HOW TO TEACH GRAMMAR – DIFFERENT METHODS:

*DEDUCTIVE APPROACH (RULE-DRIVEN)

- This method starts with the presentation of a rule and it is followed by explanation and examples

- It used to be associated with the Grammar-Translation Method, but this approach does not actually depend on translation at all, and it can be fully conducted in English

- The teacher must perform regular checks to ensure the student is following the subject in its entirety

Disadvantages:

- It might be off-putting for students that do not have enough metalanguage

- It is not suitable for children

- It might become too directive

- It does not require much student interaction

- The ease of explanation depends on how simple the rule is

Advantages:

- It saves time as it gets straight to the point - many rules can be simply and quickly explained, allowing extra practice-time

- It is interesting for students with an analytical learning style

- It respects the intelligence and maturity of the students, and it is specially suitable for adults

- It can be very effective if elucidated with contextualized examples

- It is relatively easy to explain grammar rules to students that have a prior understanding of grammar points and terms (either in English or in their mother tongue)

To ensure the effectiveness of this approach, it is necessary to make a distinction between the descriptive rule (used by a linguist), and the pedagogic rule (used by a professor). The descriptive rule is usually too complex for the classroom context, so it frequently needs adapting; the educational version must include the rule of form and the rule of use (when applicable).

According to Michael Swan, a good pedagogic rule offers the following criteria:

- Truth: even though it is usually an adaptation, it must bear resemblance to the descriptive rule

- Limitation: it should clearly delimitate the use of a given form

- Clarity: it should not be ambiguous or be described with obscure terminology

- Simplicity: it cannot be divided into too many sub-categories, and it cannot have an overwhelming amount of exceptions

- Familiarity: it should be explained through concepts that are familiar to the learner, using basic terminology

- Relevance: it should answer questions the students need answered

The rule is only one of the components of a proper deductive presentation that must have several stages: rule of form (explanation, contextualization, examples) + check + rule of use (explanation, contextualization, examples) + check + exceptions + practice + reinforcement. At the end of the process, students must be encouraged to personalise the rule using their own context. The elucidation does not have to follow this exact order, but the deductive approach does require the rules to be presented before the examples. This method allows a certain flexibility and it can be used in a number of ways (besides the traditional manner shown above): it might be explained through the use of illustrated examples, grammar worksheets or self-study grammars; it might have the students explain the rules to each other; it might be taught through the use of minimal pairs, poems, songs, etc.

*INDUCTIVE APPROACH (RULE-DISCOVERY PATH)

- Students are given examples and are not presented with any preceding rules – they must infer the norm through the acknowledgment of patterns

- This method is based on the way one’s first language is acquired (exposure to a huge amount of input, without explicit rule formulation or conscious study)

- Induction, or learning through experience, is seen as the natural manner of learning

- It is sometimes associated with the Direct Method (repetition and association) and the Natural Approach (total exposure and zero-grammar position), but they differ in relation to the organization and selection of the input, and in relation to the teachers’ intervention

- The Natural Approach is very criticized, as unfocused exposure to unorganized language data is not sufficient – that is why the Rule-discovery Path acknowledges the need of a syllabus and of a professor to conduct the classes

- The Direct Method is also highly criticized, as it promotes conditioning without understanding, through endless drilling and repetition – the posterior elicitation of the rule is forbidden, whilst it is allowed in the modern Inductive Approach

Disadvantages:

- It might take a long time for students to deduce the rule behind the examples (they could have practice-time instead)

- It is only suitable for grammar points that are simple to infer (areas like aspect and modality, for example, do not allow easy rule formulation)

- Students might hypothesise the wrong application for the rule, making it either too broad or too narrow

- If there is no overt testing of the hypotheses, the students might come up with the wrong rule altogether

Advantages:

- Rules students discover by themselves will probably fit their pre-existing mental structures better

- The fact that learners infer the rules makes them more memorable

- The mental effort required involves a greater degree of cognitive depth

- Students are more actively involved

- It favours pattern-recognition and problem-solving abilities (both of which can help with self-directed learning)

