PRESENTING GRAMMAR IN

THE CLASSROOM IN THE 21 st

CENTURY

[Weaver 1996 and Anderson, 2017]

 The main takeaway from McQuade and
Weaver’s research is that grammar instruction
must be contextualized and meaningful within
students’ reading and writing. Grammar
instruction should not be the discrete learning of
grammatical “rules” because these rules do not
translate into a superior command of language or
communication.
 These recommendations derive originally from Constance Weaver’s writings (1996) that
were then expanded upon recently by Jeff Anderson, a disciple of Weaver’s work (2017;
2021). They strive to make grammar instruction both contextualized and meaningful.

1. Try to promote the acquisition and use of

grammatical constructions through
authentic reading and writing (Weaver).

Example: Instead of solely presenting a list of rules on

proper sentence structure, the teacher assigns students the
task of crafting personal narratives.
 These recommendations derive originally from Constance Weaver’s writings (1996) that
were then expanded upon recently by Jeff Anderson, a disciple of Weaver’s work (2017;
2021). They strive to make grammar instruction both contextualized and meaningful.

2. When explaining various aspects of grammar,

usage, and punctuation to help students with their
writing, minimize technical terminology and
maximize the use of examples.

• Let the students write their own stories afterward, applying what
they've learned. For instance, reading a captivating book exposes
them to different sentence structures, and when they write their
own stories, they start using those cool structures themselves.
 These recommendations derive originally from Constance Weaver’s writings (1996) that
were then expanded upon recently by Jeff Anderson, a disciple of Weaver’s work (2017;
2021). They strive to make grammar instruction both contextualized and meaningful.

3. Encourage students to discuss and

investigate the usage of language.

• For instance, ask them to analyze how language is adapted for

different audiences or purposes. By investigating real-life examples,
such as advertisements, interviews, or social media posts, students
can discover the nuances of language use.
 In his book Patterns of Power (2017), Jeff Anderson gives easily-
implementable steps for teachers to encourage students to read and
analyze authors’ sentences as “mentors” from which new grammatical
skills can be learned.

1. I​ nvitation to notice: Have students read a sentence you provide or a

sentence that they self-select. After private thought time, ask students to
share with you anything they notice about the sentence: what they like,
don’t like, parts of speech, figurative language — anything that stands out
to them.
2. Invitation to label: Ask students to circle, identify, and/or label something
specific in the sentence that stands out to them. If an author uses a series
of adjectives separated by commas, for instance, the student might label
the part of speech (adjectives) and the punctuation (commas in a series).
 In his book Patterns of Power (2017), Jeff Anderson gives easily-
implementable steps for teachers to encourage students to read and
analyze authors’ sentences as “mentors” from which new grammatical
skills can be learned.

3. Invitation to revise: Talk with your students about how revision can take
a great sentence and make it even better. Encourage them to think about
how they might revise or change the sentence. This stage also empowers
students to see themselves as experts, on the same “level” as published
authors.
4. Invitation to imitate: Ask students to write a sentence like the mentor
sentence. Imitation can be an excellent way for students to expand their
repertoire of writing skills, especially if their mentor sentence was self-
selected from an author whose writing they admire.
The Discovery Technique

[by Susan Verner]

The discovery technique is a method of teaching in whic
h students are not directly presented with a target gram
matical structure or rule.
[Type Main Point #1 Here]
 The Discovery Technique

1. Listen for Comprehension

2. Listen with an Information Gap
3. Students Discover the Rule
4. Do an Error Check
5. Put their Knowledge to Good Use
CHAPTER 2: TYPES OF GRAMMAR in
Teaching and Assessment

1. Functional
2. Descriptive
3. Prescriptive
4. Pedagogic
 FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR

 Functional grammar, based on systemic linguistics, emphasizes the way spoken and
written language operate in different social situations.
 Functional grammar is a grammar model developed by Michael Halliday in 1960s. In
his classic book An Introduction to Functional Grammar, Halliday (1994) points out
that functional grammar is so-called because its conceptual framework is a functional
one rather than a formal one.
 It is functional in three distinct senses: in its interpretation (1) of texts, (2) of the
system, and (3) of the elements of linguistic structures.
 Three Distinct Senses in its Interpretation:

1. Of texts - we use language to talk about our experience of the world, including the world in
our minds, to describe events and states and the entities involved in them.

2. Of the system - we also use language to interact with other people, to establish and maintain
relation with them, to influence their behavior, to express our own viewpoint on things in the
world, and to elicit or change theirs.

3. Of the elements of linguistic structure - we organize our messages in ways which indicate
how they fit in with the other messages around them and with the wider context in which we are
talking or writing
 Key Concepts in Functional
Grammar

• functions and systems, hierarchical ranking of units, word order, word

groups, functions of the sentence, theme, mood, transitivity, and the
clause complex
 TRADITIONAL vs
FUNCTIONAL

 10 parts of speech: noun, verb, adjective, adverb,  Functional grammar places English words into
pronoun, number, article, preposition, four big groups: noun group, verb group, adjective
conjunction, and interjection group, and prepositional group
 Traditional grammar analyzes a sentence structure  functional grammar gives a clause different
into subject, predicate, object, attributive, functional labels depending on three kinds of meta
adverbial, and complement functions
 Differences in Nature between Functional
Grammar and Traditional Grammar

Functional grammar focuses on the way language

is put together so that meaning is communicated for
particular purposes, and looks at a language as a system
of meaning, while traditional grammar is concerned
with the ways words are organized within sentences and
looks at a language as a set of rules.
 Differences in Nature between Functional
Grammar and Traditional Grammar

Functional grammar provides us with tools for describing

how language is used in varying, real-life contexts, and for
understanding why a text is the way it is.
Traditional grammar is a prescriptive one, telling you
what you can and cannot say and provides rules for correcting
what are often referred to as grammatical errors
 Differences in Nature between Functional
Grammar and Traditional Grammar

Functional grammar is concerned with how the various

bits of language in a text work together as part of a larger
system in order to construct meaning.
Traditional grammar is concerned with identifying the
functions of words and word groups within sentences, without
demonstrating how they contribute to the overall meaning in a
text.
 Differences in Nature between Functional
Grammar and Traditional Grammar

Functional grammar is concerned with how

language is used in a range of cultural and social
contexts.
Traditional grammar is mainly concerned with how
to use language correctly in writing and speech.
 functions and systems

KEY CONCEPTS
hierarchical ranking of units
 word order
 word groups
 functions of the sentence
To serve its communicative
 Theme
purpose, its concepts are
 Mood
quite different from
 Transitivity traditional grammar.
 the clause complex
 The term “functional” is
used because it describes the
Functions and approach which sees grammatical
System categories in terms of their
communicative functions.
 This implies a segmental
principle of organization, in which
Hierarchy of larger units may be seen as being
formed from smaller units and
Linguistic Units smaller units being combined to form
the larger units.
 A clause is a grammatical
unit that includes, at minimum, a
Clause and predicate and an explicit or
Sentence implied subject, and expresses a
proposition.
 The system of theme belongs
to the textual meta function of the
language. It is concerned with the
Theme organization of information within
individual clauses and through this,
with the organization of the larger
text.
 The mood system is the part
of grammar which is most
Mood inherently linked with the roles
which speakers adopt in the use of
language
 The system of transitivity belongs
to one mode of the ideational meta
function, that is, the experiential one. It
Transitivity is a resource for construing our
experience in terms of configuration of a
process, participants and circumstances.