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Pedagogical Grammar For Lower Level Stud
Pedagogical Grammar For Lower Level Stud
Pedagogical Grammar For Lower Level Stud
Yosuke Ishii
1. Introduction
English teachers in universities may encounter a wide variety of students with different backgrounds.
While they have a chance to meet students with a great command of English, it is not unusual to have students
who have difficulty in producing even simple sentences. When faced with students belonging to this category,
teachers often provide the same traditional instructions that work for successful students. It is highly doubtful,
however, that these instructions will work with ELLs (English Language Learners) who have been left behind
and have failed in the past. This paper suggests practical ways to present grammar for lower-level students in
college classrooms.
This approach’s effectiveness lies in its simplicity that ELLs can make original sentences by putting
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words they know in each slot in the diagram. The pedagogical grammar model the author would propose is
fundamentally based on Tajino’s approach, however it is suggested that more emphasis on the process of building
sentences be placed as part of the communicative purpose.
This diagram is intended to assist ELLs become conscious of the topic and statement of the sentence
they are creating. The topic refers to “who or what the sentence is about,” and the statement is “what the person
or thing in the topic does, feels, and thinks” or “what is said about the topic.” In the presentation of traditional
grammar, the topic is called “subject”, and the statement “predicative,” but these terms should be avoided in
order to lessen the cognitive load of learners as they can focus on tasks instead of having to understand the
concepts of grammatical terms, which can often perplex them. Another modification is adding “(What)” to the
first slot. This enables teachers to give the generalization “Who = person, What = thing” to low-level learners.
Thus, by using a model based on the word order, learners can build sentences without having the full knowledge
on parts of speeches and sentence structures.
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[2B] There are more than 10 great houses on Main Street. The houses are fully furbished.
[3] Houses in Japan are often made of wood.
[4] There are some houses near the station.
In [1], listeners or readers would not know which “large house” Bob lives in until the author mentions
it. Therefore, this “very large house” is not specified. Therefore, the determiner “a” is used. In [2A], according
to the context, it is obvious that “house” refers to Bob’s house. Therefore, “the” is used. As [2B] shows, “the” is
used before the plural form of the specified noun. In [3], the writer is talking about houses in Japan in general.
Therefore, “zero + plural form” is used. This could be taught as a difference from “some + plural form” seen in
[4].
Although Yule’s model is sagacious, Diagram 3 appears to be slightly complicated since it is intended
to teach all the English verb forms, which is challenging for low-level learners. In this pedagogical grammar
model, low-level learners should work on [1] simple present [2] present progressive (am/is/are + doing) [3]
simple past [4] future (will + do & am/is/are + going to do). The mastery of these four verb forms will lead to a
better understanding of the others such as [5] present perfect (has/have + -ed/en), [6] past progressive (was/were
+ doing), [7] present perfect progressive (has/have + been + doing), and [8] past perfect (had + -ed/en). Low-
level learners do not seem to encounter [7] very often. By choosing [1] to [4] above, the verb system Yule presents
can be summarized like this: in the verb phrase, the left component refers to time and requires the subject-
verb agreement while the right one carries meaning and aspect. In [A], “is” indicates the present tense;
“holding” carries meaning. In [B], “will” indicates the future; “make” carries meaning.
[A] A man is holding an umbrella.
[B] Melody will make an announcement.
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4.2.1 Simple present
In all the following examples, the simple present form is used, but the functions in [A]-[E] vary. [A]
and [B] express current states, which is called “unrestrictive use” by Leech (1987). The word referring to the
present such as “now” and “currently” can be added. However, the use in [C] is called “habitual use,” and the
event described in the sentence can refer to “yesterday” or “tomorrow” as well as “today.” [D] refers to future
time. The simple present in [E] means “for all time,” emphasizing that the probability of the action referring to
the verb occurs one hundred percent of the time.
[A] Tak is a member of a rock band.
[B] Don has two sisters and one brother.
[C] Rich swims three times a week.
[D] The movie starts at 7:00 P.M.
[E] Tastes differ.
4.2.4. future
[A] Ms. Kim will get angry, I think.
[B] I will never forget this.
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[C] I will call you tonight.
[D] I am probably going to see Joan at the pool.
[E] Will you turn the lights off?
[F] Are you going to come to school tomorrow?