- It promotes the students’ autonomy

This method frequently utilizes the Generative Situation (also known as Situational Language Teaching) in the classroom. For that, the teacher sets up a scenario (context) in order to spawn several examples of the studied grammar point. The students then, generalise the use of the pattern through their own insight. After cycles of guided trial and error, they refine their initial hypothesis. The educator may or may not decide to elicit the formal rule. The guided discovery depends on how the data is organized, and on the quality and quantity of the data itself. With the aid of Corpora, students can seek patterns and find out about the typical co-occurrences of individual words and their suited concordance, multiplying the learning possibilities (although the benefits of learning through a Corpus are still being debated, as it can be too overwhelming for a student). This method also allows a certain flexibility, and it might make use of: physical actions (students are wholly engaged in the learning process); realia (any real object introduced in the teaching process); concordance and Corpus data; minimal pairs, songs, poems, etc.

*FUNCTIONAL-NOTIONAL APPROACH

- It analyses language through the communicative meanings learners need to express themselves and to understand speech effectively

- It makes use of a notional syllabus that works categorizing language – on the basis of quantity, location, and time – through individual functions – such as making requests, offers, apologies, etc

- The concept of language is broken down into units of analysis, in terms of the (communicative) situations in which they are used

- The Council of Europe has used it to draw syllabuses that specify what communicative functions a learner needs to know to communicate efficaciously at a given level of competence

- First level includes making requests (would you..., could you..., can you...) – in a grammatical approach, these structures would not appear before the intermediate level

This method is divided into 5 categories (levels):

- Personal: one must be able to express thoughts and feelings and to arrange ideas (ex: likes, dislikes, hunger, etc.)

- Interpersonal: speaker must have the ability to establish and maintain desirable social and working relations (ex: invitations, apologies, excuses, compliments, interruptions, etc.)

- Directive: level of skill that allows speaker to attempt to influence actions of others (ex: suggestions, warnings, forbiddance, persuasion, etc.)

- Referential: one is able to talk or report about things, actions, events or people – in the past or in the future – and to control metalanguage (ex: reported speech, paraphrase, summary, explanation, comparison, contrast, etc.)

- Imaginative: speaker is skilled to discuss elements of creativity and artistic expression (ex: discussion and analysis of poems, plays, songs, resolution of problems, creation of rhymes, poetry, stories, etc.)

This approach utilizes a functional grammar, which puts together the patterns of language and what one can do with them – explaining language in terms of how people use it to live (focused on a semantic-pragmatic-orientation).

Disadvantages:

- Deciding what should come first in order of importance (ex: complaining or apologising)

- Speaker needs a wide range of grammatical structures to manipulate even the most basic functions (ex: requests – requires learning about the usage of can, could, would)

- Deciding what to do with higher level speakers once all the functions have been seen

Advantages:

- It has changed the overall view of language teaching – to provide a clearer sense of progression, most new course books mix the functional syllabus with the focus on grammar and vocabulary - grammar + context

- Beginners can actually use what was learnt in practical situations

- Beginners feel very motivated because they can observe their own progress

HOW TO PRACTISE GRAMMAR:

The purpose of the grammar practice activities is primarily to target two main objectives: precision at applying the system, and automisation of said system. The precision is the accuracy, and the automisation is the fluency. At a given point, it is also important that students learn to reorganise what they know into more complex structures, which is called restructuring – integration of new knowledge into old.

*ACCURACY

To achieve accuracy one must devote attention to form. As attention is a limited resource, learners might have difficulty to deal with meaning and form at the same time. That implies that practice activities that focus on accuracy might be more

productive if the learners are already familiar with the meanings involved in the operation. Accuracy requires awareness and interest from the students, and it requires time. This is a process that cannot and should not be rushed. In addition, the learners must value accuracy, understanding that without it, their speech becomes unintelligible. That is why students need unambiguous honest feedback and correction of their mistakes. Also, knowing that they are being closely monitored helps them to pay more attention to form.

