When I was reading this article, a Douglas Adams quote popped into my head. "Isn't is enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" Now, of course, Adams is not talking about grammar, but I think there's sort of a parallel here. Do we have to understand grammar in order to write well or understand a text? The answer, as the article shows over and over again is no.
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| Picture posted solely because of the Douglas Adams quote. |
I believed grammar to be important, but the article got me thinking about my own educational experiences. I did not have a formal grammar class until last spring. Last January was the first time I ever diagrammed a sentence. However, we understand what grammar is, and how English should operate in its standard form just by interacting with the world. Textbooks are written grammatically, newspapers and books follow these rules. The rules of grammar and language can be, it seems, learned by osmosis. We may need to clear up some points, and offer guidance, but I don't know that we need to have students work tirelessly at grammar.
I would hesitate to say though that teaching grammar is not important at all. There are some students who will struggle with grammar, but I think the key is not overload them with the subject. Instead of seeing grammar as the foundation to good writing, perhaps we should look at it as insulation. It is important, but it isn't the biggest concern. Good grammar can help to make a good paper a great one, because good grammar won't distract from the paper's ideas like bad grammar will. However, as teachers (as was mentioned in class) it should be more important to focus on how a paper is organized and how its ideas are articulated rather than comma placement.
I think that another important thing to take into consideration is that no matter what your stance is on grammar, whether you believe it is important or not, as teachers we must be unafraid to teach grammar. Students will ask questions about how sentences are constructed and why we use I in some cases and me in others. We should be able to engage in these discussions. Grammar is a tool to use to write better and communicate better, and we should be able to help students with their grammar. At the same time, we must realize that grammar is not the only tool to be used to accomplish those goals and that each student may need something different.
AH,
ReplyDeleteI really like your point about grammar being "insulation." I never would have thought to use that word, but that's kind of how I feel about grammar, too. You're right - good grammar can make a good paper a great one, but I agree that too often the focus of teachers is simply on "correctness" instead of ideas, communicating meaning, etc. I like the idea of framing grammar in the classroom around the goal of communication and using it as a means to an end instead of it being the actual end.
I really like your comment about learning grammar through "osmosis." I believe that to be how I learned grammar. Some students may not be able to do that, but for the ones who can, do we really need grammar instruction? Probably not. That's what makes this such a difficult issue. What if half the class can't figure out where on earth to put a comma and the other half has it down? That is why I mentioned (in class the other day) students teaching each other. I would imagine a student teaching another student would be valuable to both parties. A problem arises with that, however, in making some students feel superior (as teachers) and some feel inferior (as learners). I wonder how we could avoid that. Trickery to be sure.
ReplyDeleteI think peer editing could be a way to do that. I don't think you want to have students teaching students all the time. I personally remember being paired up with kids who struggled all the time and I felt that I was being used to get the other kid a decent grade. But, if you do peer editing, have kids get in groups and read over two or three of their classmate's work, you get a more communal sense in the classroom and hopefully dull the lines of division between those who "get it" and those who "don't". Also while one kid may know where to put commas, he or she might struggle with subject-verb agreement. There's a lot of different rules and I think everyone has their own pet peeve rule, and so students might be good lookouts for different things.
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