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Thread: New English teachers

  1. #16
    Registered User gbrekken's Avatar
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    Perhaps teachers are not taught grammar for any number of reasons. Mastering it out of personal motivation is by far the most meaningful of available processes. Translate that to any classroom. You can't force/enforce, or even legislate/prohibit desire. There's an old saying about not being able to force a horse to drink even after leading it to the water hole, but did you ever think of salting their oats? Force feeding filet mignon to a nursing child is not appropriate, neither is expecting all students to be at the same level of readiness and cramming "proper" structures down their throats ala McChokimchild and Gradgrind. Generally speaking, understanding of grammar (be it traditional, prescriptive, transformational, descriptive, tagmemic, or any other), can be a contributing factor both in the formulation of understanding and in the accuracy and understandability of both written and oral communication. Some aphoristic descriptions of the appropriateness of teaching grammar: let their hunger be your guide; when the student is ready, the teacher appears (be ready at least).

    We (defenders of the ancient faith?) may not stop people from "aksing" their mother but we may slow the decay of any supposed standards that determine non-standard usage (includes figures of speech). You may take lack of comma as a small error or as my intentional attempt to hurry you on to what I consider the more important part of the two equal grammatical parts. I'll take Dickens, etc. over Snoop Dogg, Larry the Cable Guy etc. anyday. I hope that others in the future will be able to honestly say the same thing someday. Enjoy!

    I speak of Tom, and Jerry.

  2. #17
    Pièce de Résistance Scheherazade's Avatar
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    Papaya and Paul> Love those videos!

    GBR> How do you know whether a 10 year-old will be a teacher when he grows up? There was a generation in the UK that they were not taught *any* grammar at school and, I believe, this to be a great gap in their education. Children do not need to study grammar in detail until they decide to specialise in language related fields but they should, at least, be offered some basic knowledge so that they are not altogether oblivious.

    I agree with you that it is a teacher's personal responsibility to make sure that they are well-informed in the field they are teaching; however, when we know that there are too many members of the profession who are rather lacking, it is a good idea to re-trained them so that they are equipped enough to deliver their subjects.

    And that is exactly what is happening in the UK at the moment for which I am grateful even though it means extra work.
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  3. #18
    TobeFrank Paulclem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbrekken View Post
    Perhaps teachers are not taught grammar for any number of reasons. Mastering it out of personal motivation is by far the most meaningful of available processes. Translate that to any classroom. You can't force/enforce, or even legislate/prohibit desire. There's an old saying about not being able to force a horse to drink even after leading it to the water hole, but did you ever think of salting their oats? Force feeding filet mignon to a nursing child is not appropriate, neither is expecting all students to be at the same level of readiness and cramming "proper" structures down their throats ala McChokimchild and Gradgrind. Generally speaking, understanding of grammar (be it traditional, prescriptive, transformational, descriptive, tagmemic, or any other), can be a contributing factor both in the formulation of understanding and in the accuracy and understandability of both written and oral communication. Some aphoristic descriptions of the appropriateness of teaching grammar: let their hunger be your guide; when the student is ready, the teacher appears (be ready at least).

    We (defenders of the ancient faith?) may not stop people from "aksing" their mother but we may slow the decay of any supposed standards that determine non-standard usage (includes figures of speech). You may take lack of comma as a small error or as my intentional attempt to hurry you on to what I consider the more important part of the two equal grammatical parts. I'll take Dickens, etc. over Snoop Dogg, Larry the Cable Guy etc. anyday. I hope that others in the future will be able to honestly say the same thing someday. Enjoy!

    I speak of Tom, and Jerry.
    I was referring specifically to adults who, if they ever had any grammar teaching, have forgotten it. The other point about the adults - not of the student ilk, but those who most likely dropped out of school or learning early - is that they come not knowing how to progress in their learning. One of the tasks we have is to teach them how to learn in a more positive way than they did in school.

    As for the comma being the least important aspect of the writing, I agree, but we are overcoming years of no confidence and low self esteem in the student. They want to feel that what they are writing is correct.

  4. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rachel1965 View Post
    Hi Darklady,
    My son is doing his PGC at the moment and he had to do a paper on grammer,
    the whole class found this test extremely hard as there was stuff on it that they had never heard about before.
    Did you have to do a test like that?

    He did say that it helped him remember information that he had forgotton.

    best wishes for you pgc

    Rachel
    Thanks Rachel!

    No, we didn't have to do anything like that at all. It might be because PGDEs and PGCE are slightly different or just a difference between what various universities decide to include. I do think that's a good idea, though.


    Quote Originally Posted by Paulclem View Post
    In fact I only began to learn about grammar, and deveop an interest in it, when I was already a teacher!
    That makes me feel a bit better, at least!


    Quote Originally Posted by papayahed View Post
    Did someone say Conjunction???


    (Who didn't see that one coming??)
    Quote Originally Posted by Paulclem View Post
    Funky. I may use that in one of my lessons. Have you heard the homophone song?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3prL9EHifw0

    It raises some inter-species questions.
    I love those videos! They're brilliant.


    A general question to everyone: what elements of grammar do you think are essential to know about? I'm just wondering how much work I have to do to get up to a standard that will at least allow the kids I teach to have a good general base when it comes to grammar.
    If you'd like to talk about Blake I promise I'll keep checking this thread. http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=45098

  5. #20
    TobeFrank Paulclem's Avatar
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    Firstly - what a sentence is, subject and verb - sense - full stops and capital letters.

    A lot of the people I have taught write in sentences, but don't demarcate them with full stops. They coma splice - pop lots of commas in where they should put full stops. (Kids used to be told to put in a comma when you take a breath -which isn't helpful.)