ELL teachers in Japan traditionally spend time explaining the differences between the projected future
as in [A] and the intended future as in [B]. From the standpoint of communication, the difference between “will
do” referring to the unscheduled future and “is/am/are + going to do” referring to the planned future, which is
often ignored, is more important. However, a large number of students use “is/am/are + going to do” for a request
like [E], “will do” for confirming a future schedule as in [F].
5. Adding information
As stated above, teaching the parts of speech does not seem to be effective for helping low-level
learners in that it requires them to understand fairly abstract concepts. Instead, instructions based on meaning
will help them become familiar with the system of the target language they are learning. Adding information
means the mastery of adjective phrases and adverbial phrases. What is suggested here introduces how to teach
adjective phrases and adverbial phrases without using these grammatical terms.
As for adverbial phrases, using the diagram shown in Diagram 2 is effective. “Where,” “When,”
“How,” and “Why” correspond to them.
Adjective phrases can be classified into two: ones that come before nouns and ones that follow nouns.
For the former, it is important to have learners be sure to insert the adjective between the determiner and the noun
(i.e. some international students, a smart choice). For the latter, giving learners a sufficient number of examples
is crucial.
[1] A woman in a red dress
[2] People in New York
[3] A restaurant near the campus
[4] A book on the desk
6. Teaching implication
According to Birch (2005), “Many learners enjoy the inductive method teachers use to encourage them
to notice things on their own about language, but this method can be more time consuming” (p. 68). Therefore,
the combination of both deductive and inductive approaches sound most effective. For example, teachers could
have students box or underline noun phrases or verb phrases after giving brief explanations on determiners,
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singular/plural forms, and verb tenses (See Appendix A).
As for the word order, assigning students to insert components in the sentence into slots in the diagram
shown in Diagram 2 is effective (See Appendix B). Also, learners tend to prefer activities such as when they are
given some components jumbled from a sentence and they are to reorganize the original sentence (See Appendix
C).
7. Conclusion
Grammar plays an important role in learning a foreign language, but teaching too many rules can
possibly demotivate students. Especially, for lower-level students, helping them to understand a minimalized set
of rules through a simplified model is important. As suggested above, focusing on (1) word order, (2) grounding
noun phrases and verb phrases to the context, and (3) adding information can alleviate students’ loads of
memorization and provide time for communicative tasks which will provide them essential productive practice.
This would eventually pave the way for learners’ acquisition of further grammar knowledge in the future.
References
Alexander, L. G. (1995). Essential American English Grammar. Longman Publishing Group.
Birch, B. M. (2005). Learning and teaching English grammar, K-12. Pearson/Merrill/Prentice Hall.
Bolstad, F., Kanamaru, T., & Tajino, A. (2010). Laying the Groundwork for Ongoing Learning: A Scaffolded
Approach to Language Education in Japanese Elementary Schools and Beyond. Second Language
Studies: Acquisition, Learning, Education and Technology.
Firsten, R., & Killian, P. (2002). The ELT grammar book: A teacher-friendly reference guide. Alta Book Center
Publishers.
Leech, G. N. (1987). Meaning and the English verb. (2nd Ed.) Pearson Education.
Lewis, M. (1986). The English verb: An exploration of structure and meaning. Language Teaching Publications.
Radden, G., & Dirven, R. (2007). Cognitive English Grammar (Vol. 2). John Benjamins Publishing.
Yule, G. (1998). Explaining English Grammar: A Guide to Explaining Grammar for Teachers of English as a Second
or Foreign Language. Oxford University Press.
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Appendix A
Read the text below. After then, box all the things and people (= nouns) and underline words
telling an action or state (= verbs) in it. The first sentence is done for you.
AKB48 is a Japanese girl group. Most of its members are teenagers, but some
are in their twenties. This group has become so popular in Japan that you cannot
finish your day without seeing the face of any group member. This popularity probably
comes from Yasushi Akimoto’s strategy to make the members feel close to people.
Appendix B
Analyze the sentences. Put each part into a slot in the diagram.
1. Peter went to bed at two.
Topic Statement
Who(What) Does/Is Whom·What Where When How Why
Topic Statement
Who(What) Does/Is Whom·What Where When How Why
Topic Statement
Who(What) Does/Is Whom·What Where When How Why
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Appendix C
Change the order of the words from A)-D) and complete the correct sentences.
A) work / Drives / Michael / to
B) flute / the / played / Charles
C) house / Machida / in / Kevin’s / is
D) at / Chiba / in / occurred / an / two / earthquake
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