SDE Teaching and Learning Grammar Jeremy Harmer BhioncmanTeaching and Learning Grammar Jeremy Harmer EY LONGMAN ww York Contents5 Practice techniques @ drills @ interaction activities @ involving the personality @ games @ written practice @ conclusion @ exercises @ references Testing grammar @ types of test @ writing achievement tests @ test items @ conclusion @ exercises @ references Final task Suggestions for further reading 41 41 43 46 47 51 55 55 55 57 57 57 59 66 66 67 69 Preface r= SOME TIME, many teachers have felt the need for a series of handbooks designed for ordinary teachers in ordinary class- rooms. So many books these days seem to be written for privileged teachers in privileged environments — teachers with large class- rooms, large budgets for expensive equipment, and small classes! Most of us are not so lucky: most ordinary teachers are short of almost everything except students. They don’t have a lot of time for elaborate theories, time-consuming classroom routines, and complicated jargon. Longman Keys to Language Teaching have been written especially for the ordinary teacher. The books offer sound, practical, down-to- earth advice on basic techniques and approaches in the classroom. Most of the suggested activities can be adapted and used for almost any class, by any teacher. In Teaching and Learning Grammar, Jeremy Harmer deals with one of the most controversial questions in ELT — should we teach grammar’? If so, when, and how? There was a time when ‘Doctor Grammar’ was seen as a cure for everything. Later, Dr Grammar became a cure worse than any disease! This book provides a very useful over-view of the various approaches and techniques that teachers can use in teaching grammar in their classrooms. The book contains many valuable classroom examples of teaching grammar in action. Neville GrantIntroduction What is grammar? ‘The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English defines grammar (The study practice of) the rules by which words ‘hag their forms en are combined into sentences” There are two thule elements in thirdefinicion: therulerof grammar; and the study and praetiew of he rules, ‘Tho rules of grammar, ae the dictionary suggets are about how wards ehonge ond hos they are put together into sentences, For sample, out knowledge of grammar tells us that tho word walk ‘hans to walhod in the pst tense. Thi ean example of & word ‘hanging ia form, Our knowlege of grammar will also tll us what todoif we want to tthe phrase not meny into the sentence There are ranges he ‘ef There arence many oranges on the shelf) This san example ftom words are combined into wentences Grammar, then, ie the way in which words chango taemeelvas and froup together to make eentences. The grammar of language is ‘rt happons to words when thiy become plural cr nogative, or Wrbat word order i used when we make quetions or join a ‘Slausos to make one entence. Theis the grammar that wo will Be ‘onaidering in ths book, How will graramar be dent with in this book? Inthis book we wil be looking atthe wags in which students ean loam and acquire working lmowledgo ofthe English grammatical stem, We wil Looe at varios irene ids for ntrodcing this Ienowldga, how to practise how to make it enjoyable, how to get lodeots to think bout grammatical area an how tote i Returning to our dictionary definition we can say that Teaching tnd Learning Grammar focsses on the practice rather than the study of geomeExercises The role of grammar in language teaching 1 What does ‘grammar’ mean to you? 2 Try to remember when ied ‘ i y you last studied ‘grammar’: wh do in the classroom? ini 3 What grammatical rules or knowledge have you learnt about any language (including your own)? Task: Before you read this chapter, decide which of the following statements you agree with: 1 Students need to be given details of grammar rules if they are to learn English successfully. 2 Children do not learn grammar rules when they acquire their first language, so adults don’t need to either. If students get enough chance to practise using a language, they don’t need to learn grammar. It is helpful for students to be aware of grammatical information about the language. Making students aware of grammatical facts is one of the things a teacher can do, but there are many other activities in the classroom which are just as important — like reading, listening, and fluency activities. oo a on We are going to look at a number of techniques for presenting and practising grammar in the following chapters. In some of these activities the grammatical information we give the students will be extremely covert and in some cases grammatical information will be made extremely overt. What is the difference between these two concepts? Covert and overt Covert grammar teaching is where grammatical facts are hidden from the students — even though they are learning the language. In other words, the students may be asked to do an information gap activity (see page 44) or read a text (see page 35) where new grammar is practised or introduced, but their attention will be drawn to the activity or to the text and not to the grammar. With covert.grammar, teachers help the students to acquire and/or practise the language, but they do not draw conscious attention to any of the grammatical facts of the language.Overt grammar teaching means that the teacher actually provides the students with grammatical rules and explanations — the information is openly presented, in other words. Some techniques for the presentation of new language ~ for example where the teacher explains how present simple questions need do or does — are extremely overt: in chapter four we will look at many problem- solving and discovery exercises that encourage the students to consider grammatical information in some detail — and which we would therefore call overt, So, with overt teaching we are explicit and open about the grammar of the language, but with covert teaching we simply get students to work with new language and hope that they will more or less subconsciously absorb grammatical information which will help them to acquire the language as a whole. Which kind of grammar teaching is best? Should we just practise using the language and hope that the grammar ‘rubs off’ on the students? Or should we practise using the language and also from time to time draw students’ attention to the language’s formal #rammatical characteristics? Should we teach grammar at all? Grammar-less teaching? Ih recent years the emphasis has shifted away from the teaching of #rammar, Teachers have concentrated on other issues, such as how people learn languages and what they want to say. Many teachers and writers discussed these questions and gradually created a new way of looking at teaching called the communicative approach. Two of the main issues in the communicative approach were the teaching of language functions, and the use of communicative activities. Together with these issues, a distinction has been made between acquisition and learning. Language functions Some people felt that teaching the grammar of the language did not necessarily help people to use the language. Just because, for example, somebody knew the verb to be, it did not mean that he or she would be able to use it to introduce themselves or others. Language is used, the argument went, actually to do things, to perform certain functions, like inviting, apologising, introducing, suggesting, expressing likes, and so on. Instead of teaching grammar, we should teach functions. The problem, of course, is that the sentences that perform functions are made up of grammatical elements. Even the simple introduction ‘l'm John and this is Mary’ is made up of the grammatical elements the verb to be and a demonstrative pronoun. Courses based only on teaching functions (at beginner and elementary levels) run into the problem that students have to know grammar to perform the functions — but grammar is often not being taught. There is now a general feeling that students do need to learn how to perform the functions of language, but that they need a grammatical base as well. Modern courses often teach a grammatical structure and then get students to use it as part of a functional conversation. An example of this would be the students learning the going to future. They might first learn how to ask simple questions using the new structure (‘What are you going to do for your holidays?’). Later the new structure can be incorporated into a functional exchange, for example: A: Where are you off to? : I’m going to walk to the shops. : You’d better take an umbrella! Why? : It’s going to rain. > w > wy Communicative activities One of the main effects of the communicative approach has been the realisation that just getting students to perform drills or engage in controlled practice may not be enough to help them to stand on their own feet as users of English. Other types of activity are needed where students can talk (or write) freely and use all or any of the language that they know. In other words, there must be occasions when students in the classroom use language to communicate ideas, not just to practise language. There are now many books about activities like role playing, problem-solving, discussions, games, and project work which encourage students to communicate. Communicative activities have many advantages: they are usually enjoyable; they give students a chance to use their language; theyallow both students and teachers to see how well the ‘students are doing in their language learning; and they give a break from the normal teacher—students arrangement in a classroom. The question is, of course, how much they should be used. Some people have argued that all English teaching should only be concerned with activities like this, Most teachers, however, say that activities like this should form only a part of the students’ timetable. Acquisition and learning All children seem to acquire language without being taught it. It appears that they hear lots of language, and ina subconscious way ~ without thinking about it — they gradually pick it up until they ean use their native language efficiently. People who go and live in another country and pick up the language without actually going to language classes, presumably acquire their ability to use the language in the same way, to some extent. Maybe, then, we don’t need to ‘teach’ language at all. Provided that we expose students to a lot of language which they can understand the general meaning of (even though the language level is higher than their own), aequisition will successfully take place. What would thia mean for teachers if it was the most appropriate kind of language activity? It would mean that their job was simply to provide their students with the right kind of language exposure: they would not need to teach the students and the students would not have to learn. Moat teachers are convinced by the need for students to acquire language, but they also realise that students who come to language classes are in a different situation from children acquiring their firat language, or from adults acquiring the language while actually living ina community which speaks the language. Most classroom students are in a hurry: they do not have time to acquire language gradually. So while we may organise activities and material to help them acquire the language, we will also teach them language so that they learn it consciously. Conclusion: Where does grammar fit in? At this stage, it is enough to say that grammar teaching — of both the overt and covert kind — has a real and important place in the classroom. The various techniques and activities that we are going to look at in