Recently, linguists and professionals in education have shifted away from viewing grammar through a traditional lens and have focused their attention more on the functional use of grammar. Functional grammar does not view language as simply a set of rules; instead, it focuses on the way language is put together so that meaning is communicated for a specific purpose. It is concerned with how the various bits of language in a text work together to fit varying ranges of cultural and social contexts. Unlike the prescriptive, traditional approach, functional grammar is a meaning-based, descriptive approach. Functional Grammar purposes to explore the wide range of relevant choices available to the writer which can be used to convey specific meanings. …show more content…
It helps students to deconstruct meanings in texts, helps them to improve their writing skills, and strengthens their vocabulary, language, and critical thinking skills. Classrooms in the United States are becoming more and more multilingual. Approximately 5,119,561 of the students enrolled in U.S. public schools are classified as being English Language Learners (ELL) (Achugar 9). These students have greater difficulties with reading, writing, and language in particular, and often feel overwhelmed and frustrated when given a complex test or writing assignment. Functional grammar is beneficial for these students because it gives them a framework for understanding the purposes of all of the linguistic rules and elements they are faced …show more content…
However, conducting literary analysis using the Functional Grammar approach provides these students with a toolkit of steps that they can use to analyze the text in a systematic way. For example, if the students are studying Harry Potter, the teacher can guide the analysis by asking the students to search for ways that the language used by Harry and Hermoine differ. They can then discuss what the differences say about the characters? Or the students can be asked to explore the relationship between the student and teacher in The Giver. This becomes almost like a treasure hunt for the students as they look systematically for evidence in the text. Furthermore, when giving students specific details to look for, being given a smaller more concrete task prevents them from being overwhelmed with the whole
Further development and more greatly impact on my linguistics knowledge has occurred during pursuing my master’s degree in linguistics at the University of Florida. I intensively studied linguistics and explored its fields in-depth. The core courses in that program were Phonology, Morphology and Syntax. Moreover, I enrolled in theoretical and applied linguistics courses, which familiarized me with advanced materials and essential experiences in conducting original research. In applied linguistics, I studied Second Language Acquisition and Sociolinguistics and applied English Grammar. In theoretical linguistics, I took two advanced courses in syntax to investigate core areas of researc...
These rules of language were stressed among students, with the hope that a solid grasp of abstract definitions would set them up with the tools needed to avoid errors in usage. But halfway through the 20th Century, research on the value of grammar education began to surface and there was no strong correlation between the teaching of grammar and a student’s ability to avoid usage errors, the once strict education structure was dropped. With traditional techniques abandoned, the vacuum was filled by new approaches. Structural linguistics, based around the importance of the way words form sentences, began to take the place of its predecessor but was then quickly challenged by transformational grammar, a more abstract concept than the prior two. With arguments from the structural and transformational side both pushing that the other was unscientific, the importance of grammar was abandoned. Though schools are beginning to reintroduce grammar in education, it has kept a firm separation between learning grammar and learning
Muncie, J. (2002). Finding a place for grammar in EFL composition classes. ELT Journal, 56(2),180-86. doi:10.1093/elt/56.2.180
In the article, “Current Developments in Research on the Teaching of Grammar” by Hossein Nassaji and Sandra Fotos two main issues had been discussed. The first one is whether grammar teaching make any differences to language learning where the questions raised are whether grammar should be taught or not. The second issue is what kinds of grammar teaching have been suggested to facilitate second language learning. If grammar should be taught, how much and should it be implicit or explicit grammar teaching? Lastly, the article discussed on the current approaches to grammar teaching in which formal instruction can be integrated with communicative activities which are processing instruction, interactional feedback, textual enhancement, task-based
Myers, discusses the purposes of this article by saying, "I want to show (…) that it is indeed the "linguistic" component (vocabulary and syntax) that ESL students as much or more than what is considered the "writing" (rhetorical0 component that ESL need most, and that their "errors" are persistent evidence of normal second-language learning and processing" (Myers 52). Myers believes that tutors should be cultural informants, similarly to "Guilt-Free Tutoring." She believes that being a cultural informant is more than just the structure of a society, but also the "way that a language determines, subordinates, complements, coordinates, pluralizes, counts, modalizes, interrogates, and lexicalizes"(Myers 55). She goes on to say that “writing tutors need to acknowledge and respond to the central role of lexis in language learning” (Myers 65). From reading the article, Myers opinion seems to be that tutors need to realize that ESL/EFL students are not on the same level of writing as native speakers especially when it comes to the lexical part of the English language so they need to be taught in a different way. Some tutors might think of her teaching method as unethical, but this only so with native speakers who knows the language better than ESL
In the article, “Shifting Perspectives about Grammar: Changing What and How We Teach” by Dean, the reader is presented with additional examples of stylistic rules versus actual rules based in grammar.
