Grammar for Writing: The Power of Talk

Grammar for Writing: The Power of Talk Debra Myhill All art is achieved through the exercise of a craft, and every craft has its rudiments that must be taught. Fairfax and Moat (1998

Introduction: Aims of the Day • To recap on the key pedagogical principles and how they operate in practice; • To explore the Discussion element of the LEAD principles, and why it matters; • To consider what effective teacher-led discussion looks like; • To consider teaching strategies for promoting effective peer-to-peer discussion • To emphasise the importance of both teacher and student verbalisation of grammar-writing choices.

REFLECTION ON GAP TASK

Gap Task Revise and use the grammar knowledge we have addressed: nouns and noun phrases; and verbs and verb phrases. Think about where you still feel ‘wobbly’ about grammar knowledge Plan and teach at least five episodes, perhaps in the context of narrative settings and characterisation, where you use the LEAD principles to draw young writers’ attention to the link between a grammar choice and its effect in writing. Use the LEAD Planning Template to help you. Focus particularly this time on verbalising the grammar-writing link, sharing this with children, and helping them understand the effect. Bring the completed planning templates to the final CPD Day to use in discussion.

REPRISE

Guided Fantasy Just imagine…

Just write… Let your pen take your imagination for a walk!

Exploring Detail • Go back to your ‘just write’ text, and re-read it. • Look again at your descriptions, and add to them, amend them, or write down different options. Think about the detail you have provided in terms of the physical description of the character and establishing a visual image (eg clothes; other relevant objects/settings which help with characterisation (Arthurian myth). • This is still a messy, playful, exploratory piece of writing: don’t agonise over it!

Noun phrases to establish character Well-chosen noun phrases can create strong visual detail about characters: … a lady, dark-haired and beautiful, wearing a gown of wine-red; … the burial casket of a knight … her fingers, long, white and dancing, … the hood of his dark cloak, … his face, parchment-silver and etched with age

Exploring Detail • Look again at your descriptions of your Arthurian character. Refine your descriptions by making a list of noun phrases to describe your character. Keep thinking about the visual detail you want to convey. • Choose one noun phrase/image that you are pleased with, and one you are less happy with and explain your thinking to a partner.

LEAD Principles

The IMPORTANCE OF TALK

Talk for Learning • Our research shows that the quality of the talk which surrounds the attention to grammar and writing is critical. • It is where learning transfer happens. • It links to broader awareness of the importance of talk for learning across the curriculum, and the role of dialogic, exploratory talk.

Talk for Learning ‘reading and writing float on a sea of talk’ (Britton 1983:11) • National Curriculum: Spoken Language (KS1 and 2) • articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions • give well-structured descriptions, explanations and narratives for different purposes, including for expressing feelings • maintain attention and participate actively in collaborative conversations, staying on topic and initiating and responding to comments • use spoken language to develop understanding through speculating, hypothesising, imagining and exploring ideas • consider and evaluate different viewpoints, attending to and building on the contributions of others.

Talk for Writing • Talk is often used to support writing, but it is usually talk forwriting: talk to generate ideas or to rehearse ideas. • The talk we are most interested in here is (metalinguistic) talkaboutwriting which develops more specific understanding of the relationship between language choices and making meaning in writing. • Metalinguistic talk = not just using language, but talking about how language is used. • We use the term metatalk to describe this talk.

Talk about Writing • A specific kind of (meta)talk about writing with a focus on language use; • It encourages the articulation of thinking about linguistic choices; • It is a way of exploring the relationship between a writer’s authorial intention, the linguistic choices which realise that intention, and the intended effect on the reader; • It is a pedagogical tool which, through enabling and encouraging this verbalisation of choice, allows teachers to determine and extend the level of metalinguistic thinking and understanding that students have developed; • It is dialogic: it can be used ‘to teach students to think—to make knowledge’ (Resnick et al 2015) and to ‘open up discourse space for exploration and varied opinions’ (Boyd and Markarian 2015: 273).

