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Date Posted: 08:48:53 11/28/04 Sun
Author: Amanda
Subject: Re: Final Paper
In reply to: Verônica 's message, "Re: Final Paper" on 06:16:42 11/28/04 Sun

Some Perspectives of Teaching Grammar in a Second/Foreign Language Curriculum


It is possible to classify grammar into two different ways: descriptive grammar and pedagogical grammar (Lewis, 1986: 7). A descriptive grammar is the one produced by linguists who classify and describe the language based on enormous number of examples (1). This kind of grammar is as difficult as a technical book to use because it contains long, complicated and accurate description of a rule. A pedagogical grammar is the one used by foreign language students. It is smaller and easier to use and contains simplified language. Instead of describing how the language is used, it tells how the language should be used, conciliating accuracy and accessibility. In this way, teachers must know pedagogical grammar enough to be able to apply it.

Lewis (Lewis, 1986: chapter 2) says that analyzing the pedagogical grammar it is possible to note that it contains three kinds of information that must be considered while teaching grammatical structures. Fact is non-generative information (2). It means that if you know one rule it will not help you to understand the others. “The information given is generally accepted by all native speakers of English”. Pattern is generative information (3). It means that once the students have acquired the pattern of some subject, it will help them to understand the whole topic. Primary Semantic Distinctions are kinds of information that are related to meaning. In this case, the emphasis will be on understanding rather than memorizing the subject.

Despite pedagogical grammar being more accessible it is not advisable to teach grammar to beginners in a second/foreign language course. The first reason why we should not teach grammar to beginners is that learners do not need grammar instruction to acquire considerable grammatical competence. Students that have many opportunities to interact in the second language are able to acquire basic word order rules without assistance. For instance, according to Rod Ellis “Students do not put the adjectives after the noun, even when this is the ordering in their first language. They are also able to acquire the English auxiliary system and, over time, use this in a target-like manner in interrogatives and negatives.”(Ellis,2002:22). A second reason for not teaching grammar to beginners is that the early stage to second language acquisition (like the early stage of first language acquisition) is naturally agrammatical. Language learners begin by learning items (words or chunks). According to Ellis “Students communicate by linking the structures into sequences that convey meaning contextually, as shown in the following examples (Ellis, 2002:23):

- me no (= I don’t have any crayons)
- dinner time you out (= It’s dinner time so you have to go out)
- me no school Monday (= I am not coming to school on Monday)

such utterances are usual in the spontaneous, communicative speech of beginners second/foreign language learners, both child and adult. It is only later that learners begin to grammaticalize their speech. According to Ellis (2002), they do this by extracting rules from the items they have learned. In this way, the early stages off language acquisitions are lexical rather (4) than grammatical.

It must be remembered that over some easy explanations to form a rule there is a problem: the “simplified rule” may be helpful just for some time. In fact the rule that has been made can bring to the students some trouble once the rule will not always be used for the exceptions that may appear. Then students can feel even discouraged once they have to “learn” (or memorize) the rule taught plus the exceptions it carries. Making rules in class in order to clear things to the learners besides taking a lot of “precious” time will not be a “universal truth” which students can make use of in exercises given. Teachers must be aware that rules and explanations are devices (5) that have a small part to play in the classroom while other methods of teaching should have a bigger part to play in the class. Certainly the most important thing would be if teachers helped their students to run the risk of guessing the rules by themselves instead of giving everything ready to them. Of course the first option demands more work and time but is what can be called of a “significative language learning” (Lewis, 1986: 19) for students in general.

(6) Finally, the ideal way of teaching/learning a second/foreign (7) language would be the use of several different approaches and strategies that really aim to challenge the learners to use their previous knowledge, instinct and above all their reasoning towards what is being proposed.

Reference:

Hinkel,E; Fotos, S.(Ed.). New perspectives of teaching grammar in second language classroom (8). Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum. 2002.
Lewis, M. The English verb: an exploration of structure and meaning(8a). Hove: LTP.1986.

Verônica, I have some suggestions to improve your final paper. First of all I would like to advice you of general issues such as the subject. You start you text stating that “teachers must know pedagogical grammar enough to be able to apply it” and it seemed to me that this is your thesis statement but later on you conclude something really different. I think that the way you change from one subject to the other - agrammatical learning process – is ok, but the conclusion has almost nothing to do with the beginning. On the conclusion you don’t relate teaching or learning with the grammar. Do you see what I mean? I guess you should think that you are writing to a person who did not read the same texts as you and do not know previously about this matter and explain and relate your ideas better. Another thing is that you might separate the paragraphs.
(8) You must underline the titles.
(6) I guess this could be a different paragraph – the conclusion.

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  • Re: Final Paper -- Aparecida's comments, 03:05:51 11/29/04 Mon
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