the following chapters are all useful. But then, so are communicative activities, listening and reading activities, and activities aimed directly at language acquisition. Also, teachers of EFL know that different students react differently to different kinds of methodology and technique. We are all aware, too, that different activities are useful for different purposes. So what balance should the different elements have? Which parts of o— methodological programme should have the greatest weight? In general terms we can say that, at the beginner level, we would expect to do quite a lot of structure (and function) teaching and practice and less really free communicative activity — although we would place heavy emphasis on reading and listening. The teaching of grammar at this stage is likely to be fairly covert since the main aim is to get students to practise and use the language as much as possible. As the students learn more, however, the balance would change, and at intermediate levels the students would be involved in more communicative activities and would have less grammar teaching. The teaching of grammar at this stage, however, would probably be more overt and as students get more advanced they can actively study grammar in more overt ways (for example, see many of the activities in chapter four). At any level, though, we would expect students to be faced at 7 various points with input that is above their own language ability. This would not only help students to acquire language subconsciously, but it could also preview language that will later form the basis for grammar teaching (see chapter four).Exercises | What language functions can you think of? Select one and list as many ways of performing it as you can. 2 Look at a textbook you know and try to find a communicative activity. How do you think it would help students to learn or acquire English? How long do you think it would take? 3 Give an example of covert grammar teaching at the elementar level and an example of overt grammar teaching at the ° intermediate level. You can either choose examples from thi book or find ones of your own. “ ° 4 Look at the task at the beginning of this unit again. Which statement do you agree with most now? Identifying grammar: problems and solutions People who learn languages encounter a number of problems, especially with the grammar of the language which can be complicated and which can appear confusing. In this chapter we are going to look at three of the most important reasons for this: the clash between function and form; the similarities and differences between the students’ own language and the language that is being learnt; and various exceptions and complications that all languages seem to suffer from. In each case we will discuss the problem and then consider its implications for language teaching. Function and form Task: How many different meanings of the verb can are you able to think of? How would you teach can? Some of the confusion about English arises because of the mismatch between form and function. For example, most teachers of English know that the present continuous tense (e.g. he is running, they are eating their lunch) is used to describe actions taking place now, in the present. What, then, is it being used for in these examples? He’s meeting her at two o’clock tomorrow afternoon. Imagine the scene, exactly one year ago. It is two o’clock ona Wednesday afternoon. I am standing near the old factory... He’s always complaining! All these sentences use the present continuous tense, but they do not refer to the present. The first one is referring to a futurearrangement, the second one is actually a story about the past, and the third one is referring to a repeated habit. The same form (present continuous) can be used to mean many different things: the form has many functions. The situation is further complicated by the fact that the same meaning (or at least similar meanings) can be expressed by using many different forms. If we think of a situation in the future. for example, we find that it can be expressed in many different Wave: I'll see her tomorrow. I'll be seeing her tomorrow. I’m seeing her tomorrow. I'm going to see her tomorrow. I'm to see her tomorrow. I see her tomorrow. All of these grammatical constructions are different, and they all represent fine differences in meaning. The second sentence suggests that the meeting tomorrow has been definitely arranged, whereas the third sentence perhaps suggests that it is a plan, teamed not yet a definite arrangement, The last sentence implies that the arrangement is official. We could go on looking at many other examples like this. As we shall aee later in this chapter, it is important to be aware of such problems, Teachers have to make decisions about what structure (form) to teach, and what use (function) the structure is to be put to. Implications for teaching Meaning and use It is clear that when we introduce a new piece of grammar we must teach not only the form, but also one of its functions, and not only meaning but also use. Let us return to the example of the present continuous that we looked at on page 9. We could present it by performing actions such as opening the door or closing the window As we did these things, we could say to our students ‘I am opening the door. I am closing the window’. This would certainly be an adequate demonstration of the meaning of the present continuous. but it wouldn’t tell students how we use it, because people don’t usually go around describing their own actions to others. But 11 there are some situations where such commentary could be acceptable: people giving cookery demonstrations might well say what they are doing; so might the police; test pilots reporting to base; and radio commentators. Perhaps, then, it would be a better demonstration of meaning and use if we showed someone doing a cookery demonstration where they used the present continuous in an appropriate way. Grammatical form Teachers also have to be clear about the grammatical form of a new structural item. How is it formed? What are the rules? How are /f- clauses formed, for example, or which verbs take to followed by the infinitive (e.g. he agreed to wait), which take -ing (e.g, she enjoys sailing) and which can take both (e.g. he likes sailing/he likes to sail)? Patterns Once we are clear about the function and form of the new language we then have to decide what pattern it is going to be taught in. In other words if we are going to introduce a grammatical item — one of the uses of a verb tense, or one of the conditional constructions, for example — we need to decide what structural patterns we are going to use to present this grammar point. For example, we could introduce the present perfect in a number of different structural patterns: He’s never eaten raw fish. I’ve lived here for six years. Since 1968 she has lived all on her own in the big house on the cliff. We could — if we wanted — bring all these constructions into the first lesson that the students ever have on the present perfect. But if we did, the students would have to worry not only about the form of the new verb tense (have + past participle), but also about the use and position of time adverbials, the difference between since and for, and the position of time clauses and other long adverbial clauses. In other words, by not restricting the pattern in which the present perfect is being presented, we are making the students’ task more difficult than it needs to be. Most teachers would not teach the present perfect with since and for to begin with: indeed the difference between these two timeSemnensions avapeliy introduced well after students have been with the new tense. Often, too, tea 1 " q chers do not introdu new language in a long and complicated pattern since this takes ~ the focus away fr - y from the new language. A more sensible approach is a) select the new pattern, and look for examples of use which fit this pattern. us 1n our present perfect example we might choose the pattern: X has never + past participle, She’s always + past participle to produce sentences like, always acted in the theatr pattern, ‘She’s never acted in films before, she’s e.’ Subsequent models would follow this ao that this pattern is too complex, we can start by 8 fee oe in a much more simplified and personalised ‘ ple, fave you ever. . .? so that stud other, ‘Have you ever me ‘ iain ta i Petite famous person? Have you ever climbed In both cases the new gramm and the teacher gets student, questions using this pattern. ar is being taught in a specific pattern, S to use many sentences and/or Contrasts with other languages Task: Think of a language other th one problem that students wh learning English. an English. Think of at least 0 speak this language have when The second reason why En lies in the differences betw Take, fo: ee ipsa is difficult for students een English and their own lan guage. r example, the case of Spanish and English adj stiee Adjectives behave differently in English and S panish, both in terms of their position and in how they agree, or don’t agree, with nouns Here are some examples: Tengo zapatos azules. I have blue shoes Mi abuela es muy vieja. My grandmother is very old. Me dio dos gatos pequenos. He gave me two small cats. 13 English adjectives usually come before nouns (blue shoes, small cats), not after them. In Spanish the situation is reversed (zapatos azules, gatos pequeros). Another difference is that English adjectives do not generally change when they apply to ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’ words or plurals. In Spanish, however, the adjective azul becomes azules when it agrees with the plural zapatos, vieja is used because it agrees with the ‘feminine’ grandmother (masculine viejo). and the singular pequerio becomes pequerios. It is not surprising that Spanish speakers have trouble with English adjectives. The situation is just as bad for English speakers who learn Spanish — and it takes most students of both languages quite a long time to get it right! Most.teachers can think of other examples: word order problems for German speakers; the use of the, a, an for Japanese speakers; different uses of the present perfect tense for French and Spanish speakers, and so on. Teachers with a class of students who all have the same mother tongue are in a very good position to do something about these contrasts. They can specially plan to introduce problem patterns in a particularly careful way and if necessary add a word of explanation at an appropriate stage. Teachers with multi-lingual classes will find their preparation much easier if they have some idea of any problems of contrast that their students are likely to encounter with new grammar. Exceptions and complications Task: Teachers frequently tell students that some is used with affirmative sentences and any is used in questions and negative sentences. Is this always true? We now come to the third reason why English seems difficult for speakers of other languages: it is full of exceptions to grammar rules. That’s the way it appears to many people, anyway. For example, when students think that they have worked out that the English past tense is formed by adding -ed to a verb, they are somewhat surprised to come across went, ran and put. In the same way, it seems peculiar that a noun like sheep does not change in the plural. It appears that all these words are ‘exceptions to the rule’. The situation is not, of course, quite that simple. There are anumber of English nouns th ! at do not change when th e oe as there are some that add an ‘s’ (rooms, girls) ae change a sound inside the word (women teeth) i In the same way, some nouns can furniture, air, sugar. We don’t sa furnitures.’ But then the situatio we use the word ‘sugar’ to mean ‘ two sugars.’ The complexity of E for some teachers — and can be done about it? not be made plural at all, e.g. y, for example, ‘I like those two m does get complicated, because if a cube’ we can say, ‘I’d like nglish grammar is ver i y depressin: Just as worrying for their students! What ° will cause, and partly from the experiences of colleagu that the teacher will have s mistake These es). ae prediction of problems means ome idea of what to do when typi : f ical f $ occur, and will have some suitable techniques erie wo examples help to show what can be done: , 1) 2 He must to come tomorrow. we ‘s wee mistake that students make, often due not erterence from the mother ton b i ere gue, but from confusion grammatical system. We sa , y have to aa to vse ania to come/would like to come so why 0 as well? A teacher who antici aay toas cipates this prob] can explain — if the problem ari 7 =m ses — that verbs like can must, will, and should are not followed by to whereas Hane ought, want, would like are. H is wi i Pree lacirehay , are. Hopefully this will make things 15 2) x Iam living here since two years. There are two problems here: the use of the present continuous verb form and the misuse of since. Well-prepared teachers will not be surprised by such mistakes. They will know that the verb problem almost certainly comes from a confusion between English and the students’ mother tongue. For example, whereas in French we say J’habite ici depuis deux ans in English we have to say ‘I have lived/been living here for two years.’ Teachers also know that since and for are frequently mixed up. They are therefore prepared to explain the difference between since + a definite point in time and for +a length of time. Depending on the students, this can be done either with more examples or with grammatical explanations. A teacher who can anticipate the problems that students are going to have, then, is in a better position to deal with these problems when they occur. Conclusion We have looked at three areas in which English grammar is problematical for our students. These areas should not depress us as teachers, however. Instead, we should use our knowledge of potential pitfalls to help us plan our teaching of grammar and to anticipate our students’ problems. So we could use a form like this when we plan the teaching of a new grammar item: Problems Solutions If we are going to teach the present perfect tense to a class of French speakers, the form might look something like this:uvean 172] present perfect (simple) var she hao Une her fir six yars/ since 9 court [a pesent/urrent state starting in the paot sromtees [contrat with j'habite confusion with Sree and For [cn Use time kines to explain tense Contrast English and French to show difference Write “since' and ‘for'on the board and rice the ine expressions that can go with them Milbeimabter pei endo as teaclurn andar tec we tohelp arate 1 What elo or nd fartion cl thr nthe (Gra langue ate aod Eat — 1 Whae areal ere el yo che ature tor thet ear? 4 To eld ye eto witha ent wh aby ‘rvtrace quien gle ht Thre ay chee were Presenting grammatical items ‘What is presentati reson the sagt which oda ated othe ‘cunt lw da works wth tens ye bn SESS ensues forthe et na Or hy ear "litres eng fogiar pas tans verbench a Se cored ad inne AL same tien ering [iivthenee lunar ssc hey acm bac aa ‘Toth bow he langue rsrtaton the stages whieh stan ear He LM {cea worn sn amis ter Ache nao ‘tenant pom ty wie firm terest hienvcalens une nw poe oferanmar vay tne {iret neo: eam ace {Ceotcmacies yeaing what hy 00 ‘Sie iney tne ohare they cfr enorme anon Tie “Reveheeinctadenen ee chance tube ho men anew ‘eethenecoen Sontines arses takes ace wi ‘tie tw angus xml page Some (wenenatinstrn nthe Hot par os poveration which iodine ‘hreogh neon tent pura iesexales? ©What are the characteristics of good presentation? A good presentation should be clear. Students should have no difficulty in understanding the situation or what the new language means. A good presentation should be efficient. The aim is to get tothe oe stage as soon as students can manipulate the new anguage. The more efficiently we can do this the better. A good presentation should be lively and interesting. We want wigs get interested and be involved during a presntition ‘ age. With the help of a good situation and lively teaching it can e one of the most memorable parts of a language course. And if it is, there is a good chance th i y at students will grammar more easily. nace good presentation should be appropriate. However interesting unny, or demonstrative a situation is, it should be appropriate f the language that is being presented. In other words it should b a good vehicle for the presentation of meaning and use i pee a good presentation should be productive. In other words © situation the teacher introduces should allow students to make many sentences and/or questions with the new language We can now look at a number of presentations that sha all, of the above characteristics. “_ 1 Using charts In this example the teacher wants to present the pattern How does X get to work/school? . ea: /school? The teacher puts the following chart on the 19 The teacher can then ask a student ‘How do you get to class?’ The student chooses one of the options and the teacher writes the name in the ‘name’ column and ticks the appropriate ‘transport’ column. For example, if Juan gets to class by car, the first entry on the chart will look like this: The teacher then fills up the chart with information about other students. When the chart is full he can model the question and answer: How does Juan get to class? By car. Task: How could you use the students and their situations to present either whose + possessives or the going to future. 2 Using a dialogue Task: Before looking at this example, decide how you could present Do you like X? Yes I do/NoI don’t. In the example on page 20 for beginners from Meridian 1, students listen to/read a dialogue which shows the new language Do you like . . 2? Yes I do|/No I don’t being used. After completing a comprehension task, students move straight onto a personalisation stage using a similar technique to the one we looked at in the first example. This technique — of getting students to personalise the new language as soon as it is introduced — is particularly suitable for language such as: can/can’t (= ability) where students can complete charts about each other’s abilities; possessives + whose where they can ask about the ‘ownership’ of various objects; and it tastes/looks/smells + adjective where they can talk about their reactions to various foods, smells, etc.9 Using a ninisituetion’ Inthis example for intermediate stadeats the teacher wants to reson the hase nomedhng one ator Ts teacher can pat tows ‘Mmcaltintione (care 0 the bord one By emer have the ‘lst prepare en Hash ea Rosie Lee “Fortunes told” “Motenis then an and onamer ike hie ‘Why ie Mary qung to Clarks photographers? ortuseshe wants to have her hoLogrop aken ors prsonaaation tage the tens can sy wa ther woul Thete eve deg Teeto have my bir at “Tonks What ocr quation and anewor models wil he studecte Teeeiptawce ore pctares abe using hove something ‘Ws thee mi sitaatonypctoer can you hink oto Introtuce th puter? 44 Using tents for contrast “this example for intermediate students fom Ege i Teeth contrat the hace continous ad he fata simpleAs apersnaliaation stage soadens can sy what they will be ‘oingiwbat they wil €o a even ime ta ube ture eg ight ‘Felock tomorrow wening, lnnchtire next Sunda) 5 Using texts for grammar explanation “Task: Before looking at this example, decide how much ‘rammatical explanation you wud give when prosnting the rons perfect with wince an for How pould you give this Tn thin example from Kernel, elementary student read atest. ‘hich ives examples of the new language (rceentporfoct with ‘ince and for) The grammar i thon explained before they are aed {erchoowe between since and for This tthe tax And thin in the explanation and preliminary exersss "For cyvonacton the rena com ask each ther how on they TecPezariios inne hay wil anawer within oe. 6 Using isuals for situations ‘final oxple shows how teachers can use pictures for strata nal qc nemtenal efor clement) suds who sre reece pact continous ese ote et ine. TH Ce can eadualy dam thin pcteeon te boar Melee Uh gp O07The students discover that a murder took place at exactly eight o'clock in the top flat of a block of flats. They will ask and answer, like this: What were the Johnsons doing in flat 4 at eight o’clock? They were watching television. Task: How could you complete this presentation sequence with a personalisation phase? What overt grammatical help can the teacher give at the presentation stage? In two of our examples (1 and 5) we have seen that the materials give the students a considerable amount of grammatical information. But where materials do not give this kind of information, or where teachers are using pictures or their own realia, they will often want to give extra grammar information themselves. How can this be done? Modelling One technique is for the teacher to give a clear spoken model of the new language. This should be done with normal speed, stress and intonation. The teacher can give this model a number of times and then ask students to repeat it, both in chorus and individually. The modelling is particularly important since it gives students a chance to hear what the new sentence should really sound like. Repeating in chorus allows students to ‘have a go’ at the new language without having to talk individually in front of the class. Isolation ‘Teachers frequently isolate parts of the sentence they are modelling so that they can give them special emphasis. When teachers present the first conditional, for example, they might model a sentence like this: If it rains, she’ll get wet... listen, she’ll . .. she will .. . she'll .. she'll get wet. If it rains, she’ll get wet. 25 The teacher isolated the she’/l element, and then explained ~_ it was (she will) before putting it back into the model that _ eing given. Students get a lot of grammatical information in this way, although rules are not specifically stated. Visual demonstration Another way of explaining grammar is through various forms a ig visual demonstration. In example 5 we saw how a diagram oa : coupled with an explanation to give a clear demonstration of the point being made. Other diagrammatic/visual demonstrations that can be used are: Writing The teacher can write sentences on the board and underline ~~ ; critical points. Relationships between questions and enn oO example, can be shown with arrows and boxes like this: He watchles] TV every evening. [Does| he watch TVevery evening ? Time lines ok A favourite technique for many teachers is the use of time ines, " where a diagrammatic representation of tense and el is given. Thus the present perfect continuous in the sentence ve ver a reading the newspaper might look like this (it is represented by dotted line): Activity started Past ~> Now FutweWhereas the time line for the future perfect tense in the sentence In two months I wili have seen most of the United States could look like this: 2 months from ‘Now Past Novy. Pecan Feber Fingers Many teachers use hands and fingers as a way of demonstrating grammatical structure. For example, if we consider how willis frequently contracted, we might be focussing on a sentence like She'll arrive tomorrow. After modelling it, the teacher holds up four fingers and says this sentence, pointing to a finger for each word: She will arrive tomorrow The teacher then puts fingers 1 and 2 together and now says (pointing with the other hand): She’ll arrive tomorrow \ The act of pointing can also be used to increase the students’ speed, rhythm and stress. 