TEACHER-LED TALK

Teacher Questioning • A lot of older research on teacher questioning distinguishes between closed questions (bad) and open questions (good) • More recent research suggests this is too simplistic and much more complex things are happening in sequences of questioning/discussion led by teachers. • What is more important is listening to what a child’s response tells you about their understanding, and shaping questions to extend and clarify from that point. • It is also important to be clear what learning the questioning is trying to achieve.

Analysing Teacher Talk • Classroom discussion is a live in-the-moment event and highly complex. It is one of the most sophisticated things that teachers do! • Analysing the strengths and weaknesses of teacher-led talk is helpful in thinking about how to strengthen classroom talk, and what to avoid. • But it is not a criticism of teachers: it is almost certainly impossible to lead a lively episode of classroom talk and not have questions or comments which could have been better.

Teaching Context • All the talk extracts were recorded in year 5 or year 6 lessons following a Scheme of Work on Arthurian legend (Merlin). • The Scheme of Work integrated attention to grammar within a broader unit on narrative writing which included work on narrative structure; creative/imaginative writing, and disruption of a linear approach to the writing process. • The written outcome was a new Arthurian legend (no more than 500 words), about a character they had created. The writing focused on the development of character and effective shaping of plot. http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/education/research/centres/centreforresearchinwriting/grammar-teacher-resources/samplelessonplansandschemes/

Grammar-Writing Links • How nouns and adjectives support visual descriptions of characters; • How noun phrases, especially with post-modification, generate descriptive detail of characters; • How verbs can establish character by showing (not telling) what characters do; • How subject verb inversion in sentences alters the emphasis in a sentence for plot effects; • How varied sentence length creates textual rhythm of the narration of an episode in a plot; • How short sentences can create emphasis or anticipation in developing a plotline.

‘What’s in my Head?’ Questions Does he want his non-finite? Why will it be better? What has the student learned about writing through this talk episode? Why is it brilliant? Teacher: ‘The mystical knight who was standing on his horse’, comma. Now you want your non-finite? Student: ‘The mystical horse swung at his enemies’ Teacher: Let’s write that down. ‘The mystical knight … (pauses while child writes). Right now. I think if we do that non-finite it will be better – ‘The mystical knight…’ Student: ‘was’ Teacher: Not the ‘was’, we want the –ing or the –ed that verb –ing or –ed verb – ‘The mystical knight…’ Student: ‘swinging at his enemies’. Teacher: Brilliant, ‘swinging’ Student: ‘at his enemies’ Teacher: ‘Ooh, ‘The mystical knight, swinging at his enemies…’

‘What’s in my Head?’ Questions What have the students learned about writing through this talk episode? Kim: Jewelled? Teacher: Yeah, jewelled? Dan? Dan: Pearl Sarah: Embroidered Teacher: Embroidered. Now, going back to what Dan said, is pearl an adjective? What is pearl? It’s a noun. So you’ve actually modified it with another noun instead of an adjective, which is fine. This is just an example of a structure you can use. Now I’m going to say, ‘the shimmering…’ What does shimmering mean? Someone put their hand up and tell me, please. Kim? Kim: Sparkling, Teacher: Sparkling, good, well done. So, ‘the shimmering necklace’. So that’s my noun, and now I want a relative clause.

Missed Opportunity What might the student be trying to say here? What do you think the teacher means? The lesson was focusing on how a well-chosen noun can do the work of a string of adjectives (eg‘a Rottweiler’, rather than ‘a fierce, brown, slobbering dog’). As a teacher, you need to be clear how you will verbalise the learning point. Teacher: Do we put loads and loads of adjectives to make a good description? Student: No. Teacher: No. Why not? … Student: Is it because like, erm, if you have too much description then it will just get boring? Teacher: Yes, it takes a bit away, doesn't it?

