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Approaches to Teaching Grammar

Approaches to Teaching Grammar. Kristen Hawley Turner krturner@fordham.edu Created 2010. How do we help students “get it right”?. TRADITIONAL APPROACH: Grammar as a separate subject. Isolated skill work absorbing huge amounts of curricular time

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Approaches to Teaching Grammar

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  1. Approaches to Teaching Grammar Kristen Hawley Turner krturner@fordham.edu Created 2010

  2. How do we help students “get it right”?

  3. TRADITIONAL APPROACH:Grammar as a separate subject • Isolated skill work absorbing huge amounts of curricular time • Prescriptive approach (do this, don’t do that) • Emphasis on memorization, identification, and nomenclature • Minimal units of analysis: parts of speech

  4. The Research Says… Traditional grammar instruction does not transfer to writing development • Issue of transfer – mastery of nomenclature to application in writing (declarative to procedural knowledge) • Syntactic maturity hinges on the varied application of clauses and phrases. • Syntactic maturity – biggest growth in the shift from compound construction to inserted modifiers

  5. Developing Syntactic Maturity The girl dodged the car. • Opening brushstroke Jumping onto the curb, the girl dodged the car. • Inserted, or periodic, brushstroke The girl, surprised by the sudden roaring engine, dodged the car. • Strung-along brushstroke The girl dodged the car flying down the street.

  6. Grammar as Brushstrokes • “Painting” with grammatical structures • Focuses on developing style, rather than naming

  7. Teaching Grammar and Style in Context • Addresses errors and issues that occur in the students’ writing • Individual (micro-lesson) and class (mini-lesson) instruction based on these errors and issues • Tackle errors within their own writing

  8. Characteristics of a Mini-Lesson (Atwell, Calkins) • Brief, approximately 10 minutes • Include direct instruction on the nature of the error, its effect on writing, and strategies for recognizing the error • Presented to the whole class when teacher believes most students will benefit • May require follow-up mini-lessons • Require demonstration that is facilitated by technology • Most effective when part of class routine

  9. Embedding grammar instruction in context of writing • Must be strategic. Students must have opportunity to tackle errors relevant to their own writing. • Must be sequenced. Writing assignments across the school year must expand attention to particular patterns of error that are relevant to whole class. • Modification of scoring rubrics to reflect expanded attention to issues of grammar, mechanics, and style. • Record keeping that allows students and teacher to document progress.

  10. Patterns of Error • Helping students to recognize the patterns of error in their own writing (seeing the errors) • Maintaining expectation that students are responsible for recognizing and documenting their own growth and mastery • Providing a system of record keeping that is accessible and sensible to students

  11. P-rules (Comma Usage) • P1: Compound Construction • P2: Run-on • P3: Adverbial Clause

  12. Grammar Matters • Knowing “the definition of a few terms” • Experiencing “the importance of those terms, as much as possible, in the context of their reading and writing” • Applying the terms immediately to “work that matters to students and that clearly counts in the world” Smith and Wilhelm, 2007, p. 15-16

  13. Consider what you call it. • Proper Noun OR • Name

  14. Key Ideas • Correctness an important goal • Work “directed toward bringing student writing and/or speaking in line with what is called Standard American English” Smith and Wilhelm, 2007, p. 5

  15. Contrastive Analysis • Seeing language and register as different, not deficient • Identifying features and patterns of language • Code-switching from home to school discourse

  16. Features of AAVE

  17. Features of Digitalk

  18. multiple consonant • Lily: heyyyy (: • Lily: nm, chillennn; whatchu up too ? • Lily: mm, y quien ta jugandoo ?Lily: WHAAAATT A JOKEEEEE, dime como yankees lostt againstt them yesterdaii. • Lily: & the nationalsss won like only 16 games . . . one of the worst teams homieeegee. • Lily: AHA, naw gee thats easy $ for youu ! =p • Lily: lol imma talk to you later . . . i got pizzaa awaitinggg meeeee (; abbreviation multiple vowel missing cap ellipses phonetic spelling missing apostrophe combined words missing end punct

  19. Let’s share what we know.

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