Teaching Grammar: Mission Impossible?

Marion Engrand-O’Hara

Centre for Development of Academic Skills (CeDAS)

Outline

• The context

• The old Academic Grammar course

• Some trends in Grammar T. & L.

• Course content selection

• Syllabus design

• Evaluating success

The Context

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Academic English for International Students Courses

• 4 or 8 weeks, 1 or 2 hours / week

• Term time, free

• Open to all NNS on campus (UG/PG)

• Choice of 10 Courses in T1, 11 in T2

• 30 groups in total in T1, 22 in T2, max. 20 students

• Students can take up to 4 hours / week

• Moodle (VLE) support for all courses

• Mostly Management , some from Psychology, Information Security, CeDAS and visiting students, English, Media Arts,...4

Grammar for Academic Writing (Old Course)

Week Topic

1Clause patterns- includes identification of subject, verb, object, complement and adverbial elements of sentences.

2Dependent and independent clauses- includes linking two independent clauses and linking a dependent to an independent clause.

3Relative clauses- making sentences using who, which, that etc.

4Nominal clauses- making wh- and that- clauses which function as nouns.

5Adverbial clauses- includes identification and punctuation of adverbial clauses.

6Review of dependent clauses- using what we’ve learned to improve reading comprehension.- further practice of punctuation.

7Non-finite verbs- how to write phrases with –ing or to+infinitive verb forms.

8Online practice

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Grammar for Academic Writing (Old Course)

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Grammar for Academic Writing (Old Course)

• Feedback: From tutors:

A lot of grammatical terminology to teach firstNot suited to most studentsToo narrowNot easily applicable to students' own writing

  From students:

Too narrow (mostly sentence structure)

‘Boring’Not enough practice

 

• Retention rate Spring 2014: 33 %

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Some Trends in Grammar Teaching & Learning

• Student writing as a starting point: What do our students need?

• Necessity to step away from the ‘study skills’ approach (Wingate, 2006): What do students need to express their ideas in an academic context (discourse-level grammar)?

• Unclear distinction between Grammar and Vocabulary. For example in high-frequency clusters or lexical bundles (McCarthy, 2006, p.7).

• Need to teach grammar and vocabulary together: Genre analysis (Swales and Feak,2001) , corpus linguistics (Coxhead & Byrd, 2007; McCarthy, 2006) = specific lexicogrammatical features of particular types of text or discourse.

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What do students need ?

Essay Writing Framework (Wingate, 2012,p. 153) :

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Course Content Selection

Student writing feedback shows our students need:

Sentence structure (clauses), tenses/prepositions/articles

Academic style: nominalisation, information flow,

cohesive devices, functional language for

definitions, comparisons, taking a stance, etc.

Awareness of own strengths and weaknesses, independent learning skills.

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Course Content Selection

Variety of approaches in published materials :

• A focus on verbs and tenses, and nominalisation (Dudley-Evans and St John, 1998)

• Sentence-level grammar (Bailey, 2011 and many others)

• No specific grammar point, inclusion in writing course (Swales and Feak, 2001)

• Bite-size ‘language focus’ sections within an EAP course (Argent and Alexander, 2010)

Two recent publications stand out:

• Paterson, K. (2013) Oxford Grammar for EAP, Oxford: OUP

• Vicary, A. (2014) Grammar for Writing, Reading: Garnet

Benefits: They seem to achieve what research calls for: a discourse-based lexico-grammatical approach that is clearly based on the needs of the academic writer.11

Designing the Syllabus

Guiding principles:

• Only the most needed content is included (2 x 4 lessons

only)

• Readily usable content / transferrable skills

• Develop learner independence

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Course Content Selection

Activity:

1. Rank the core grammar point and function cards in order of priority

2. Make two piles: independent study vs. classroom activities

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Academic Grammar and Vocabulary Par t A Course Outline

Functions Grammar points / vocabulary covered

Unit A1

Overview Using academic style 1(being

formal, using impersonal language)

Nominalization Academic words/phrases

Unit A2

Using academic style 2 (using impersonal language)

Using the right tense

The passive Tense formation and use Tense use in academic writing Tense consistency

Unit A3

Structuring your writing at sentence level

Simple and complex sentence structure

Unit A4

Using a concordancer to improve accuracy and vocabulary range

Accuracy in writing Improving an essay

Vocabulary in context Recording vocabulary Agreements (subject/verb;

qualifier/noun…) Information flow, sentence structure Using articles and prepositions

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Academic Grammar and Vocabulary Par t B Course Outline