Missed Opportunities Student: She’s got too many ‘bigs’ Teacher: Overuse of the word ‘big’. Who can think of different words we could have instead of ‘big’? Student: Enormous. Teacher: Enormous. Student: Gigantic. Teacher: Gigantic. Student: Massive. Teacher: Massive. Student: Colossal. Teacher: Colossal. Student: Huge. Teacher: Huge. Student: Grand. Teacher: Grand. Student: Humungous. Teacher: Humungous. Student: Vast. Teacher: Vast. Student: Large. Teacher: Large. Teacher: So, whoever’s writing that was, I hope they’ve now got a few ideas for how they can level up.

Missed Opportunities Teacher: Some amazing post-modification going on there – impressive! What do these children learn from the teacher’s response? Student: ‘Rusty old casket’ Teacher: Fantastic adjectives Teacher: Yes, so which way has she post-modified that one – ‘washed in lava’ Student: Anon-finite clause Teacher: It’s just those little bits of detail that makes your writing so delicious, and so exciting. Student: ‘That is Excalibur.’ Teacher: That’s the one I was thinking of. … ‘That is Excalibur’… impact!

Your Turn! Jo is sharing two sentences in her Arthurian story draft where she thinks she has created a strong visual description with noun phrases. Jo: I’ve written two here: ‘Merlin sat there unblinkingly at the old man, he was also staring intently at Merlin’s stiff, rigid face’. And the second one is ‘Sunlight streamed through the moth-bitten curtains, and flooded the desk with almost unnatural light’. Teacher: Oh, I like that one, ‘the moth-bitten curtains’…and you’ve done what we were talking about this week, haven’t you – combining the noun and the verb to make an adjective. Oscar, can you read yours? The teacher misses an opportunity to explore Jo’s thinking about her choices, or to model (meta)talk by suggesting why the images are successful. In pairs, work out together how you might have responded to Jo.

Less effective teacher talk • ‘What’s in my head?’ questions: encourages students to play a guessing game, and to think there are right answers. What actual learning occurs in these talk episodes? • Missed opportunities to follow up on a student’s thinking; or to give a clear explanation yourself as teacher.

Checking Understanding (Closed) Does Fay understand Show not Tell? Does Andy understand inference? How would you verbalise the idea of Show, not Tell ? Teacher: Can you remember what we meant by Show not tell? Fay? Fay: Instead of saying what the character looks like, you can say like how they move … Teacher: Yes. Comparing it with something so using the correct words we can infer can't we. What do I mean by infer? We can infer what the character is like by using well-chosen words. Tell me about infer. Andy? Andy: Does it like make a picture in your head without reading the description? Teacher: It does, yes, it builds a visual, you're hinting at things, aren't you. By using those really good word choices hopefully you can get a picture in your head that infers something.

Checking Understanding (Closed) Teacher:What is the subject of the sentence? Student: The sword Teacher:Why do you think he’s chosen to do it this way round? Why has he left the shining sword – the subject - until later in the sentence?

‘Opening Up’ Questions • We've been trying to choose our words carefully, haven't we, really carefully. Why have we got to choose so carefully? • Why would we use simple sentences? • How could I make that better? • What are your reactions to what we’ve just read?

‘Opening Up’ Questions What have the students learned about writing through this talk episode? Note how Charlie knows that he doesn’t like the choice of ‘floating’ but doesn’t quite manage to express why clearly. This is important because he is making steps in his learning. Student: ‘As she slowly floated away into the mist, it was just like she vanished into nowhere.’ Teacher: What do you think, Charlie? Charlie: I think it was quite good, but I think he could have like used a better word than ‘floated’ because when it says ‘floating’, I can't really imagine how she went away. Teacher: Ok. You can't imagine her floating? Maybe?