A practice activity that can effectively improve accuracy must have the following characteristics:

- Attention to form: it should motivate learners to focus on how they say something

- Familiarity: students must be familiar with the language they are practising (so as not to worry about meaning)

- Thinking time: students must have enough time to think and reflect

- Feedback: learners need unambiguous messages as to how accurate they are – the correction must be done in a timely manner

*FLUENCY

The ability to process language easily and speedily is a developed skill. The automisation of a language happens, partially, through the use of pre-assembled “chunks” of speech (the “blocks” can be picked up as single units). Too much attention to form may jeopardise the fluency, which is why practice that aims to develop the latter needs to divert attention from the accuracy, focusing on the meaning. One way to do that is through information gap tasks, which produce language based on communicative purposes. By focusing on that, the students deal with a reciprocal need to listen and talk to each other. The communicative purpose, the reciprocity, the mutual intelligibility, and the unpredictability of the situation are all features of real-life communication. The tasks that incorporate these features are called communicative tasks and they help to develop fluency.

To ameliorate fluency, the practice activities must have these characteristics:

- Attention to meaning: less importance to form, and more to meaning, to what is being said

- Authenticity: it should try to simulate real-life language use

- Communicative purpose: it should entice the interaction and include real-life speech features

- Chunks: at least some of the practised language should be presented in short memorisable “blocks” that can be automised (ready-made sentences and expressions)

- Repetition: for automisation to occur there must be some repetition of the targeted pattern

*RESTRUCTURING

It is the integration of new information into old, the incorporation of new rule and usage into learner’s mental grammar. Communicative tasks promote restructuring, as they problematise learning. By doing so, the need for a negotiation of meaning arises, and said negotiation is thought to trigger restructuring.

Problem - speakers cannot interact properly + consequence - communication breakdown + solution - negotiation of meaning (collaborative work done between people to make message comprehensible) = reorganisation

For restructuring to occur:

- Problematising: dealing with problems forces reassessment

- Push: activity should push learners to try to out-perform their own competence, by aiming to produce language that is more complex than what they usually do

- Scaffolding: there should be sufficient support (familiarity) to provide security that allows taking risks with the language. That is why the practice should balance old (previous knowledge) and new

HOW TO COMPOSE AND ORGANIZE A GRAMMAR LESSON:

- Presentation: grammar structure is introduced according to the chosen teaching method/approach

- Focused practice: the learner manipulates the structure in question with all other variables made constant. That allows the student to gain control of the grammar construction without the added pressure of having to reproduce it. Feedback is usually given immediately. An example of focused practice is a gap-filling text

- Communicative practice: the learner engages in activities to practice the presented structure in a context that embodies the actual process of communication. Mistakes are usually written down to be addressed later, so as to allow the flow of talk. An example of communicative practice is a roleplay activity

- Teacher feedback and correction: The context where the error happens and its gravity are key points to decide when/if to interrupt the flow of speech to submit feedback; but ultimately, it is up to the professors to use their discretion and judge the real need for it.

Mistakes that involve the grammatical structure being taught at a given moment, or that make a statement unintelligible should be corrected immediately, whilst still in context.

Errors made during a communicative task are usually dealt with at a later stage.

Errors can be divided into two basic categories (according to how serious they are): global (customarily addressed immediately) and local (generally corrected at a later stage).

Global mistakes are the ones that break the rules involving the structure of a sentence, the relation among clauses, or the connection amongst the major

elements of a sentence – for example, using the wrong word order, or forgetting to use one of the obligatory constituents of a sentence (like the subject).

Local mistakes are the ones that cause a particular term of the sentence or clause to be faulty (often a simple misuse of a class of words or a minor lexical flaw) – for example, forgetting to use an article, or not using the “s” in the third person inflection (singular – simple present).

Mistakes that stigmatize the learners should be pointed out at once, regardless of being global or local. For example, the use of he ain’t instead of he doesn’t (America), or innit instead of isn’t it (UK) might make students feel more “native-like”, but it is likely to cause them to be labelled, and therefore, to suffer prejudice.

