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The document discusses the nature of grammar, its role in language learning, and the differences between spoken and written language. It emphasizes the importance of grammar in conveying meaning and the need for a communicative approach in teaching grammar. Additionally, it outlines various characteristics of spoken and written discourse, highlighting their structural complexities and contextual dependencies.

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2 views

Notes

The document discusses the nature of grammar, its role in language learning, and the differences between spoken and written language. It emphasizes the importance of grammar in conveying meaning and the need for a communicative approach in teaching grammar. Additionally, it outlines various characteristics of spoken and written discourse, highlighting their structural complexities and contextual dependencies.

Uploaded by

mariacristienesantos
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Lecture 1: What is Grammar?

Social media post corpus is a collection of written or spoken material in


machine-readable form, assembled for the purpose of studying linguistic
structures, frequencies, and etcetera.

Texts, Sentences, Words, and Sounds

The study of grammar consists, in part, of looking at the way these forms are
arranged and patterned. For example, adjective precedes noun.

Grammar is conventionally seen as the study of the syntax and morphology of


sentences.

Morphology is the study of words, how they are formed, and their relationship
to other words in the same language.

It is the capacity to recognize the constraints on how sentence elements are


chained and on how sentence slots are filled that makes a good amateur
grammarian.

From a learner's perspective, the ability both to recognize and to produce well-
formed sentences is an essential part of learning a second language.

Grammar and Meaning

Grammar is a process for making a speaker's or writer’s meaning clear when


contextual information is lacking.

Grammar is not a static object. It has evolved to express the needs of its users
as efficiently as possible. It is a body of rules that underlies language without
which language would be chaotic.

Lecture 2: Spoken and Written Language

Probabilistic talks about probable structure in terms of actual use, while


deterministic are linguistic and rules determined by specialists.

Role as a Second Language Teacher:


 Learner’s attention needs to be focused not only on the forms of
language, but on the meanings they convey.

Two Kinds of Meaning:


 Representational is how language represents something. In its
representational role, language reflects the way we perceive the world.
 Interpersonal is how we develop relationships through language.

Speech Act:
 Locutionary refers to the literal meaning of the utterance.
 Illocutionary is related to the social function that the utterance or the
written text has.
 Perlocutionary is the result or effect that is produced by the utterance in
the given context.

Spoken and Written Language General Differences

1. Grammatical Intricacy

Written discourse is more structurally complex and more elaborate than


spoken discourse. In other words, sentences in spoken discourse are short and
simple, whereas they are longer and more complex in written discourse.

Rebuttal: Halliday argues that spoken discourse is not less organized. He


claims that spoken discourse has its own kind of complexity. In spoken
discourse, clauses are long and spread out. Spoken discourse can be
grammatically intricate as well.

2. Lexical Density

Lexical density refers to the ration of content words (Nouns, verbs, adjectives,
and adverbs) to grammatical function or function words (Pronouns,
prepositions, and articles) within a clause.

Spoken discourse is lexically dense than written discourse. Content words


tend to be spread out over a number of clauses, whereas they seem to be
tightly packed into individual clauses.

3. Nominalization

Nominalization refers to presenting actions and events as nouns rather than


as verbs.

Written discourse has a high level of nominalization (More nouns than verbs).
Written discourse tends to have longer noun groups than spoken discourse.

4. Explicitness

Writing is more explicit than speech.

Rebuttal: This is not always true. It depends on the purpose of text. A


writer/speaker can state something explicitly or infer it depending on many
variables.

5. Contextualization

Contextualization refers to the extent knowledge of context is needed to


interpret a text.

Writing is more decontextualized than speech. Speech is more attached to


context than writing, because speech depends on a shared situation and
background for interpretation.
Rebuttal: This may be true of conversations, but not in all types of spoken
discourse. Some types of written discourse may show high dependence on
shared contextual knowledge. For example, personal letters between friends.

6. Spontaneity

Spoken discourse lacks organization and is ungrammatical, because it is


spontaneous, whereas written discourse is organized and grammatical.

Spoken discourse contains more uncompleted and reformulated sentences.


Topics can be changed. Speakers may interrupt and overlap.

Rebuttal: Spoken discourse is organized, but it is organized differently from


written language.

7. Repetition, Hesitations, and Redundancy

Spoken discourse contains more repetition, hesitations, and redundancy,


because it is produced in real time (On the spot)

Spoken discourse had many pauses and fillers.

Lecture 3: Grammar in the Communicative Approach

Communication is the be-all and end-all of language learning and grammar is


the by-product of this endeavor.

Grammar is cumulative. It should not be presented in a linear additive fashion


but should be regularly revised and reintroduced (Cyclical/spiral approach)

Cyclical/Spiral Approach
 Repetition of lesson

Grammar instruction and activities should be integrated within a


communicative framework.

Language should be presented and learnt within a context.

The relationship between forms and their uses should be made clear to
learners.

Characteristics of Communicative Activities:


1. The success of a communicative activity can be determined by the
extent to which learners are dependent on the teacher. Tasks should be
devised in a manner that learners gain autonomy and independence
while learning.
2. Clear and to the point instructions. Environment for learners to interact
and exchange information.
3. Learners should be at ease and have fun while doing the communicative
tasks.
4. Communicative tasks are realistic.
5. Communicative tasks require learners to take initiatives and provide
their responses.
6. Communicative activities are meaningful.
7. Underlying competence that is linguistic, sociolinguistic, pragmatic, and
strategic.

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