27 The same effect is often achieved by teachers using Cuisenaire rods. Originally developed for use with a method called the Silent Way, these rods are of different colours and lengths. Teachers can give different grammatical properties to different rods and thus help to make grammar learning more visual. Explanation Of course teachers frequently explain new grammar. This can be done more or less overtly (see page 3). The use of ‘isolation’ (see above) is obviously a fairly covert way of explaining, whereas the following explanation is more overt: We don’t usually put adverbs between the verb and its object. Actually there are three main positions for adverbs: mid- position; end position; or initial position. We put adverbs in initial position when... This explanation might well present problems to a lot of students because of the technical words being used, and because abstract grammar explanations are always quite difficult to swallow. Of course, said in the students’ mother tongue it would be a lot more comprehensible. But we will want to be careful about the amount of mother tongue that we use in the English class. In general it seems that grammar explanations for beginners and elementary students are better handled with more obvious techniques, such as isolation and demonstration. Of course this is not always the case, and where a rule is easy to explain at the students’ level, then clearly an explanation would be appropriate. Conclusion In this chapter we have said that presentation is the stage at which students are introduced to the form, meaning and use of the new language. We have said that good presentations should be clear, efficient, lively and interesting, appropriate and productive. We have looked at examples of presentation material and concluded by looking at ways in which the teacher can give students more grammatical information.Exercises 1 Look at the exercise on page 18 again. What problem might be caused by the words at the top of the chart and what mistake can you predict? How could you solve this problem? 2 You have to present the past simple tense. a) How can you do this using the students and their situations? b) Look at some textbooks and see how they introduce the structure for the first time. Choose the one you like best and decide how you would teach it. 3 How would you use time lines to help students understand the difference between the past simple and the past continuous tenses? 4 How would you use your hands and fingers to demonstrate the contracted form of would and have in a third conditional sentence like: If ’'d known I’d’ve come earlier. References The examples from textbooks in this chapter come from the following books: a Student's Book 1 by Jeremy Harmer, p 24 (Longman English in Situations by Robert O'Neill, p 138 . . Press 1970) eill, p (Oxford University Kernel 2 by Robert O'Neill, pp 37, 38 (Longman 1982) 29 Discovery techniques In this chapter we are going to look at exercises and techniques which encourage students to ‘discover’ facts about grammar and grammatical usage. What are discovery techniques? In the last chapter we looked at ways in which the teacher asks the student to focus on new items of language. It was the teacher’s job to give the students examples of the language which the students then repeated and used. The teacher explained the grammatical and phonological form of the new language through various techniques. Discovery techniques, on the other hand, are those where students are given examples of language and told to find out how they work — to discover the grammar rules rather than be told them. At the most covert level, this simply means that the students are exposed to the new language, with no focus or fuss, some time before it is presented. At a more conscious level, students can be asked to look at some sentences and say how the meaning is expressed and what the differences are between the sentences. As students puzzle through the information and solve the problem in front of them, they find out how grammar is used in a text and are actually acquiring a grammar rule. The advantages of this approach are clear. By involving the students’ reasoning processes in the task of grammar acquisition, we make sure that they are concentrating fully, using their cognitive powers. We are also ensuring that our approach is more student-centred: it’s not just the teacher telling the students what the grammar is. They are actually discovering information for themselves. Of course these techniques are not suitable for all students on all occasions. Discovery activities can take a long time and cancceasionally be confusing Tho teacher ehould decide when to use these actiitiog, with what gramme and with which students ‘Meat teachers and materials writer have found of eouree that thi ‘Kind of materials casytodongn and use at termite Lovels where students have more English to talk bout language, For {his reason, many ofthe examples bolo core frm materiale for lower intermediate tudents and above, rather than foe bos f bogioners But ue we shall soe, chere are also ways of wing discovery techniques at lower levee We wil Be looking at four typos of activity preview: matching techniguee; text study; and problem-scleing Preview (One rather diginaland covert way of allowing students to before it ie actively learnt and taught. In other words, stadente ae ‘apoved 1 the new languages thes do act concentrate on a this tage, butte fact of having see the granumar in ation will hl ‘them deal with i when toy have eo ead ila Activities such as rooding and listening to txteexpoceetudont to language in this way, because while tudonte are practising Hetening and reading sil, they can algo be abworbing new language, Tacs two exampos from txthooks show ths kind of 1) from Track 2 2) frm Merion. Stents Book Trask: Search the text and ane how many examples of fF slauses asks Head ough he tex uch anes am ay you can in | erwin ane eure Whar langage sbi reviews In this ettret (from the eecond stage ofcourse for adolescents) Inti ec page 80 the sadntu are peoctiing thn sil of the text contains eramples ofthe grammatical patterns to be tought extracting facts and figures from a piece of tex. AL tho same ane, Imubsequent classes patter auch asf reine on Sunday PL ough there are two uses of cn, expressing possiblity, which will Stay ethane What wit! you do if ix sunny? In ther words the text te the focus of eudy in a eubeequent een, {sud noe only for comprehension a for setting up atopic for tse later in the uit but also to make the etudents famiir with the few language before teaching it ater. Previewing then n'a way of making aden aware of anew pice of language: the wil help them when thes study ta later sageMatching techniques ‘A numberof grammar xercee ak students to match parts of Sentences ant phrase. Often they workin pir for this and seat the activity rater like a problem-solving exerci (ee pa 3 “The point of matching exercinesiato get students to work tinge ‘bt fo thomas: they have to make choice about what gee = with what, and the activity of making choices helps them to discover correct Facts about grammar. These two examples show matching exercises 1) Tag questions Inthis matching exercise for elementary earners, the students have to match sentences with the tag questions that would go with them. As they do this Gndividually or im pairs) they work out how tag questions work You've been to Brazil, are you? ‘You can playthe flute, don’ you? You study ceonomics, did you? You aren't going to eave, haven't you? You didn’t fail the exam, can't you? ‘Task: Selest another grammatical area that you could use the same technique fr. 2) fram Ways to Grammar In thie example from a grammar book for intermediate students, the use ofthe word ufos is briefly explained. Students are then asked todoa matching oxercive. While they are doing this, they will be sorting out their understanding of uafese and bow it compares withif.Tanks Select another grammatical arva that you could use the | some teehnigue fo. Text study thom to concentrate nits one na text Teachers can get stent olootat the ay language saad or what kind of lang tied in contin context.‘The principle aim here ts toe siden terecognive the new language, Tees contrasting examples wil how thictechmigue: 1) from Kernel Tasks Doside what the new grammar point isin the sone passage Tnthis tract students have a situation clearly eet up by che thort passages of text. The new grammar points thes brought the second short pasage for immediate student attention Ciiz===) a ie en 4 s ‘This type of materia is very similar, ofcourse to the presentation material we looker tin chapter three. Here, a8 part of the presentation, the material arks students to discover for themsclves toh the grammar is, and what it mean. 2 from Turtle Diary Perhaps the best kind of text study is where students read (or listen ta} an authentic piece of text and then search through i to see how ‘certain coneapte are referred 0. “Tasks What concepte or vero tenses in this text would you point Gu toa group of lower intermediate stulents? Tawa im once, Th Seimwer, with Burt Lancaster. nite wasan ‘Amercan aSverising man mbes sad had sipped ot the preset. He ‘Moughrhe wl ad wile apd chideen anda hows, but i 8a gone ‘Theficgan with glen late summer aternoon. He raroed atthe “inning pool of me end wo bade sen ir for ang tne. They Tooke at han strangely be wae pct of hei preset ine ny mae ‘Whale he was thereteccrred Bl hat there were soma sang pons int pt of Connecti that Be oul lost wim al he wey Foe Soe men fom plo pool, public ad private, swimming across Fane Coury necting people fom aerer bit of ise whe Soinming few ase thought. And wherever be wet pepe bear ‘ery and deurbed, be ota’ belongio th present tine hey dia. ‘Nonchim ni Ath cod of the il be war beled in the doorway the ‘Tope locked bose tat ad teen his whe rin came down and he ear {acl ong back and ferh onthe erp tenis eat and he vices of bis dnughters who were gone, Dora and Tse the fi onthe L (© Russell Hoban 1975 ‘Stadenta rad this extract fem the novel Turtle Diary by Russell Hoban. After they have done compresension exercises and discussed the extract, the teacher can ask ther to Look a the following sentences: Init he wasan American advertising man whose mind had slipped out of the preset He turned up at the swimming poo! of some friends who hadn'« seen him fora Tong time At the end ofthe film he was hudaed in the doorway ofthe ‘empty locked house hat had been hisThey can then be asked to identify the verb (in each sentence) that refers to time/events before the film and the verb (in each sentence) which refers to time/events during the film. Clearly the past perfect forms are the ‘before the film’ verbs and the past simple verbs are the ‘during the film’ verbs. The point about this kind of activity is that the teacher asks the students to work something out for themselves. They see language in its proper (authentic) context and are then led to understand how it works. The same technique can be used with newspaper articles, play extracts, poetry, advertisements, etc. 3) The past simple | Task: What are the three past endings for regular verbs? In this example, students read a text and then have to select the verb endings and put the verbs in the right columns according to their endings. First of all the teacher writes a text using the required verbs. Here is an example: Mary watched the old man. He walked down the road. He stopped and talked to Mrs Castle at number 27. Then he crossed the road and managed to dodge the traffic. He visited the drugstore and disappeared through the door. Then he reappeared and walked towards her. The students have to put all the verbs into one of the three columns: /Id/ visited This activity would be suitable either before, or immediately after, 4 presentation of the past simple. The advantage of using it before the presentation is that it will give students a clear knowledge of the tense before they are asked to use it. If used after, it will serve as a good reinforcement to what the students have been learning. Wither way, the fact that students are asked to complete this 37 exercise themselves means that they are personally very involved in the acquisition of grammatical knowledge about the different endings of regular past tense verbs. | This kind of overt and conscious study of grammatical form leads us into our final category of discovery techniques. Problem-solving As students move from beginner levels of English through to intermediate and beyond, their level of English allows us to encourage them to talk about grammar and to analyse its properties. More importantly perhaps, students can look at areas of grammar rather than small details; the future, for example, rather than just one future form such as going to. One way of getting students to do this is to set up a problem and ask students to solve it. The problem can be, for example, that six sentences use the same structure, but it has six different meanings — what are they? Or the problem concerns typical mistakes that students make — how can they be corrected? The three examples we shall look at here show how, in solving such problems, students become aware of how the grammar of English works. 