Minigrammar lesson

When the teacher detects common systematic errors in the students’ speech, he/she might decide to tackle them in a remedial way with a minigrammar lesson. It usually follows these steps:

- Professor presents relevant data

- He/she gets students to detect and correct their errors (after this step the educator might or might not choose to elicit the rule)

- Focused practice: learners practise the target structure through exercises

- Communicative practice: Teacher provides a contextualized task to practice the structure

HOW TO TEACH GRAMMAR THROUGH:

*LISTENING AND RESPONDING

It is a known fact that listening comprehension is necessary for the acquisition of an additional language. Despite all the criticism over classes where the professor only speaks to the students in the target language, this is one of the most effective manners to provide them with the necessary skills to be able to achieve fluency. This particular set of techniques makes use of the silent period, which is important to help students to comprehend a structure before they are asked to reproduce it. To begin with, the learners are given a lesson based on TPR (Total Physical Response), firstly being shown commands, and then being asked to obey commands (according to research, students benefit both from watching and from doing). Afterwards, they listen, and only physically respond to the commands received, subsequently they listen and draw, and then listen and colour. Once that initial stage is complete, they have to listen and manipulate objects, and, as a follow-up, listen, look and verbally respond (using no more than one or two words to answers). Students are then allowed to listen and speak, and finally, to listen and write. This set of listening exercises is great for beginners, because it gives them a chance to match meaning and form, whilst taking some of the pressure away (as it does not require that they produce something before they can even grasp it). These assignments are valuable for fluency acquisition, as research shows that the principle of delayed oral production is effective for that matter.

*STORIES

Most people love stories and they can be very useful in class, both to elicit (favours inductive reasoning) and to illustrate (favours deductive reasoning) grammar points, as they can be contextualized. A well-told story provides a great context for the structure-discourse match; and it can be a versatile technique, having students read it, perform it, recreate it, etc. Apparently, the more bizarre and exaggerated the stories are, the more students will remember the grammar points they demonstrate. In general, the narratives should last up to five minutes. Moreover, storytelling is a part of tradition in almost all civilizations, and as such, it can be used to teach the culture of a particular place. The storyteller does not necessarily have to be the teacher, the students can be made to tell tales to each other too. A story can be true - but it does not have to be - and it can be told in many ways - as a chronicle, a report, a fairy-tale, an anecdote, a piece of gossip, a joke, a good memory, etc.

*DRAMA AND ROLEPLAY

According to research, the use of drama in language education increases motivation, heightens self-esteem, encourages empathy, and lowers sensitivity to rejection. It is also thought to give strong instrumental motivation, making students more prone to oral proficiency, given its context. Due to the relaxed non-threatening environment, the anxiety levels are reduced and learners are able to achieve the spontaneity state (when language flows without the interruption of self-inhibition or self-doubt). It has been observed that the fluency and accuracy achieved whilst performing are frequently surprising for professors and students, as said spontaneity allows the free emersion of creativity and resources previously uncharted. In addition, the communicative strategies used by the learners in the dramatic performance become a part of their linguistic repertoire, resetting their mind to that same mode in regular situations. Roleplaying enacts real-life situations, and it can work as a diorama of the dramatic performance inserted in a problem-solving context. Within this milieu, the students are exposed to situations they are likely to encounter inside or outside the classroom, and, being presented with a problem, they have to act out its solution. Feedback from the teacher helps them with the linguistic and cultural awareness they need to grasp the purpose of the roleplay, but it must be kept to a minimum during the task, being addressed after the performance.

*PICTURES

Imagery can be a valuable resource for aspects of grammar that require a structure-meaning match. They are especially useful for beginners and pre-intermediate levels. The pictures can be used to describe an object, to study sequential logic, to compare, to study vocabulary, or even to dictate the beginning of a story. The educator might choose to work images with each student individually, in pairs or in groups. Pictures are a stimulating way to help learners to create associations and to match form with meaning. In addition, the professor might choose to draw pictures on the board and ask students to draw on their notebooks too, making the whole lesson more visually pleasing and, therefore, more memorable.

*REALIA

Realia is a term that describes any object used to illustrate vocabulary and structure in the target language. It has many uses in the classroom, being suitable to promote cultural insight, lexical broadening, and to teach grammar through the match of form and meaning. In the lack of paraphernalia to bring to the lesson, the classroom itself can

provide a variety of realia. Uttering commands, the teacher can address a number of phrasal verbs (utilizing the light switch to teach turn on and turn off; using a chair to illustrate sit down and get up). Working with the students’ books and pens, the educator can instruct them about prepositions. Realia helps to contextualize the grammar lesson, and that makes it all the more memorable. Even students themselves can serve as realia, for instance to teach body parts - as it was done in Tudor England .