    I teach 3 rules for commas - lists, with a small conjunction to join sentences and to demarcate a subordinate clause. There are lots of permutations for the subordinate clauses, but basic knowledge will help.

    If the kids are doing essays, then colons and semi-colons are really useful.

  6. #21
    Registered User gbrekken's Avatar
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    Not quite sure where/when general language knowledge becomes grammar. Is it once we start applying certain terms? Sentence is essential. However, I've had students in the past with whom I started with: "there are things, and there are things we say about things." to introduce the concepts of nouns and verbs. Hope all your students are more advanced when the cross the threshold of your classroom.

  7. #22
    TobeFrank Paulclem's Avatar
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    Unfortunately not. Often we have second language speakers who do well in the end, but struggle- particularly with articles.

    Also, we often start learners off with recording their spoken words, but then reinforce that spoken is different to written. Then the opportunity to start with rules comes in.

  8. #23
    Registered User gbrekken's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Paulclem View Post
    Unfortunately not. Often we have second language speakers who do well in the end, but struggle- particularly with articles.

    Also, we often start learners off with recording their spoken words, but then reinforce that spoken is different to written. Then the opportunity to start with rules comes in.
    most of my ESLers were of Hispanic descent, and articles were not a problem even worh addressing. I needed to learn that, for them, the past tense/permissive statements were not lies, but merely the custom of their language. They didn't "do" something (for whch they could lay claim/fault), but some things just happened.

    never had the opportunity to audio record their usage. too many years with over 200 per day. it's haitus time for me. stay well committed.

  9. #24
    TobeFrank Paulclem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbrekken View Post
    most of my ESLers were of Hispanic descent, and articles were not a problem even worh addressing. I needed to learn that, for them, the past tense/permissive statements were not lies, but merely the custom of their language. They didn't "do" something (for whch they could lay claim/fault), but some things just happened.

    never had the opportunity to audio record their usage. too many years with over 200 per day. it's haitus time for me. stay well committed.
    Yes, I know what you mean about the articles. There are more important parts to the language, but we are preparing the learners for jobs or course applications, work in schools or to have an input into their kid's schooling. It then becomes about getting what they know correct so that the can move on.

    We were discusing this the other week and it was sugested that as there are more English speakers on the Indian Subcontinent than in he UK, that in time we might lose articles.

  10. #25
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    I have a question and since it sort of fits into this thread I thought I'd ask here instead of starting another thread.

    I'm marking a classes work right now and there are marking guides up on the wall to help. For instance, if the pupil has made a spelling mistake then 'SP' is used; for a punctuation mistake 'P' is used and so on. I've got quite a few pupils who keep forgetting about capital letters at the beginning of sentences and I'm not sure what to mark this under. I thought probably 'punctuation' but there is a seperate one for grammar (not surprisingly its code is 'G'!). What does everyone think? Is this punctuaution or grammar or even spelling??
    If you'd like to talk about Blake I promise I'll keep checking this thread. http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=45098

  11. #26
    Pièce de Résistance Scheherazade's Avatar
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    Why not make a new code? "C" for capital letter misuse?
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  12. #27
    TobeFrank Paulclem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dark Lady View Post
    I have a question and since it sort of fits into this thread I thought I'd ask here instead of starting another thread.

    I'm marking a classes work right now and there are marking guides up on the wall to help. For instance, if the pupil has made a spelling mistake then 'SP' is used; for a punctuation mistake 'P' is used and so on. I've got quite a few pupils who keep forgetting about capital letters at the beginning of sentences and I'm not sure what to mark this under. I thought probably 'punctuation' but there is a seperate one for grammar (not surprisingly its code is 'G'!). What does everyone think? Is this punctuaution or grammar or even spelling??
    I think it comes under the definition of a sentence - beginning capital letter/ end full stop/ sense etc. So I'd call it grammar, but, as Scher has said, a specific code for a common mistake might be better.

  13. #28
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scheherazade View Post
    Why not make a new code? "C" for capital letter misuse?
    Quote Originally Posted by Paulclem View Post
    I think it comes under the definition of a sentence - beginning capital letter/ end full stop/ sense etc. So I'd call it grammar, but, as Scher has said, a specific code for a common mistake might be better.
    Thanks a lot. I hadn't even thought of making a new code! I think I'll leave it for now because I've only got another week and a half here and I don't want to try to impliment something like that just as I leave. It's definitely something to consider for my next placement, though. For now I'm classing it as punctuation just for the fact that I don't think they'd know what I meant if I said grammar.
    If you'd like to talk about Blake I promise I'll keep checking this thread. http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=45098

  14. #29
    Registered User gbrekken's Avatar
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    don't know the volume or age you're dealing with; i simply circled both types of mistakes, and upon returning student work made mention to all of such circles, referencing need for capitalization and better guesswork on spelling. love abusing capitalization here. Check out Bear, Invernezzi, and Templeton (Words their way). it won't cure the spelling mistakes, but may reduce their volume.

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    I didn't read any of the other posts, but whether you like it or not, GRAMMAR MUST BE TAUGHT. It can't be skipped just because it's borring. The key, as most contemporary pedagogy suggests, is to teach it in context. The classical methods of sentence diagraming etc. DOES NOT WORK for most students. It must taught in the context of the students' own work... their own writing. This ties neatly into the process theory as an essential part of editing and revision. But it cannot be effectively taught as an independent skill like it was for so many years. And, ideally it should be taught as an element of style, not as hard & fast rules... Remeber, grammar rules are broken all the time in authentic literature. It's teaching students how to use grammar as style and looking at why writers make certain grammatical choices and how it affects the text and the audiences reading of the text.

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