1) from Ways to Grammar In this extract, we assume that students already have some A Study these examples: Goodbye. I'll see you tomorrow. ; ; Look at those big black clouds: it’s going to rain. : We bought our tickets yesterday. We're leaving at 4 0 clock this afternoon. Beth may come to stay with us next weekend. ‘ The weather might be better if we wait until July. oe Our boat leaves Southampton at 10 am next Monday and arrives in New York next Friday evening. Now write the numbers of the examples above in the appropriate columns: the speaker is sure: the speaker is not sure:knowledge of the various ways of expressing the future. What is important is to get them to see the differences of meaning and use. This exercise asks them to study the future in terms of how sure the speaker is of the future. Task: Decide what level you could use this exercise at and how easy the students would find it. 2) from Discover English In these examples, the students are encouraged to become aware of exactly the kind of aspects of grammar that we discussed in chapte: two — the problems of form and function. In the first exercise (A), students are encouraged to realise that all the sentences refer to habitual or repeated actions, even though the grammatical forms are different. In the second exercise (B), students will recognise that the same form (the present continuous) can be used to express a number of different meanings. SECTION TWO Look at these groups of utterances. What do the utterances in each group have in common? What distinguishes them? If necessary, check in the commentary after doing exercise A to see whether you are on the right track. A. 1. Willy smokes B. 1. Pollution is getting 2. Fred’s a slow worker. worse. 3. Aggie used to drink. 2. It’s raining. 4. Joe’s in the habit of 3. I’m going out tonight. talking in his sleep. . He’s always dropping 5. He’s always making ash on the carpet. that mistake. Task: How would you use this material in class? 3) Using students’ efforts Task: List three of the most common verb tense mistakes that your elementary students make. A very good way of getting students to discover grammatical rules is to present them with examples of incorrect English. You can then encourage them to discover what is wrong and why. Hereare two possible ways of doing this: 39 1 While students are involved in an oral activity, go round the class noting down any errors you hear. When they have finished you can choose the mistakes that are the most ‘serious’ and write them up on the board, like this: 1 x You must to agree with me 2 x People is always complaining 3 x I haven’t seen him yesterday 4 x I am not agree Now students can work in pairs to identify the mistakes and put them right. (Notice that you should not say who made the mistakes.) 2. When students have written a composition (such as a letter, narrative, or advertisement) choose one which contains some common mistakes. Wipe out the name on the homework, underline the mistakes, and then photocopy it. In groups, students can study the composition and decide why the underlined pieces are wrong, and how to correct them. Conclusion Encouraging students to discover grammar for themselves is one valuable way of helping them to get to grips with the language. Very often this discovering of grammatical facts involves students in a fairly analytical study of the language — especially in the more intermediate examples we looked at. Teachers will have to decide how much of this kind of material is appropriate for their students, but one thing is certain: the use of discovery techniques can be highly motivating and extremely beneficial for the students’ understanding of English grammar. So then the question is whether these techniques are particularly time-consuming. Obviously reading a text (see pages 31, 32 and 35) takes time, but teachers should remember that the student will get reading practice as wellas focusing on the grammar. Getting students to solve grammatical! problems probably seems like a very long process. But if we think of the amount of time we generally spend on presentation at the intermediate level, the use of a problem-solving activity does not seem exaggerated. So time is not really a problem. What is much more important is whether teachers feel happy with these techniques and whether or not they suit the students. Exercises 1 Find an authentic English text that would be suitable for your students. a) Study it to see what language you could draw students’ attention to. b) How would you draw the students’ attention to the concept/language you have selected? 2 Choose a structure anda pattern. a) Write a story using examples of the structure. b) Decide on the task the students will do which will help them : to recognise the structure (see example 3, page 36). 3 Listen to some students talking and write down every mistake ‘you hear. Decide which of these mistakes you would put up on the can if you were going to use the techniques described on page 39. References The examples in this chapter have come from the following books: oan 2 by Michael Palmer and Donn Byrne, pp 20, 21 (Longman Meridian Student’s Book 1 by Jeremy Harmer, p 35 (Longman 1985) Ways to Grammar by John Shepherd, Richard Rossner and James Taylor, pp 143, 144, 112 (Macmillan 1984) Kernel 1 by Robert O’Neill, p 83 (Longman 1979) Turtle Diary by Russell Hoban, pp 70, 71 (Picador Books 1975) Discover English by Rod Bolitho and Brian Tomlinson, p 8 (Heinemann 1980) 41 Practice techniques In this chapter we are going to look at exercises and techniques which get students to practise grammatical items. In each case the teacher or the textbook writer has decided that certain specific items of language should be practised. But there are various ways of doing this. Some of them are straightforward — like drills — and others are more involved such as the use of interaction activities, games and quizzes. We will be looking at four different types of oral practice: drills; interaction activities; involving the personality; and games. We will also be looking at some written practice activities. Drills The aim of a drill is to give students rapid practice in using a structural item. Often this is done with the whole class — rather than with students in pairs — and the teacher is able to get students to ask and answer questions quickly and efficiently. The chief advantage of this kind of technique is that teachers can correct any mistakes that the students make and can encourage them to concentrate on difficulties at the same time. The problem with drills is that they are often not very creative. Teachers should make sure that they are not overused and that they do not go on for too long. As soon as students show that they can make correct sentences with the new item, the teacher should move onto more creative activities like the interaction activities in the next section. These two examples show drills in action: 1) Lists — have to and would like to Teachers can create material for controlled practice with drawings/mini-situations on the board just as they can create presentation material.In this example the teacher draws two faces on the board atu given them names. Then he or she writes in prompts for what the characters have to do at work and what they would like to do. For example: Miss Greystoke Clean floors Type letters Obligations | Wash windows Answer the telephone Empty rubbish Take shorthand Marry Miss Greystoke Earn more money Desires | Learn to read Take a long holiday Get a better job Marry her boss Students now practise asking and answering. What does Jake have to do at work? He has to clean floors. What would he like to do? He’d like to marry Miss Greystoke Task: How long would you let this activity continue? Would you use pairwork or do it with the whole class together? 2) From Meanings into Words: Intermediate 8.6 RECENT ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS Practice Work in pairs. Example A: You look tired. What have you been doing? B: I’ve been redecorating my flat. _ | How much have you done? ~~” | How far have you got with it? B: Well, so far I've done the ceiling and I’ve papered the walls, but | haven't painted the woodwork yet. Have conversations like this about: 1 cleaning the living room 5 making the supper 2 typing letters 6 getting the flat ready for a party \ revising for the exam 7 organising your brother’s wedding 4 building a house Work in groups. Tell each other what you have really been doing recently, and what particular things you have done. 43 In this example at the intermediate level students are practising the present perfect continuous and they are given more freedom than in the previous example to use their own ideas. Notice that the instruction is for the students to work in pairs. Here the teacher would first conduct the drill working with the whole class. With the first prompt ‘cleaning the living room’ the teacher can hold up cards with words like ‘dust the furniture/vacuum the carpet/shake out the rugs’ as prompts for the students to say, ‘Well, so far I’ve dusted the furniture and hoovered the carpets, but I haven’t shaken out the rugs yet.’ The teacher would then continue to give prompts where necessary until the students showed that they understood and could do the drill. At that moment the teacher would put them into pairs to continue the exercise. Task: What other drills can you think of? Drills, then, are fairly mechanical ways of getting students to demonstrate and practise their ability to use specific language items in a controlled manner. Interaction activities One of the problems about drills is that they are fairly monotonous. Some way must be found of making controlled language practice more meaningful and more enjoyable. One of the ways of doing this is by using interaction activities. These are designed so that students work together, exchanging information in a purposeful and interesting way. The following two examples show exercises which get students to practise grammatical items in a motivating way. 1) From Coast to Coast 1 In this (American English) example at beginner level, students are practising where questions with the present simple, making a difference between third person singular and plural verb endings. Students are put in pairs. Student A looks at the following material:6 ‘You will notic that A and #s information is slightly different. For ‘example, Adee kaow where Tracy lives and has to ask 8, who ‘doce know. Bdocen't know whore Ben and Shirley live and has to ‘sak A, The whole point is that and 8 must not look at each others ‘mape until they have finished, Sotho only way they have of ‘completing the task s by asking cach other questions like () ‘Where does Tracy live? to which 8 wil reply, Between the post ofice and the bank’. ‘This is an example ofa socalled information gop activity —where students have to ask each other for information to loss the gap” in ‘the information which they both have. Task: Decide what instructions you would give your class to make sure that this activity was a success. 2) Charis past ond present tenses Charts are very useful to promote interaction between student; in ‘onder to complete them the student have to question each other fad note down the replies. Inthis example students have to write down another student's ‘name. Then they ask that tuden: these questions ‘What is your favourite leisure activity? ‘When did you lst (do your favourite leisure activity)? How often do you (do your favourite leisure activity? ‘They fill in this chart according to the answers: Name Favouriteleisure activity] When?] How soften? Y 2 3 4 5‘The best way of doing this activity is to-ak all the students to stand up. They ean then move round the class questioning various Clasarnatos. When the students have finished they ean compare reeults, What isthe most popular leisure activity in the class? ‘Task: Decide what problems this activity might cause. How could you overcame them? Involving the personality Recently come teachore and materiale writers have designed ‘exercises which practise grammar while atthe same time requiring students to talk about themselves in a more involved way than in the example above. They are asked to discuss things that affect their personality and to use this subject matter as a focus for ‘srammar practice. These wo cxamplas show how thie ean be done: 1) Chain dell — crimes! ‘One way of making a practice drill more involving is to get | students to contribute something oftheir own toi: in this way they | ‘ill be more involved in the practice (even though iti fairly ‘mechanical | In this example, students are practising the present perfect. They stn circles ad one after the other have to say, | am (name) and I've never (crime). | for exemple, Tam Mana and Pve never robbed a bank. ‘This activity great fun, although ifthe circle is too large the students soon run out of ‘crimes’ and have to think fairly hard ‘Some people also worry that students might revea! a bit toomuch, fof themselves when they choose the crime that thoy haven't ‘committed! 7 }o you like this activity? Why? Why not? 2) Your favourite food In this example from Caring and Sharing inthe Forsign Language Class, students practise the use of was and were in the context of, talking about their childhood in a positive and happy light. In an ‘hadente stat discussing rather than peactsing the language. i “Task: Thiemavorial from am American writer How can you all? In oth these examples the practice hae been designed tobe more interesting than usual. Bocoase the atudents are themoalvee involved in mhat they are talling about, the activities are likely to ‘be more meaningful Homever teachers have to be sure that thoir sSrlents are mature enough to handle such activities and they need tobe aonaitive tothe stadente’ reactions to such oxeraises. Games Gameoe of variow kinds have boon uced in language teaching for 8 Jong time and they are expecially useful for grammar work.“Task: Have you ever used games in class to practise language? Did you ever play games clase when you were learning a language? ‘Noughts and crosses/tie-tae-toe ‘This game is very poplar in the classroom ~ siti in eal life. The ‘las ie divide into teams, Team «uses tse ought (0 and tam ‘uses the crous(X). The teacher draws a grid on the board and fle tach apace with a word or phrace. For example, ifthe teacher ‘wanted to practice quection worda, the board might Look like thie: ‘Team Achookes one ofthe squares and one ofthe team has to make’ fa gentence or question withthe word or phraso in that square. If they aucceed they put an Uon that equare. Team Btries todo the same with another square: if they are succesful they puta cross on their square. The frst team to get astraight line of three nought ‘oreromes (either horizontally, vertically or diagonally) wins the ‘Teachers ean of course put whatever words they wantin the spaces, for example, modal vorbs ntniives which the students have to rake into past verbs, conjunctions, et. General knowledge quizzes Gencral knowlege quizzes can be very enjoy topractise various grammatical items Here ina procedure to follow ifthe teacher of an elementary clase wants the tuden's to practise the superlative orm of adjectives lead can be used "The teacher elicits superlative jective (oldest, bigest longest, most expense) from the students, They then divide into ‘two tearm Bach team must write general knowledge questions ® using these adjectives, such as What isthe highest mountain in the world?" While they aro writing those questions they can consult. atlases and other reference books, When the game start team A tasks team Bone of the questions. Team fgets a point if they answer correctly, Quizzes ean also be used for past tenses, (Who was the first man on the moon”), comparatives, (Which is heavier; an elephant or & whale?’ and so on. Board games ‘Many bourd games have been adapted for use in English teaching. ‘The following game, taken from Meridian 2, isa typical example of sich games. ‘The board looks like this:These are the instructions which the student gets: 3 ee ee Meridian Trail: a game for 3-5 players You need: * adice * the Trail board on page 74-75 * asmall piece of paper with your name on it to use as a ‘counter’ How to play 1 Throw the dice. The player with the top score starts the game. 2 The player throws the dice. If, for example, the dice shows 4, he goes forward four squares. 3 Ifa player lands on, for example, a GO TO 6 square, he goes forward to square number 6. If he lands ona GO BACK TO 3 square, he goes back to square number 3. 4 When a player lands on a A/SK square, all the players must look at the R/SK questions on page 75. For unit 10 the player must choose the number between 1 and 10 on the RISK square and answer the question. If the other players say ‘correct’, he goes forward one square. If they say ‘wrong’, he goes back one square. If in doubt, ask the teacher. 5 The winner is the first player at number 30. And these are the questions which the students have to answer if they land on a ‘risk’ square: Meridian Trail: Risks 1-10 1 Complete the sequence: tall/taller/tallest; big/bigger/biggest; good/.......... Tiawcarsexmpons 2 Whichis correct? Heisn'tas abigger bbiggest cbig ashis brother 3 Complete this sentence: Books are.......... expensive than records. 4 Complete the sequence: wear/wore/worn; work/worked/worked; DOK «ose nmeceass Vincweptouxt PRED) 5 sede stai Picstiodtiyss 5 Give the correct form of the verb in brackets: | (never see) .......... the film ‘A Passage to India’. 6 Make a sentence with just. 7 Complete this sentence with one word only: | haven't got.......... money. 8 Complete the following sequence: kind/unkind; expensive/inexpensive; possible/........... 9 Make a question with most expensive. 10 Which is correct? He ahas bwas just been made President. 51 Meridian Trail: Risks 11-20 11 Complete this sentence with one word only: You weren't at home last night, 12 Give the correct form of the verb in brackets: Next week | (buy) a new car. 13 Make a question with been. 14 Which is correct? |haven‘tseenhim asince bfor twoyears. 15 Complete the sequence: see/saw/seen; wear/wore/worn; speak/.......... i sieves 16 Give the correct forms of the verbs in brackets: If you (go) out now, you (get) 17 Make a sentence with as soon as. 18 Which is correct? If! awin bwillwin alotof money, I'll buy a car. 19 Make a question with while. 20 Which is correct? As soonashe awillarrive bhasarrived he'll phone his wife. Games like Meridian Trail can be used to animate a class and as a form of relaxation from the usual activities of language learning. Task: Decide if you would use a game like this in class. What problems can you anticipate? How could you overcome them? Other games that can be used in the classroom to practise grammar are bingo (where a teacher reads out sentences and the students have to identify them on a board), twenty questions (where students ask yes/no questions to try to identify an object) and board games (where students have to say whether the sentences they find on certain squares are grammatically correct or not). Written practice Grammar practice is often done through writing. Students are frequently given homework exercises which ask them to practise specific language items. The following examples show some of the more common exercise types that can be used. They start with the most controlled kind of writing practice and end with something that is a bit freer — even though it is still designed for the practice of a specific grammatical item.“Task: Decide which ofthe foloming two types of writin practice you prefer, and why. Lins ‘Tho Sillin ioa favourite tochniqu for practising and testing writing, The students ead sentence with Dian They have toil the blanks with recite words. Tn this example for complete beginners students are practising td Aiferenee between is and ae. Put iso aren the blanks, 1 Potse —__adoetor. 2 His ister Margaret —_a reporter 3 They 26 yoars ol 4 Margaret and Peter not twins 5 Pater in Turkey now. He on oli i ila are fey cay to write and are eel for quick practical specific language poince, Stadents can do them i clase be as Bomowork. Writeen dite Inthe fllowing written drill for upper intermediate sunt Meanings int Words, students have to respand Loa peep brtcubae grammatical constriction, Word order Word orders a problem fr most non native speakers of Bglish. ‘This is especially so in writing One way of practising correct word order isto give students jumbled eotences whieh they thon have to rearrange in the corect fonder Here are some examples: 1 Ankara jon holiday. ties J right now / Peter /in oni hein i 2 at/ eta / Margaret home | half past ix. usually 4 Peter /hois/the hospital | works/in a eurgeon. / where Away of making this activity even more involving isto put the ‘words sod phrases on large cards, Exch atadent gets a card and the ten Nave to rearrange themselves physically. “Task: Sone wections in thin exercine have single words and ‘thers have more than one. Is there any Feacon for this do you think? Sentonce writing Tn this exercise for beginner, students are ashed to write sentences bouts picture using prticlar verb ense. This example tes the pretentcontiouous. ‘Write four sentences about the picuire. Say what the peaple areTask: If you were correcting this activity, would you yourself write out the correct version of sentences that students get wrong or would you get the students to try to do it? Why? Parallel writing Task: Read the postcard in the example. What language (apart from the present continuous) is being practised? In this example for (American English) beginners from Coast to Coast 1, students are again being asked to practise the present continuous (amongst other things). When they have read Joan’s postcard, they have to write a similar one of their own. Read and write 3 Read Joan's card to her mother. Then answer the questions: 55 Conclusion In this chapter we have looked at a variety of practice activities which ask students to practise certain grammatical items. Generally, the activities are designed so that the students practise the language while at the same time being involved in an enjoyable activity. Students need to practise their grammar a lot. Where possible this will be done in pairs using interaction activities and so on. Where drills are used, the teacher must always remember that they are only a means to an end. As soon as possible they should be abandoned in favour of one of the more creative activities that we have shown in this chapter. Exercises 1 Design an information gap activity like the one on page 44 to practise the patterns who is he?