Some of you who know me know that I am not the ... um ... most thorough when it comes to teaching grammar. Why? Mainly, because I hate teaching grammar. Also, because I was never actually taught grammar. I remember doing the occasional grammar activity while in high school, but, for the most part, we just read, talked, and wrote. In fact, when I interviewed to be a writing tutor at Santa Barbara City College, I had to take a written test which, in part, involved identifying grammatical errors. After the test, the interviewers mentioned that while it was clear that I didn't know exactly what some grammatical terms referred to, it was obvious from my writing that I had a strong command of grammar usage; I got the job.
I wholeheartedly agree with all the research out there indicating that the best way to improve one's grammar and vocabulary is through reading and writing. Furthermore, in one of my English classes during my Teacher Education Program at UCSB, the professor (Sheridan Blau) made some comment about the absurdity of teaching grammar that I have never been able to shake; he said something along the lines of, "To think that students' writing will get better by using those grammar worksheets and handbooks that show students examples of poorly written sentences using incorrect grammar is ridiculous." I'm sure he said it much more eloquently than that, but that was the gist of his point. It struck a chord with me, and, as I said, I've carried the idea with me ever since.
This was all well and good when I was primarily teaching English 11. Even though I taught (teach) English Language Learners in my English 11 class, by the time they get to me, they have already been in the United States, speaking and learning English, for at least 3-4 years; therefore, I could get away with not spending a whole lot of time on explicit grammar instruction and focusing more on reading and writing.
And then I was assigned to teach ELD 2...
I assumed, going into it, that I would need to do a better job in terms of teaching grammar since I had absolutely no idea what my students would come in knowing and not knowing. However, I was also teaching an entirely new prep with a brand new textbook, which meant there was no incumbent teacher who could tell me exactly what to do and when to do it.
At the beginning of first semester, I copied a bunch of pages from the textbook's accompanying grammar handbook, and I would pass one out any time we had a spare 10 or 15 minutes that I needed to fill. I would do a mini-grammar lesson, have the kids complete the worksheet, and that was about it. I know it sounds horrible, but if that's all I was doing, I can only assume there are quite a few other English/ELD teachers out there who are doing the same thing. Since the kids came to me with a strong foundation of skills, especially in regards to verb tense, and they were writing pretty good sentences whenever I had them write, I wasn't too worried about the damage I was doing by not teaching them more grammar. I was a little concerned by the fact that the worksheets did sometimes have the students fix mistakes in poorly written sentences, but, since I didn't have anything else to use, I decided I didn't have much of choice but to keep on keeping on.
When Winter Break rolled around, and I was buried under mounds of papers that needed grading before the start of the new semester, I came across another problem. Every Tuesday and Thursday, my ELD 2 kids have to turn in a "Watching Television" assignment and a current event, respectively. (I based both assignments off the "Noticias del Momento" they have to do in their Spanish Language Development classes.) As you can imagine, a good chunk of the work I had to grade during Winter Break was made up of the yellow current event papers and the pink "Watching Television" papers. (I like to color code different handouts, hence the yellow and pink.)
This frustrated me for a couple of reasons. First, why hadn't I just graded those assignments right away? They were relatively easy to grade, but I had let them pile up and had about a month and a half's worth to grade during the break. Second, since I had let them pile up, I hadn't been checking to make sure that my students were actually doing them well. (I did spend some time at the beginning of the year teaching my students how to write summaries in their own words, but I hadn't followed up on this during the last month and a half of the semester.) And since I hadn't been checking the assignments, I hadn't been using them to help the students improve their writing. What a lost opportunity...
And then it hit me! That's what I would do during the second semester! I would check their work immediately and on a weekly basis, have the students revise their own writing to fix their mistakes. I had actually started doing something very similar in my English 11 classes at the beginning of the year, and the students reported that it was helping them improve their writing. In those classes, I would have the students write 1/2 a page, skipping lines, on a given topic during the first few minutes of class on Wednesday. Then, I would go through and make corrections; I started by actually making the corrections for the students and then began just underlining mistakes for the students to figure out and fix on their own. I would then pass the same papers back out and make the students rewrite their original few sentences, fixing all of their mistakes. This allowed me to tailor my grammar instruction to my students' individual needs, it helped them see the mistakes in their own writing, and it pushed them to revise and improve their writing. Since it worked so well in English 11, I decided it would probably also help my ELD 2 students.
Now, instead of just collecting the weekly assignments from my students, I read through their writing within a few days of collecting the assignments. I underline and fix mistakes. (I am much more explicit about how to fix mistakes with my ELD 2 students than I am with my English 11 students, due to their level of comfort with and knowledge of the rules of English grammar.) Then I give the assignments back to the students before the end of the week (usually Friday after their vocabulary quiz) and have the students rewrite their summaries and personal reactions, fixing all of the mistakes they originally made. I told the students we would be doing this every week, which holds me accountable and forces me to actually read through them in a timely manner; otherwise, I would simply procrastinate as I did in the previous semester.
I know that, in a way, I am doing what those grammar worksheets do - I am having the students look at poorly written sentences and asking them to fix the sentences. However, since those poorly written sentences are actually their poorly written sentences, the task becomes useful and informative. The students understand that the activity actually helps them to directly improve their writing (especially since they try to not make the same mistakes on the next assignment, so they won't have as much to rewrite), as opposed to those grammar worksheets which often seem disconnected from their actual writing.
Don't get me wrong - I think it is very important for students, especially English Language Learners, to understand how to construct complete sentences. I am in no way advocating for an abandonment of teaching grammar altogether; however, I feel we need to create more authentic ways in which we teach grammar to our students to help them internalize what we are teaching into their writing and speaking.
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