‘Opening Up’ Questions Teacher questions which open up students’ thinking, even though not answered. Teacher: So, is it the word ‘shiver’? What is that precise vocabulary that you’re going to use? What is the punctuation that going to let you pause for effect? What is it that’s going to get you to ‘boom’ out their voice? They’re the things that you need to now think about. Is it going to be a dragon? Is it a troll? Is it a unicorn? What magical, mythical creature is your thing going to be? It’s up to you to decide but now I want you to think about how they’re going to act. If mine was a dragon, I need to think about my noun phrases – what kind of dragon? How am I going to describe my dragon?

A writer’s view: Malorie Blackman explains the choices she makes as a writer http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p011mxd6

Inviting Elaboration What have the students learned about writing through this talk episode? Teacher:What have you learned about how to use sentences to describe characters and events? Student: Don’t just use long sentences. Use short sharp sentences. Teacher: Ok so we need to use long sentences, short sharp sentences, tell me a bit more, Mark? Mark: When we watched the clip about.. she said that if you use just long sentences it’s boring and if you use short sentences its boring but if you use a mixture it’s more interesting. Teacher: Ok, so makes your writing more interesting. Student: Use long sentences for description. Teacher: Long sentences for description. Student: Don’t just keep adding short sentences … so you need to add a mixture of long sentences and short sentences. Teacher: OK? Student: Short sentences for tension. Teacher: Short sentences for tension.

Inviting Elaboration Student: And she’s wearing a gown of wine-red. Teacher: OK. Talk about that a bit more? Student: She wouldn’t wear a white dress. Teacher: Why? Student: Because if you was not evil, you would like wear yellow. Teacher: Anyone got something else to comment on Anna’s wine-red colour? Ahmed? Student: It’s like blood. Teacher: Like blood. So think carefully when it comes to yours, think about the colours of what your writing is using.

Inviting Elaboration [discussing a subject-verb inversion] Teacher: Why is that such a good sentence? Student: They’ve described it well. Teacher: Yes he has - but from the reader’s point of view, what’s just happened? Student: He’s made the reader wait. Teacher: Good, but how has he done that, what has he done? Student: He put ‘the ring of fine gold’ at the end. Not until the end of the sentence do we find out what it is.

More effective teacher talk • Checking Understanding questions: skilful use of closed questions, either at the start of a talk sequence, or part way through, to check understanding of a point in order to allow further discussion of it. • ‘Opening up’ questions: questions which invite students to think more deeply about a language choice - often questions beginning with ‘Why? ‘How?’, or ‘What do you think?’ • Inviting Elaboration questions: questions which pick up on students’ responses and ask them to give more explanation, elaboration or justification – for example, ‘Can you say a little more about that?’; ‘Tell me more…’; ‘Go on…’ or a question specific to the point being discussed eg ‘So why do you think the short sentence works well there?’ • Common to all these questions is a focus on student metalinguistic learning.

Your Turn! The learning focus for writing is to show how one way to create effective character descriptions is to provide strong visual images through the detail provided in noun phrases, and through this to ‘show, not tell’. What questions might you ask your class to check understanding of this or to open up thinking? Guinevere Sitting alone in the room was a girl – no, rather a woman – and beside her a harp. As I strained to see better, I slipped noiselessly on the wet cobbles. But so intent was she on her playing that she did not hear me and she did not look up. Her fingers plucked effortlessly. It was her fingers, long, white and dancing, that I loved first. Her hair was the colour of honey, of gold washed in milk. It fell over her face so that I could not see her. But I did not need to, for I knew already she would be perfect. From Arthur, High King of Britain by Michael Morpurgo

Some Possibilities • Why does Morpurgo add ‘- no, rather a woman –’? He could have revised this and just written ‘in the room was a woman’? • Why put the adjectives after the noun in ‘her fingers, long, white and dancing’? What effect does this have? Guinevere Sitting alone in the room was a girl – no, rather a woman – and beside her a harp. As I strained to see better, I slipped noiselessly on the wet cobbles. But so intent was she on her playing that she did not hear me and she did not look up. Her fingers plucked effortlessly. It was her fingers, long, white and dancing, that I loved first. Her hair was the colour of honey, of gold washed in milk. It fell over her face so that I could not see her. But I did not need to, for I knew already she would be perfect. From Arthur, High King of Britain by Michael Morpurgo