*GRAPHICS

Charts, tables, schedules and graphs can aid in the focused and in the communicative practice of grammar. They can help to match form and meaning and, if they involve texts in the activity, to match form and discourse too. Charts and tables are probably the most common stimuli of this type, as they help to break down texts into units that are easier for the students to analyse and compare. The exercise can also work the other way around, having students produce texts from given topics. The teacher might choose to use tables to work with wh- questions, comparatives and superlatives, for instance. Schedules lend themselves to the practice of a number of grammatical items, the most common probably being verbal tenses (a student might be asked to write texts based on what one did, does, or will do, for example). They can also be used for prepositions and for giving directions. Graphs are a common resource in any IELTS course, used to introduce students to specific words often featured in newspapers columns and articles (such as these from the economy section: plunge, plummet, pinnacle, plump, surmount, summit, apex, acme, vertex, etc). They are also used as a backup for cloze procedures, tackling not only the lexicon, but also verb tenses. Graphics do not need to be used only as an objective information-based activity, they can be used to discuss lighter subjects, like to compare star signs or to make a list of pros and cons of a movie or a band.

*SONGS

Music can be used to contextualize any grammar point. If the songs are easy enough to follow, they are likely to “get stuck” in the learners’ minds, making them very memorable. They can be grammar-focused songs, tailored especially for students (even sounding childish they serve a purpose), or contemporary popular songs already familiar to the students (helping to keep their attention and motivation). Tunes can help learners to develop listening, speaking, and even reading (if the lyrics are also provided). They can be used to teach pronunciation, rhythm, parts of speech, review vocabulary, idioms and sentence patterns, etc. By providing a non-threatening environment, songs allow students to feel relaxed and open for the learning process. They can also be used to target cultural matters, different dialects, accents and even slang. Ideally, the teacher should explain the grammar topics beforehand, so that the students can pay more attention to the specific points. To select the correct song, the professor must take into consideration the learners’ age and interests. The tune must be evaluated in relation to the language used, and to the grammar point it wishes to elucidate. Moreover, songs should have short verses, be somewhat repetitive (to help with the memorizing process), and have a singable range, rhythm and length.

*VERSE (POETRY/RHYMES)

Like songs, poetry can contextualize grammar points effectively. Through the repetition of the poem, the underlying grammar structure becomes deeply internalized, as it engages the eyes, the ear, the tongue, and the mind. This polymorphic effect makes rhymes and verses easy to memorize, and their exaggerated rhythmicity is extremely

valuable for the learners (the English language is also full of rhythm and syllabic stress, even in everyday speech). Poetry also helps to bring to the classroom the cultural context in which it was produced. Its interpretations and underlying meanings show the richness of the language and entice the learners’ imagination, helping to keep their interest. Its complex structure might bring difficulties to the class (linguistic, cultural or intellectual issues), and that is why the poem to be studied has to be carefully chosen. It is probably better to select verses from the 20th or 21th century, which usually feature a more suitable choice of words, and, probably, a more meaningful and relevant setting for the learners. In addition, the teacher must remember to consider the students’ maturity and proficiency in relation to the theme of the poem. The students might be asked to paraphrase the verse in “normal” syntax, answer questions about it, write an extra line or rhyme, find the figures of speech, interpret the hidden meaning, etc. For beginners, it might be sensible to trade the traditional verse for a nursery rhyme.

*GAMES AND PROBLEM-SOLVING ACTIVITIES

When engaged in this type of effort, the students make use of language that is task-orientated, focusing on meaning rather than form. That is why such activities are ideal for the improvement of fluency. Nevertheless, if the teacher insists on providing a more complete exercise, form-focused points can be highlighted beforehand. As open-ended tasks, problem-solving activities are more suited for students beyond beginners’ level, because it requires a good command of the language and its lexicon. Games, however, can be adapted to all age groups and levels of knowledge. At first, adults might be less interested in these, but if they are presented in a non-condescending way and in accordance with the students’ age and proficiency, they can be useful and interesting, even for grown-ups. Problem-solving activities are proven to be wholly efficacious as long as the professor provides a structural focus along with them. Challenging, they engage the students’ attention and give them motivation to use their cognitive, linguistic and lexical knowledge. The competitiveness factor is another incentive provided by this type of interaction. The teacher’s feedback must be given after the activity is finished, so as not to interrupt the flow of thought and speech. This can be done through a minigrammar lesson addressing the issues with which students most frequently have problems.