Functions Grammar points / vocabulary covered

Unit

B1 Overview Structuring a piece of writing

(cohesion, signposting/connectors)

Making a text ‘flow’ Signposting and using connectors

(expressing cause and effect, showing contrast, clarifying, illustrating…)

Using cohesive devices

Unit

B2 Writing definitions Using your own voice:

Expressing degrees of certainty

The structure of definitions (e.g. X is a Y which…)

Using modal verbs and adverbs Cautious and emphatic language

Unit

B3 Referring to published

literature Writing about research 1:

aims and results

Sentence types used to refer to academic sources

Reporting verbs and their use Expressing study aims Commenting on quantitative data

Unit

B4 Writing about research 2:

findings and conclusion Working independently

Summarising findings Writing a conclusion Understanding and recording vocabulary Improving your essay

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The Approach

•Compare two texts and identify features of academic style.

Developing noticing skills:

•Observe the following text, can you work out any rules about where independent markers appear in a sentence or how they are punctuated?

Learning inductively:

•Look at a student’s essay extract below. The point that s/he is trying to make is quite simple, but it does not come out clearly here. Can you work out why? (lack of signposting).

Working with authentic materials:

•In small groups, brainstorm reporting verbs you know and sort them into your own meaningful categories.

Using student-generated materials:

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The Approach

•gap-fills, grids to complete, annotated essay extract to rewrite,...

Providing plenty of practice (and

more...):

•pooling knowledge and skills (brainstorm, explain,…), negotiating meaning, etc.

Taking advantage of classroom

setting:

•Using a concordancer to check the meaning/use of a word in context•Awareness raising activities (Needs Analysis, Influence of native language)

Providing self-study resources, but also

developing independent learning skills:

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Evaluating Success

Retention rate increase (non-compulsory students):

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Autumn 2014 Spring 2015

G & V Part A 70 % (67 sts) 69 % (13 sts)

G & V Part B N/A 59 % (34 sts)

Autumn 2013 Spring 2014

Old G course 40 % (51 sts) 33 % (22 sts)

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Evaluating Success – Student Feedback

Course Total responses

Materials, Activities

Tutor explained well

Enhanced acad. Skills

Comments

Acad. Grammar & Voc. Part A, Academic Year 2014-15

9 1.0 1.11 0.78 + Interactive mode of teaching/discussions+ Grammar, e.g. articles, prepositions and sentence structure+ the feedback of the essay after checking- Optional homework exercises will be useful. I feel that I want to practice what I learn in the class.

Acad. Grammar & Voc. Part B, Academic Year 2014-15

15 1.20 1.40 0.80 + Voc (2), + Gram., + Very good material (practical approaches) and resources provided also for further studies, good teaching atmosphere, + Materials- More examples/practice/exercises would be good (5) - Better explanations, more vocabulary exercises - in relation to good scientific resources/papers

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Evaluating Success

Tutors’ comments: “This was quite popular and generally well attended. I found it

easy to adapt the materials to suit the needs of the group, and I thought there was a good balance of input and pairwork/groupwork. Most of what was studied in the lessons was very practical and easy for students to use in their written work.”

“Appropriately pitched and good range of topics, but too much in each lesson so I’ve had to be quite selective.”

 

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Implications

So...

• More practice? More online materials, including new points not mentioned in class? Effective? Useful?

• Low score on ‘enhanced academic skills.’ What are we doing wrong?

• Further address retention rate issue?

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Mission impossible?

The new course is successful to an extent, but there are still some issues to address…

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Bibliography

Bailey, S. (2011) Academic Writing, a Handbook for International Students. 3rd ed. , London: Routledge

Coxheard, A. & Byrd, P. (2007) Preparing writing teachers to teach the vocabulary and grammar of academic prose, Journal of Second Language Writing, 16, pp. 129-147

Dudley-Evans, T. and St John, M.J. (1998) Developments in ESP: a multidisciplinary approach. Cambridge: CUP

McCarthy, M. (2006) Explorations in Corpus Linguistics. Cambridge: CUP

Paterson, K. (2013) Oxford Grammar for EAP. Oxford: OUP

Swales, J. and Feak, C. (2001) Academic Writing for Graduate Students. Ann Arbor: U. for Michigan Press

Vicary, A. (2014) Grammar for Writing. Reading: Garnet

Wingate, U. (2012), ‘Argument!’ helping students understand what essay writing is about, Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 11 (2), pp. 145-154

Wingate, U. (2006), Doing away with ‘study skills,’ Teaching in Higher Education, 11 (4), pp. 457-469

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