Freeman, D. E. & Freeman, Y. S. (2004). Essential linguistics: what you need to know to teach reading, ESL, spelling, phonics and grammar. Portsmouth: Heinemann
Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., Svartvik, J. (1985) A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, Essex: Longman Ltd.
Grammar teaching has an irreplaceable place in English language teaching because of the fact that without teaching grammar learners cannot learn the system of English language; they may not achieve to express their intentions or meaning of the messages in a well-established communicative activity. It has been seen that throughout the history, the attention of grammar teaching has differed from time to time. In the beginnings of the twentieth century, grammar teaching was considered so essential that other aspects of language were ignored as it was thought that it was necessary to know the grammatical rules in order to communicate appropriately.
The place of grammar has beenalso a matter of debatealong the history of second language teaching. Thornburry(2001) believes that grammar debate is the most important issue that has taken the effort and time of the linguists and practitioners.Many attitudes have been revealed within this debate. Some argues that grammar is a main item in teaching English language. This attitude is shown in the Grammar Translation Method. However, some linguists assume that learners of English shouldn't learn grammar. And this attitude is shown in Natural Approach and the Communicative Language Teaching.
For teachers, this allows them to evaluate the student’s work. The nice part of the Glossing process is that grammar instruction is individualized. The teacher can assist students individually while others fill out their “Glossing Sheets.” This process also allows the teacher, depending on the grade, to steer the process based on what they are teaching their students. For instance, Johansen and Shaw explain how a freshman teacher may highlight fragments and run-ons in their students’ papers while a senior teacher might highlight parallelism (98). However, to keep students from feeling overwhelmed by the amount of grammar rules, a list of twenty most difficult grammar rules for students in 9th to 12th grade was created, English Conventions Rule Sheet. Based upon this list, the teachers would go through the student’s compositions and highlight the rules that were violated. Johansen and Shaw conclude the article with the results of their research which consisted of students understanding the Glossing process, a better understanding of the grammar rules, or finding the process tedious yet
A large part of an English teacher’s job deals with helping students find their own voices amidst the many teachings of their parents and peers. A student’s voice can be their values, their interests, and their perspectives of the world in which they live. Their voice can be their critical questioning of the many situations they face, whether in a text, the school cafeteria, or a park after school. It is the job of an English teacher to aid in finding this voice through their writing. It is by putting words and thoughts down on paper that a student can sometimes feel comfortable enough to take risks and find their true voices. Although traditional grammar instruction has long been thought to improve this skill, this is no longer the case. Instead, by providing a classroom environment in which students are immersed in classic literature from many genres including poetry, short stories, and novels, students will learn how to harness grammar for their own purposes of finding their voice in their writing.
When grammar is put to use in a society, people will often have different beliefs at what is the "right" or "proper" usage. This had led to the formation of two widely accepted forms of grammar, Prescriptivism and Descriptivism. These forms will often separate those who believe their form of grammar is the only correct way from those who use many forms they find to be acceptable. Descriptive grammar is formed by analyzing how speakers use a language, and deducing the rules they follow. Linguists create descriptive grammars in order to understand language more deeply. They understand that a single language can have multiple dialects, and that each dialect will have its own grammatical rules--internally
The aim of a theory of language is to describe a speaker's linguistic competence. (Class notes) In order for a grammar to be satisfactory it must satisfy two main conditions: descriptive adequacy and explanatory adequacy. A grammar that satisfies descriptive adequacy "describes the grammatical sentences of a language in such a way as to uncover deeper principles and rules, which capture in a more satisfactory way the intuitions of the native speaker. A grammar which is formulated in accordance with the principles and conventions of a general i.e., universal linguistic theory with explanatory power is said to meet with explanatory adequacy." (Class notes)
Systemic Functional Grammar looks at language in terms of form and meaning but pays very close attention to the linguistic level at which the analysis takes place. It then integrates subanalyses into a semiotic system. Readers and addressees need to be reassured that they are following the development of the text. Many texts are signposted by placing elements from the Rheme of one clause into the Theme of the next, or by repeating meanings from the Theme of one clause in the Theme of subsequent clauses.