Wu Heping
Northwest Normal University
Kunming·2015
Teaching Grammar in the Post-method Era
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CONTENTS
Meothods and Post-methods
Changing faces of grammar
Basic choices in grammar teaching
From Methods to Post-methods
Methods as the key notion in the history of language teaching
Methods as panacea: a cure-all remedy in language teaching
• Grammar translation• Direct method• Audiolingualism• Cognitive-code method• TPR (Total Physical Approach)• Functional-notional method• Communicative method• Lexical approach• Task-based, content-based, project-based• 疯狂英语,张思中教学法• ……
The Pendulum Metaphor
History of language teaching shows it swinging like a pendulum between extremes of method as teachers have searched for different solutions.
We have seen a pendulum swing in grammar teaching, from the well-established Grammar-Translation Method and its many variants, to pure meaning-based language teaching during the 1980s; and the pendulum is now on its return swing.
FORM MEANING
Two Broad Schools of ApproachesForm-based approaches Meaning-based approaches
Objectives Reading and translating literary works
Developing oral skills
Content Language forms and structures
Practical linguistic skills
Theorectical principles
Rationalism Naturalism
Schools of language teaching
Grammar translation method, audioligualism, cognitive code method,
Direct method, natural approach, communicative approach, task-based method
Break away from methods: the post-method era
Proposed by Kumaravadivelu in 1990s.
alternative methods vs ‘an alternative to method’
He suggests 10 macrostrategies as “an alternative to method”, based on which teachers can generate their own situation-specific, need-based microstrategies or classroom techniques.
“…in order to help our learners learn, it is not ‘the latest method’ that we need, but rather a fuller understanding of the language classroom and what goes on there.”
The role of grammar Central role in language
• Grammar translation method: • Audiolingualism
• Imitation and repetition of mechanical sentence patterns
Beginning in 1970s, communicative L2 teaching was perceived as a departure from grammar in favor of focusing on the meaning only.
Recent years have seen a growing trend of reappraising the role of grammar in English language teaching.
What is grammar?
Grammar is the business of taking a language to pieces, to see how it works. (David Crystal)
Rule-based theory
Usage-based theory
Rule-based theory of grammar
Grammar is the set of structural rules governing the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language
Problems: Grammar is seen as static product that consists of forms that are
rule-governed, sentence-level, absolute, and constitute a closed system.
Students still can’t exchange information, express ideas or feelings, or develop social relationship in a second language.
Usage-based grammar
Usage-based theory of grammar Grammar is viewed as the cognitive organization
of one’s experience with language. ( Joan Bybee)
As users of language experience tokens of language use, they categorize them at varying degrees of abstractness.
Grammatical patterns emerge as we experience language while using it.
世界上本没有语法。用得人多了,也便成了语法。
Communicative definition of grammar
Grammar is a resource that
enables us:to get things done
to make choices
to express ourselves as individuals
to articulate our feelings and attitudes
--David Nunan
Grammar involves…(Larsen-Freeman)
FORM
How is it formed?
USE
When/Why is it used?
MEANING
What does it mean?
Relative Clause The teacher talks about a friend of hers who came from
another country.Since she is a foreigner she keeps asking questions about the things she sees at the market or food names that she hears of.The teacher tells the students that it may be tiring sometimes and asks for help...She then gives each pair a card with an authentic meal, object,place etc on it and tells them to define that object for her.For example. "Salep,is a drink that is made of milk and drunk only in winter in Turkey."
The students like this activity since its challenging, authentic and fun.Its worth to try ,just to see how hard they try and how amused they are by the idea of becoming tourist guides.
*You can also ask the pairs to define the word on their cards without mentioning the name of it,so that the rest of the class can guess as they read it aloud at the end...
Structure: relative clause Context: touring experience Function: giving definition
Choices we make in grammar teaching
Form vs. Meaning
Knowledge vs. skills
Grammar vs. lexis
Explicit vs. implicit
Induction vs. deduction
Input vs. output
Form approach to language
Bloomfield: ‘Mathematics’ is a ‘specially accurate form of speech’, indeed, ‘the best that language
can do’.
N. Chomsky: Chomsky proposes to construct a formalized
general theory of linguistic structure and to explore its foundations.
Meaning approach to language
Cognitive linguistics All linguistic forms do NOT have inherent form in
themselves, they act as clues activating the meanings that reside in our minds and brains.
Semantic structure reflects the mental categories which people have formed from their experience and understanding of the world.
Focus on form vs focus on formS (Michael Long)
Focus on form(FonF instruction)
Focus on forms(forms-focused
instruction)
The word form refers to language form in general;
Forms refers to discrete, isolated, specific language forms
Learners first engage in meaning; then explore some linguistic features.
Primary attention to form
Occasional shift of attention to form
Most attention to form
Focus on form(FonF instruction)
Focus on forms(forms-focused
instruction)
Triggered by perceived problems in comprehension or production
Pre-selected in the syllabus
Linguistic features are explored in contexts.
Forms are taught in isolation
Different Ways of focusing on form
“Focus on Form” is the grounding theory of Task-based teaching.
Ways of Focusing on form• Conscious reflection• Noticing the gap• Hypothesis formulation and testing• Recasting• Typographical (visual) input enhancement: manipulation of
italics, bolding, enlargement, underlining, colouring --I go to the school every day. --You go to the school? --Well, I go to school every day.