/where does he live?/what does he do?/what’s he doing right now? 2 Write ten general knowledge questions that you think would be appropriate for your students. 3 Choose a specific language point and write a fill-in exercise to practise it. 4 Write a short text for beginner students to use as a parallel writing activity. References The textbook examples in this chapter have come from the following books: Meanings into Words: Intermediate Students’ Book by Adrian Doff, Christopher Jones and Keith Mitchell, p 54 (Cambridge University Press 1983) Coast to Coast Student’s Book 1 by Jeremy Harmer and Harold Surguine, p 74 (Longman 1987) Caring and Sharing in the Foreign Language Class by Gertrude Moskowitz, p 120 (Newbury House 1978)Meridian Activity Book 2 by Jeremy Harmer and Steve Elsworth, pp 34, 74, 75 (Longman 1986) Meanings into Words: Upper Intermediate. Workbook by Adrian Doff, Christopher Jones and Keith Mitchell, p 10 (Cambridge University Press 1984) Coast to Coast Student’s Book 1 p 45 Acknowledgement 11 first saw the ‘crimes’ drill (p 46) used by Mario Rinvolucri. 57 Testing grammar In this chapter we are going to look at how to test the students’ knowledge of grammar. We will look at a number of types of test items. Types of test We can test the students’ ability to speak or write. We can test students’ reading or listening comprehension skills. Many tests include all these elements, especially public exams like those from the University of Cambridge or the Oxford Delegacy, for example, which have four or five separate papers. But because marking written tests is easier than marking oral tests — and because written tests take less time and are easier to administer — most tests are based on the written skills, especially when they are designed for individual schools and colleges. Many teachers feel that this is unsatisfactory since so much teaching in the classroom is based on oral work, but as yet no one has come up with a practical solution to the problems of time and administration with oral tests for large numbers of students. Public exams test how good a student’s overall command of English is. In this chapter, however, we will look at tests which are given in schools and classes to find out how well students have done. These are often called achievement tests and are given after four or six weeks’ study, or after three or four units of a coursebook, or after a semester or year’s work. The aim of such tests is to see if students have learnt and acquired the language they have been studying or have been exposed to. Tests are usually written by heads of departments or by teachers of individual classes. Writing achievement tests Writing a test is an important job that demands skill and patience. Good tests show both teacher and students how well they are alldoing. They do not fail students unnecessarily and they give everyone a chance to show how much they have learnt. Tests can often go wrong, not just because of the students’ lack of knowledge, but also because of problems in the writing of the tests themselves. When writing tests teachers should bear in mind the following five ‘rules’. 1 Don’t test what you haven’t taught The purpose of an achievement test is to find out how well students have achieved what they have been studying. In such a test, then, it is not fair to test things that they haven’t been exposed to. Stick to the language that you have been studying unless you are testing reading or listening comprehension (where the students’ ability to understand unfamiliar words is one of the things you will be looking at). Of course, where students are being asked to write freely, they can be encouraged to be as ambitious as you want them to be (see 4 below). 2 Don’t test general knowledge Test writers should remember that they are testing the students’ knowledge of English, not their knowledge of the world. For example, a test item like this would not be acceptable. Picasso was a famous It is, after all, quite possible that your students have never heard of Picasso, especially if they are young or come from non-European cultures. The problem is that if students get this item wrong, you don’t know if it is because they don’t know about Picasso or because they don’t know the word painter (or artist). 3 Don’t introduce new techniques in tests One thing that confuses students in tests, is the presence of item types and techniques that they have never seen before. In other words, if students are given a set of jumbled words and asked to reorder them to make a sentence, we would expect them to have seen this type of activity before in class. If the sentence-ordering activity is completely new to them, they may have difficulties 59 understanding how to do the question which have nothing to do with their knowledge of English (or lack of it). 4 Don’t just test accuracy Although we will be looking mainly at items which test grammatical accuracy in this chapter, it is vital that an achievement test examines the students’ ability to use language, not just their knowledge of grammatical accuracy. In other words students must be given a chance to write a letter, a description or an essay (for example) at some stage in the test. The teacher marking the test can then see if the students are able to express themselves freely, as well as being able to do questions about specific language items. Items which only test one thing (e.g. a verb form or a question word) have been called discrete items. Test items which test the students’ whole knowledge of the language — like essay writing — have been called integrative. 5 Don’t forget to test the test It is extremely unwise to write a test and give it straight to the students. Often unforeseen problems arise. Perhaps you forgot to write clear instructions. Perhaps there are some mistakes. Perhaps the test is far too difficult — or far too easy. But especially if the test is important for students (and most tests are) you must try to ensure that it works. The first thing to do when you have just written a test is to show it to colleagues. They will often spot problems that you have not thought of — and they may be able to suggest improvements. At the very least they should spot misprints! If possible you should try your test out with a class of students similar to your own. Sometimes the best way to do this is to get a class of a slightly higher level than your own to try it out. If they can do it fairly comfortably then you’ve probably got the level about right. But even if you can’t try out your test on other students, you must get other people to read it to spot any obvious mistakes or problems. Test items We can now look at a number of items that test a student’sknowledge of grammar. We will start by looking at more discrete items (see 4 above) and end by looking at testing techniques that are slightly more integrative. Task: For each of the following test types find out a) exactly what the exercise is testing, b) how you would mark it, c) how easy it would be for your students, and d) how much of a test with fifty marks you would devote to this kind of test. Multiple choice In multiple choice items, students have to choose the correct answer from a number of alternatives. At the most simple level, multiple choice can be used to test the students’ grammatical knowledge, for example: Choose the correct answer, a, b, c or d. 1 Charles ________ to work yesterday. a) doesn’t go b) hasn’t gone c) didn’t go d) isn’t going 2 Charles is going _______ his grandmother tomorrow. a) visit b) to visit c) visiting d) visited 3 I want to buy _______ new furniture. a)some b)a c) two d) something Multiple choice items can be made a greater test of all-round comprehension if they are part of a passage or dialogue, for example: HILARY: Where are you a) on to? b) in c) off d) out JANE: I’m just going to the shops. HILARY: Could you a) post this letter with you? b) take c) bring d) buy JANE: Yes, of course. HILARY: And you’d better a)take anumbrella. b) to take c) taking d) took JANE: Why? HILARY: Because it’s going to rain. 61 Multiple choice items like this have the great advantage of being easy to mark. But it is difficult to write ‘distractors’ (the three wrong answers), which aren’t either absurd — or possible — as well as the correct answer. Special care should be taken to make sure that there is only one correct answer. Multiple choice items like this test the students’ recognition of grammatical items. They are not tests of the students’ productive ability. Fill-ins Fill-ins are those items where students have to fill a blank with a word or words. Often students see five separate sentences and have to fill in a word for each. In this example from the tests of Opening Strategies (at beginner level) however, the students have to understand a whole text at the same time and then write the words on a separate sheet of paper. Look at Jenny’s postcard to Joanne. Write the missing words on your answer paper. Write one word for each space. Example: This is a picture 12 _ the Colosseum in Rome. You write: 12. of people (2) very nice. Susan (3) not Like the city very much, buk (4) Uikes tne meals. (She loves spaghetti! ) Sunan har two friends in Rome (s) Palo and Kutt. (6) live (7) the netth-west of Rama. Kurt is an artist. (2) pichures are very gaze. Paolo is Malian and Kurt is Geeman. te. ls (4) Homburg. | (0) speak (tehian or Greeman, but Paole and Kurt aun speak English very well. See you sem, Leve, "00d tect of students’ comprehension as well as oftheir Jnowiedge of individual grammatical items (such a= personal pronouns, prepositions, andthe verb 10 be, ete) Its certainly more integrative than the treditional Allin vem such as He te orange after Lunch, Filkin items are easy to write although it ix sometimes dificule to ensure that students can put in only one answer! Even in our orange example, readers willbe ublo to come up with more than one ‘nord to put inthe blank which could be correct, Test writers wll dhave to ty their best to write items which only allow one answer ‘but they should be prepared to accept other correct possi ‘that they had not previously thought of Sentence completion Fillin items usually ask for only one word, But they can be ‘extended to teet more ofthe students knowledge and use of English. Students haveto fil n'a blank and/or complete a sentence with more than one word. There will often be more than one way of doing this. Test items lke this are usually called sentence completions {In this example from a progress test from Meanings into Words (at the upper intermediate level), stadents have to choose language that makes sense rr Cone esr wo ty mene 1 kena 4 Re ore none fhe Ba DES Obviously students who complete this task succesfully show that they have alot of grammatical knowledge an that they ure abe to ‘use the right vocabulary and grammar to complete the tak, In that sense these are quite integrative tasks. But they will be dificult to ‘mark accurately. Do students get extra marks for trying to be more ‘advanced’? Do all mistakes lose the same aniount of marks? Obviously the writers ofthis test do not have only one correct newer in mind, but deciding what to necept makes the test, ‘marker's task quite complex Sentence reordering [students are used to this activity, then part of atest (for beginners) might look like this Put the words in order to make correct sentences 4 he lives / John i / and Jin London, /a student 2 ahousewife and |is/ His sister sheis secretary. | 8 at home now, /isn't/im Canada. / His sister / she is 4 Thursday. [Toronto /Sbe was /on in 5 om holiday in /in London, / John {he is / France. ian ‘This type of test item explores the studente' knowledge of syntax sand is useful ndltion toa teat. However it should not be confused With a test of production and once again test writers must be sure ‘hac ifmore than one order ix powsible (and itaften is all possible forders should be marke ax correct. ‘Transformations A test of the students knowledge of syntax and structure is sentence transformation. Here students have to rewrite sentences So that they have the same meaning but different grammetical structure, Hore are some examples: Complete the sentences so that they mean the same as the original sentence. Start with the words given. 