Deploying Grammar Teachers steer or cue students towards ‘putting in’ certain grammar features to improve their writing, but no link is made between deployment, choice and effect. T: Don’t forget, can you get a short sentence in there? * * * T: Can you put adjectives after the noun; can you put a prepositional phrase? * * * T: And think about how you could add nouns, I'd really like to see some noun phrases with post-modification, adjectives after to describe. You might have a go at adding some -ed verbs or some -ing verbs after the noun as well. * * * T: Can we add some -ing or -ed verbs into our sentence, this is thinking about what the person is doing. * * * C: The cloak resting on his tight mighty shoulders T: Yes that’s a non-finite clause – that’s like uber posh!

Deploying Grammar Before you do your final draft, you’re going to have to make sure you’ve got all our different writing checklists in your writing … so we need the 13 uses of punctuation, ok, if you haven’t can you work out which one you’re missing and can you put it in by editing your work? Can you, you all should have noun phrases, cos we spent so long doing noun phrases, and adverbial phrases, because we spent so long putting adverbial phrases in, remember, if you haven’t got a passive sentence, you need to change one to get a passive sentence in. Has anyone got any modal verbs? Right, I want you to go back through that, and I want you to put your commas in for your clauses. There are relative clauses in there that are not punctuated at the moment. It might be a time to get an exclamation mark to make it more dramatic. Obviously Michael Morpurgo knows more about it than we do, but it would be a chance to get an exclamation mark in if we were the writer.

PEER-TO-PEER TALK

Setting up effective peer talk Inviting students to • discuss what might go in a gap in the text;

The Power of Choice What do you think goes in the gap? I found him in the garage on a Sunday afternoon. It was the day after we moved into Falconer Road. The winter was ending. Mum had said we’d be moving just in time for the spring. Nobody else was there. Just me. The others were inside the house with Doctor Death, worrying about the baby. He was lying in there [in the darkness behind the tea chests, in the dust and dirt ]. It was as if he’d been there forever.

Setting up effective peer talk Inviting students to • discuss what might go in a gap in the text; • compare two different versions of a phrase, sentence, paragraph;

An Illustration Authentic text • Read this sentence aloud – where will you put the emphasis? • What possibilities are there for re-ordering this sentence? • How does this change the emphasis? Links between grammar and meaning Discussion • Read both these sentences aloud – how do they portray this moment in the plot differently? How might you film these two sentences? • What do you think is the effect of moving the adverbial ‘out of the mists’ to different places in the sentence? • What do you think is the effect of the putting the subject (a figure) after the verb (came) in the first sentence ? Examples

Setting up effective peer talk Inviting students to • discuss what might go in a gap in the text; • compare two different versions of a phrase, sentence, paragraph; • discuss different choices made by different authors on same point;

Concrete Nouns in Lists On Saturday, he ate through one piece of chocolate cake, one ice-cream cone, one pickle, one slice of Swiss cheese, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake, and one slice of watermelon. The Very Hungry Caterpillar – Eric Carle Then Mr Gumpyand the goat and the calf and the chickens and the sheep and the pig and the dog and the cat and the rabbit and the children all swam to the bank and climbed out to dry in the sun. Mr Gumpy’s Outing – John Burningham Why do you think Eric Carle chooses to use commas to separate his long list of noun phrases and John Burningham chooses to use ‘and’?

Setting up effective peer talk Inviting students to • discuss what might go in a gap in the text; • compare two different versions of a phrase, sentence, paragraph; • discuss different choices made by different authors on same point; • use card sort activities to explore different possibilities;

Grammar for Writing: The Power of Talk