quality of written language development for 5 to 16-year-olds. This does not mean to say that there could be no such influence. It simply means that there have been no significant studies to date that have proved such an effect. (my emphasis)

In New Zealand?

1969 = introduction of a new prescription for

English language teaching in the 6th and 7th form

brainchild of John Pride, a sociolinguist working

out of VUW, who proposed: no linguistic theory should be taught and that

linguistic terminology should be kept to a minimum there should be no direct teaching of metalanguage

and pupils should only be given terminology when they asked for it

grammar was to be taught as an aid to the description of a particular language variety and not as a content subject

In New Zealand?

Gordon (2004):

within a few years, many teachers were also expressing disquiet, because it was clear that the inductive approach to learning about grammar was not working. Some recognised that because of their own, inadequate linguistic knowledge, English language classes had become more sociological than linguistic (50).

Cf. Prerequisites for TECS366: “300-level English (focused on Drama and Literature, not Linguistics)” (UC Enrolment Handbook, 2011).

In New Zealand?

English in the NZ Curriculum (1994):

Knowledge about language is an area of intrinsic interest, worthy of attention in its own right. It is important for students’ language development. Such knowledge expressed in relevant terminology enables students to talk about texts in an informed way. (17)

Q: not whether, but how, do we teach grammar

in a way that is both meaningful and engaging?

Not Whether, But How

Most research repeats the mantra: “don't teach grammar prescriptively”; rather, teach grammar descriptively and in context.

However: [T]he context can be so interesting that the grammar learning is lost.... [E]xplicit knowledge is, by definition, more cognitively accessible for reflection and decision-making, and may therefore be a powerful enabling tool for writers. (Myhill 81-82; 89)

Specific Strategies

Sprinkle grammar in as a “do now” activity

Reserve any kind of extended, explicit instruction of grammar for higher-ability classes?

Once students have the basics, then you can start teaching them to use those basics more effectively through explicit language choices

Specific Strategies

Safety in worksheets? Use material that

interests students (songs over poems)

Ask the students to teach it

Online tools Schoolhouse Rock www.theoatmeal.com Know your students

References

Andrews, Richard. “Knowledge about Teaching of [Sentence] Grammar: The State of Play.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 4.3 (2005): 69-76.

Clark, Urszula. War Words: Language, History, and the Disciplining of English. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2001.

Gordon, Elizabeth. “Grammar in New Zealand Schools: Two Case Studies.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 4.3 (2005): 48-68.

Hudson, Richard, and John Walmsley. “The English Patient: English Grammar and Teaching in the Twentieth Century.” Journal of Linguistics 41 (2005): 593-622.

Kolln, Martha, and Craig Hancock. “The Story of English Grammar in United States Schools.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 4.3 (2005): 11-31.

Locke, Terry. “‘Grammar Wars’ – Beyond a Truce.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 4.3 (2005): 1-10.

---. “Secondary English Teachers in New Zealand: A Changing Academic Profile.” English in Aotearoa. 40 (2000): 79-83.

Myhill, Debra. “Ways of Knowing: Writing with Grammar in Mind.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 4.3 (2005): 77-96.

Norman, Phil. “Fitness or Formality, Fruitcake or Fudge? A Retrospective on Grammar in the English Curriculum.” English Drama Media (2010): 39-46.

NZ Ministry of Education. English in the New Zealand Curriculum. Wellington: Learning Media, 1994.

---. Exploring Language: A Handbook for Teachers. Wellington: Learning Media, 1996.

Trousdale, Graeme. “Knowledge About Language in the English Classroom in Scotland.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 5.1 (2006): 34-43.

Van Gelderen. “What We Know Without Knowing It: Sense and Nonsense in Respect of Linguistic Reflection for Students in Elementary and Secondary Education.” English Teaching: Practice and Critique. 5.1 (2006): 44-54.