*TEXTS

Language is context-sensitive, so an utterance only becomes fully understandable when inserted in the correct “frame”. Course books are usually tailored to facilitate the comprehension of a certain grammar feature, and that can give their texts an unreal sense, misrepresenting the way language is used in real-life contexts. On the other hand, using a newspaper article in class can be very demotivating for students because of all the unfamiliar vocabulary and syntactic complexity. A good alternative to said predicament is to take authentic texts and to simplify them (making sure the “flavour” is maintained). In this way, the provided alternative will still offer the co-textual information that allows learners to deduce the meaning of certain vocables through their context. Students can benefit from the grammar and vocabulary input, as well as from the structure and organization. The piece must be carefully put together so as not to be off-putting in terms of simplicity or difficulty. In addition, the subject broached should be well thought-out, conforming to the learners’ interest.

*TEXT-BASED EXERCISES AND ACTIVITIES

The benefits of this type of practice can be channelled to students’ reading and writing skills if the focus is kept at a text-level (discourse) rather than at a sentence-level. The comprehension, generation and manipulation of texts is the primary technique to be developed to achieve the improvement of the discourse. Given the focus, this type of activity is suited for the intermediate level onwards. Text-replication practices, to improve the understanding of structures and of how their integration is key to a meaningful text, include dictations (visual or aural), and dicto-comps (usually aural). The former practice requires that what is dictated be noted verbatim; the latter requires that students only write down key words, and that, after listening to the structure three times, they try to replicate it as perfectly as possible. Text-completion tasks are useful tools, and they can be presented as cloze passages (individual words), or gapped texts (one or more words to fill in the blanks). Text-manipulation practices are another great resource to promote enhanced writing (for instance, students might be asked to rewrite a passage - originally in the past tense - in the present). In more sophisticated text-manipulation-imitation exercises, the teacher might provide students with a model passage drawn from literature, and ask them to rewrite it with a slight change of topic, maintaining the original style and structure as much as possible. The combination of scrambled sentences into a coherent text is another interesting alternative. As an added option, the educator might hand out the transcript of a conversation or interview, and ask students to transform it into indirect speech text. In the text-elicitation tasks, the professor provides a title or a theme for an essay, and specifies the structure to be used. Another technique involves peer-correction - getting the learners to correct each other’s essays as practice to eventually, with the help of a checklist, correct their own.

HOW TO CORRECT GRAMMAR (FEEDBACK):

The mistakes made by language learners are unavoidable detours, and therefore, a teacher must be prepared to deal with such inaccuracies, instead of ignoring them. First of all, the educator must learn how to identify the type of mistake made by the student. Then, the educator must decide if what is important at that particular moment is the focus on meaning or on form. In addition, the teacher must consider the type of learner that made the mistake and the context provided by the peers. Only then will the educator decide what type of feedback to give to students.

Example of mistake: She has a curly hair.

Type of mistake: local – grammar (sentence structure) – misuse of indefinite article, sentence required zero-article

- No! – This is clearly negative feedback and it plays with the students’ self-confidence. Moreover, it offers no clue as to what the mistake was, being of no help for the learners’ improvement

- She has curly hair. – Teacher corrects the mistake quickly so as to maintain the flow of the conversation, and, at the same time, reminds him/her to focus on form

- No article. – Teacher pinpoints the kind of error, but allows student to reformulate the sentence

- No! Anyone? – Teacher signals sentence was not correct and calls for peers to rectify it. Sometimes the student feels humiliated with this type of feedback

- She has...? – Teacher replays sentence up to the point where the mistake occurred, letting the student or the peers reword it

- She has a curly hair? – Teacher echoes the mistake as an interrogation, allowing the student or the peers to notice the error