Kowledge Philosophy Psychology Biology Literature Linguistics Geology
Skill Driving Skiing Cooking Fishing Dancing Bungee jumping
‘Grammar can be productively regarded as a fifth skill, not only as an area of knowledge.’
‘It is a process for which we need a verb–something like grammaring.’
Grammaring:The fifth skill
Grammar-lexis dichotomy
Language was generally conceived as a grammar-lexis dichotomy with grammar ‘rules’ on the one hand and ‘lists’ of individual words on the other.
Words and rules were thought to be represented and processed differently in the human mind.
• Rules are “learned” while lists of words are memorized.
• Referred to as “Rule/list fallacy” by Langacker.
Dichotomy vs. Continuum
The grammar-lexis dichotomy has been discarded and replaced by a more realistic conception of language as a continuum from simple units to more conplex ones.
H.A.K. Halliday: Lexicogrammar.
--interdependence of, and continuity between
vocabulary (lexis) and syntax (grammar).
A. Goldberg: Construction grammar
knowledge of a language is based on
a collection of "form and function pairings“
R. Hudson: Word grammar.
Grammatical knowledge is largely
a body (or network) of knowledge
about words.
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The lexical approach: the role of chunking
Developed by Michael Lewis in the early 1990s.
Lexis is the basis of language Language consists of grammaticalised lexis, not
lexicalised grammar. The grammar/vocabulary dichotomy is invalid; much
language consists of multi-words 'chunks'. Collocation is used as an organizing principle. Successful language is a wider concept than accurate
language.
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Lexical chunks
'prefabricated phrases‘
'lexical phrases‘
'formulaic language‘
'frozen and semi-frozen phrases‘
'lexical chunks'
'collocations any pair or group of words which is commonly found together, or in
close proximity.
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Lexical chunks
The principles of the Lexical Approach have [been
around] since Michael Lewis published 'The
Lexical Approach' [10 years ago]. [It seems,
however, that] many teachers and researchers
do not [have a clear idea of] what the Lexical
Approach actually [looks like] [in practice]
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Two types of lexical chunks
Lexical chunks (not collocations) by the way
up to now
upside down
If I were you
a long way off
out of my mind
combines a lexical content word and a grammar function word.
Lexical chunks Collocations totally convinced
strong accent
terrible accident
sense of humour
sounds exciting
brings good luck
a pair of lexical content words commonly found together
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It felt like
Were simply being respectful
Have a good point
It is not only …. Even…
Very close to each other.
Many differences between
Cause a lot of embarrassment
Experience cultural shock
Table manners /classroom behaviour
Take sb. by surprise
Accept the tips
Implicit knowledge is language knowledge that learners possess intuitively but are not able to put into words;
Explicit knowledge is language knowledge that learners possess and are also able to verbalize.
H.H.Stern: Explicit-implicit is one the three dilemmas in language teaching.
Interface hypothesis: Can explicitknowledge become implicit?
S. Krashen: no interface: Implicit learning leads to acquisition while explicit
knowledge can only function as “monitors”.
R. Ellis: weak interface position Explicit language knowledge can become implicit to some
extent, but that these are limited by various developmental
factors.
R. DeKeyser: Strong interface position Explicit language knowledge can always become
implicit language knowledge, and that such
knowledge becomes implicit through repeated practice.
One evening in late 1972, my father George Latham was driving across town to collect my sister from a party. A white car passed him in the lane to his left, and then slowed to turn. My father saw a flash and then there was a big explosion. The white car, with its four passengers, was on fire. A drunk driver had crashed into it from behind.
Immediately, Dad stopped the car and ran back to the scene of the accident. The driver, a woman, jumped from the car. Some men pulled two of her daughters out, just as the fire began to reach the engine. A third little girl, an eleven-year-old, was screaming in the back seat. She couldn't undo her seat-belt. One of the men shouted that he couldn't open her door. "It's hopeless," somebody said, as everyone moved back. The little girl was going to burn to death right in front of them.
My Dad and the Burning Car
2. a. Work with a partner. Read the first paragraph of George’s story.
One evening in late 1972, my father was driving across town to collect my sister from a party. A white car passed him in the lane to his left, and then slowed to turn. My father saw a flash and then there was a big explosion. The white car, with its four passengers, was on fire. A drunk driver had crashed into it from behind.
b. Look at the underlined phrases in 2a above. What is the difference between them? Why?
e. Read the third paragraph below. Underline any examples of ‘a or an + noun’. Circle any examples of ‘the + noun’.
My father heard all this and saw all this. He ran to the car and reached through the open door on the other side. He pulled the child across the seat and out of the car, through the flames. He turned and walked out of the fire just as the back window of the car exploded. Within moments, the whole car was on fire. People gathered around the little girl. My hero dad just walked back to his car and drove on, thinking only about picking up his own daughter.
f. Which paragraph has the most examples of ‘a + noun’? Why?
Two broad approaches to grammar teaching
Inductive approach From examples to rules Students “discover” the rules Learner-centred Time consuming More beneficial to higher level
students
• Observing• Discovering• Discussing• Putting to use
Sts engaged with meaning and use of language
Deductive approach From rules to examples
Students “accept” the rule
Teacher centred
Time saving
Effective among lower level students.
• Explanation• Understanding• Practising• Using
Devoid of language meaning and use