1 John is taller than Mary. Mary isn 2‘Thaven't sven her for years’ he sai.RAR BRIG Shab ee eet le el ll 3 I won’t come unless you ring. MP COMO pe 4 She wasn’t strong enough to lift the suitcase. WWe'puitcase Once again, this is the kind of test type that students need to be prepared for. Students should have practised transforming sentences before they come across this exercise. But the ability to transform sentences correctly certainly implies quite a lot of grammatical knowledge — although it may take a certain kind of ‘intelligence’ to be very good at it. Sentence writing As we saw in chapter five, students can practise their sentence writing by describing a picture, as in this example: Write four sentences about this picture using there is and there We ae sel 2 3 4 This activity certainly tests the students’ ability to write correct sentences — and their ability to use there with is and are correctly. It is not, of course, a very creative exercise, and, although more integrative than a single sentence fill-in, does not really test language use. 65 Parallel writing One way of providing a fairly controlled integrative test type is through parallel writing. Here you ask the students to use their knowledge of grammar and vocabulary to imitate a piece they have read (and understood). The following example from a test for Track 2 (at the elementary level) shows the technique in practice. G_ Writing (10 marks) Read this passage, and look at the map. ONRADY The island of Konrada is in the Pacific Ocean, 600 kilometres north of Japan. There are a lot of mountains in the west of the island and a big forest in the south east. There is a PACIFIC big volcano in the middle of the island. The GlEAN name of the volcano is ‘Hajimoto’. There are two big cities. Bintwa is in the north and Rakawa is in the south east. Most BX , of the people live in the cities. A few people el my | saran 600 kms live near the sea in the south of the island. These people are fishermen. Now write about the island of Binat. Use these notes and look at the map. island / Binat / Atlantic Ocean / 300 kilometres / west / Africa. // mountains / north / island. // big forest / south west. // big volcano / middle / island. // name / volcano / Fire Mountain. // two big cities. // Crofta / south east / and / Portland / west. // most / people / live / cities. // few people / near / volcano / middle / island. // people / farmers. // P AFRICA 300 kms ortland ——_> ATLANTIC OCEANThe students are given notes to help them write their own paragraph, and this may be especially helpful since this material is designed for young teenagers. The activity would be even more challenging, of course, if the notes were not there. Parallel writing is quite a good compromise between discrete and integrative test types. The test writer can include the grammar he wants students to produce in the original paragraph and hope that the students will reuse it in their own piece of writing. The test writer can make the original paragraph more or less controlled. In order to complete this task successfully, students need to understand a paragraph, its form and its grammar. Once again, the test writer should be sure that students have previously used this technique in class since it might otherwise cause confusion. Conclusion In this chapter we have looked at a number of exercises which test grammar, together with some ‘rules’ or hints about test design. We have stressed the need for test exercises which encourage the students’ written production as well as items which concentrate on accuracy. Most of our examples have been of the latter kind, but we should not forget activities like essays, compositions, and letter writing. As soon as students start using language in this way, though, grammar is just one of the things which is being tested — and that is why such exercises have not been included in this book Exercises = Write some multiple choice items to test the students’ knowledge of the difference between simple and continuous verbs (present, present perfect past and past perfect tenses). Write a five item sentence-completion exercise for a final test at the lower intermediate level. Try to make all the items refer to the same context. 3 Write three transformation items to test either reported speech or the second conditional or so/such a... that... Look at the bw 67 parallel writing test item above. How would you mark this item? How many marks do students lose for mistakes? Are all spelling mistakes going to be penalised? What does a student need to do to score full marks on this exercise? References The textbook examples in this chapter have come from the following publications: Opening Strategies Tests by Nick Dawson, p 5 (Longman 1983) Meanings into Words: Upper Intermediate. Test Book by Adrian Doff, Christopher Jones and Keith Mitchell, p 6 (Cambridge University Press 1984) Track Tests 1 2.3 by Nick Dawson, p 26 (Longman 1985)Final task Say whether you agree with these statements by scoring them from 0 (if you completely disagree) to 5 (if you completely agree). All grammar teaching should be covert. Teachers 0123:45 should not draw students’ attention to grammatical facts and rules. Students should discover facts about grammar 012345 through problem-solving activities. Teachers should not teach such facts. The best kind of grammar practice is written 012345 grammar practice. The only language that you can really test with O12 3145 any accuracy is grammar. Children do not learn grammar rules when they 012345 acquire their first language, so adults don’t need to either. Compare your results for this task with your results for the first task of chapter one. Have your opinions altered as you have read the book? 69 Suggestions for further reading There are many books about grammar available nowadays, and many more collections of grammar exercises continue to be produced. A list of all the books which have been published would be extremely long: for that reason we will list only a few titles from amongst the many excellent books in the shops. We will look at two kinds of books; books about grammar and grammar practice books. Books about grammar BALD, W, COBB, D AND SCHWARZ, A Active Grammar (Longman 1986) This is a simple reference grammar which describes the structures and forms encountered at basic and elementary levels. It is clearly laid out and it is accompanied by examples. It includes cartoons. There is an accompanying book of exercises. BOLITHO, R AND TOMLINSON, B Discover English (Heinemann 1980) The authors called this a ‘language awareness’ book and it was developed for use with advanced students and trainee teachers. Readers are made aware of problems and usages in English grammar through ‘discovery techniques’ (see chapter four). In the second half of the book the authors provide solutions to the problems they have set. SHEPHERD, J, ROSSNER, R AND TAYLOR, J Ways to Grammar (Macmillan 1984) This is a grammar practice book intended for intermediate students. However, each section is prefaced by a description of the points to be dealt with and there are extremely useful summary charts which lay grammatical information out in a sensible way. While not being as comprehensive as Practical English Usage, (see below) there is a lot of clear explanation here. SWAN, M Basic English Usage (Oxford University Press 1984) This book concentrates on the most recurrent problems in English usage. It is arranged alphabetically and shows typical mistakes together with correct forms and usage. There is an accompanying book of exercises.SWAN, M Practical English Usage (Oxford University Press 1980) This is the more advanced version of Basic English Usage. It is designed for upper intermediate and advanced students, but many teachers have also found it useful as a reference guide. Grammatical points are arranged alphabetically and common mistakes are mentioned. The language of the explanations is clear and accessible and the number of entries and the points covered is extremely comprehensive. Serious students of English will also want to consult these two titles: QUIRK, R, GREENBAUM, S, LEECH, G and SVARTVIK, J A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Longman 1985) This is the most complete and authoritative grammar of the English language for both native and non-native speakers of English grammar. QUIRK, R and GREENBAUM, S A University Grammar of English (Longman 1973) This concentrates on present-day English grammar and makes distinctions between spoken and written, formal and informal, American and British, usage. Grammar practice books Apart from the exercises which accompany the books about grammar and the practice material in Ways to Grammar, here are some other practice titles: ELSWORTH, S AND WALKER, E Grammar Practice for Intermediate Students (Longman 1986) This collection of exercises is for students at an intermediate level (or above). The grammar is clearly explained and then students do 1: variety of exercises which are often accompanied by humorous cartoons. GRAVER, BD Advanced English Practice (New Edition) (Oxford University Press 1985) This favourite for teachers of advanced students has exercises on 1 great variety of grammar points in the English language. Much of the language is at a very advanced level. Some of the exercises are a bit out-of-date, but this is a solid collection of practice activities for students at this level. 71 HIGGINS, M Elementary Grammar Workbooks 1, 2 and 3 (Longman 1985) These three workbooks cover the grammar found at the elementary level. Students write in the books for the various exercise types. Each section is preceded by a chart which lays out the point(s) to be practised. MURPHY, R English Grammar in Use (Cambridge University Press 1985) This is for intermediate and advanced students. Grammar explanations with exercises are provided, and there is a detailed index and appendices dealing with tenses, spelling, etc. SEIDL, J Grammar in Practice 1 and 2 (Oxford University Press 1982) Grammar points at the elementary level are presented through a series of dialogues and texts and then practised in a variety of exercises.