Page 9 - HOW TO TEACH GRAMMAR

WHY TEACH GRAMMAR?

In 1622 a certain Joseph Webbe, schoolmaster and textbook writer wrote: “No grammar can run
speedily to the mark of language that is shackled …with grammar precepts.” He maintained that
grammar could be picked up through simply communicating: “By exercise or reading, writing, and
speaking… all things belonging to Grammar, will without labor, and whether we will or no, thrust
themselves upon us.”

Differences in attitude to the role of grammar underpin differences between methods, between
teachers, and between learners. Here, for example, are a number of resent statements on the subject:
“There is no doubt that a knowledge – implicit or explicit – of grammatical rules is essential for the
mastery of a language.” (Penny Ur, a teacher trainer, and an author of “Grammar Practice Activities)

“The effects of grammar teaching … appear to be Peripherical and fragile.” (Stephen Krashen, an
influential, if controversial, applied linguist)
“A sound knowledge of grammar is essential if pupils are going to use English creatively” (Tom
Hutchinson, a course-book writer)

“Grammar is not very important: The majority of languages have very complex grammar. English has
little grammar and consequently it is not very important to understand it.” (From the publicity of a London
language school)

What Is Your Most Compelling Reason for Teaching Grammar?

Amy Benjamin
Hendrick Hudson High School

Montrose, New York
President, NCTE Assembly on the Teaching of English

Grammar

mrsbenj@aol.com
I teach grammar for two reasons. The first is that grammar instruction gives students metalanguage,
“language about language.” Having this, students can learn a great deal more about how to
communicate clearly than they can without it. The second reason is that students are interested in
language— its changes and variations—and they feel gratified to learn how it works and what it can
do. Whether I am teaching Shakespeare or contemporary literature, oratory or poetry, writing as a
means to learn or writing through process, the effort that I’ve put into teaching grammar pays off. But
aside from its utilitarian purpose, grammar instruction is fun. Everyone seems interested in language
on some level. As John Crow of Florida Southern College points out, properly structured grammar
instruction is highly brain-compatible because the brain is a pattern-seeing device and grammar is a
patterned system (email message to the author 5 Jan. 2006). If we go with the natural ability of the
human brain to make meaning through patterns, we can easily teach grammar and have it be
something that delights students because of how much of the system they come to us already knowing.

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