- Sorry? Excuse me? – Teacher uses clarification requests, signalling to the student that the message was unclear or had problems with the form

- Just one? Like this? – Teacher points to a single hair, or draws a bald man with only one hair on his head. It might work for some students, but it may humiliate others, depending on how the peers respond

- A curly hair is just one single hair. On our head we don’t have a curly hair, we have curly hair. – Teacher uses the mistake to explain a grammar point (reactive teaching)

- Oh, she has curly hair, has she? – Teacher uses reformulation, much like parents do with babies. In that way, students do not feel inhibited, and the conversation flow is not interrupted

- Good! – Teacher praises student because it is productive to have conversation flowing. If the focus is on meaning rather than on form, and if the purpose of the practice is to get students to talk, then correction is not needed every single time

- Teacher says nothing, but writes the mistake down for future correction so as not to disrupt the flow of talk. Feedback cannot be given much later though, otherwise it is not taken in, because it is not contextualized in real operating conditions

- Teacher says nothing if he/she notices that this type of mistake is common and systematic in a particular group, subsequently presenting a remedial minigrammar lesson

CONCLUSION:

The best way to teach grammar is to mix and match the methods and techniques, offering students variety, and thus, not allowing them to get bored with static classes. Some topics suit a method naturally, and others simply do not. Teachers should not try to force the pairing of certain subjects with approaches just because they feel more comfortable with said method. For example, it seems natural that commands and prepositions are taught through the inductive method (using TPR, realia or illustrations). On the other hand, it seems pretty safe to say that it is more efficient to teach reported speech, or the inflexion of the third person of the singular in the simple present through a rule-driven approach (using the board, grammar sheets or a grammar book). Requests match dramatization rather well, and comparisons absolutely suit charts. Generalising: When matching structure with semantic factors, the use of props, like pictures, realia and graphs, can really complement the explanation, providing the visual reinforcement this kind of subject usually needs. When matching structure with social factors, the use of interactive tasks, like skits, plays and roleplays, makes sense. To better match structure with linguistic factors, the use of songs, problems-solving activities and stories is very effective. These are merely

suggestions of good “natural” matches, but a class does not have to follow only one procedure or use just one type of material – it can mix different techniques and utilize many complementing resources at the same time. The most important is not to be boxed in a sole method because it is easier to deal with or it provides a more controllable environment. Moreover, the professor must know his/her students to be able to adapt to the practice that is the most suitable for that particular group. The educator must try to provide context when teaching grammar, whether it be through the use of gadgets and props, or by setting a scenario. Grammatical forms should be taught in association with their meaning. In addition, the teacher must encourage students to personalise the rule, and must perform constant reviews ascertaining the maintenance of their knowledge. The educator must also provide the right conditions to propitiate learning, guaranteeing that students get the right amount of input, that they have enough study and practice time to produce output, and that they get appropriate feedback to motivate them through the process. An educator also has to learn to accept students’ feedback, being always prepared to change a flawed or outdated technique. By being professional and showing concern for the students’ opinions as well as for the teaching process, the educator creates the conditions for real communication. Furthermore, a skilled professional should always trust his/her teacher’s intuition more than any method, as the former is constructed through keen observation, whilst the latter is, at best, a generalized approach. The choice to combine methods and techniques is not easy, it requires extra effort from the professor and careful preparation of classes, but it is most definitely worth it if one considers that getting a positive outcome from it is the utmost reason for the whole process to be.

*BIBLIOGRAPHY

Marianne Celce-Murcia & Sharon Hilles, Techniques and Resources in Teaching Grammar

Scott Thornbury, How to Teach Grammar

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Jeremy Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching

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http://www.docstoc.com/docs/25496540/How-to-Teach-Grammar-from-Examples

http://penningtonpublishing.com/blog/grammar_mechanics/how-to-teach-grammar/

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_8079156_teach-grammar-adults.html

http://www.suite101.com/content/teaching-eflesl-students-grammar-a31850

http://www.studyenglishgrammar.com/kids-education/how-to-teach-grammar-to-kids.htm

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_5462631_teach-adult-english-grammar.html

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_5910815_understand-english-grammar-interactive-approach.html