Richard Hudson on Grammar teaching and writing skills: the research evidence
Grammar teaching could be surreptitious, as it were, with a clear underlying theory of grammar but minimal use of grammatical terminology. This is in fact how a lot of grammar teaching has been done; and in particular there is a well-recognised activity called 'sentence combining' which seems to be widely used in the USA. There is some evidence, apparently good, that this kind of activity benefits children's writing (Abrahamson 1977; Barton 1997; Hillocks 1986; Mellon 1969; O'Hare 1973), and in some studies it turned out that this kind of grammar teaching produced better results than more traditional teaching of grammatical analysis. For example, " Hillocks surveys the many studies of the effects of sentence combining, and finds them overwhelmingly POSITIVE at all levels (grade 2 to adult). 60% show significant gains in syntactic maturity; 30% non-significant gains; 10% no gains." (Weaver 1996, reporting Hillocks (1986)).
Why should these exercises be so much more successful than traditional analysis? It seems reasonable to assume that it is at least in part because they are exercises in the production of language, and specifically in the production of written language, so they feed much more directly into the child's growing repertoire of productive skills than exercises in grammatical analysis do. In short, they are more closely integrated into the teaching of writing, so the skills acquired in isolation are more likely to transfer directly into a usable skill. However this conclusion does not necessarily rule out the possibility of transfer from grammatical analysis under the right conditions.
This sentence combining quiz is pretty good. Here's a simple page for kids.
I think a couple of you may have rounded up sentence combining exercises the last time this come up. If so, I'd love to get the links.
(quick note: I didn't have good luck with Killgallon's books on sentence composing and neither did Susan S as I recall. I may go back to them in another year. We'll see.)
What do you think about teaching kids grammar? I bought the Hake Grammar/Writing books. One of the books is pretty heavy on grammar.
ReplyDeleteI can see that practicing writing is the most important part of developing writing skills. But it seems that some understanding of formal grammar is also important.
Do you afterschool in grammar?
Hi Robyn -
ReplyDeleteSusan S came up with THE single best grammar source for afterschooling: Understanding and Using Good Grammar: Reproducible Lessons, Exercises, and Tests (Revised Edition) by Genevieve Walberg Schaefer
I bought the Hake books, but they were too much for me at this point. They're probably terrific given who the authors are.
Another factor: I think our middle school is doing a pretty decent job teaching grammar. When Christopher took the ITBS test of grammar he said, "Ms. K taught us all this last year." (He was only in her class half the year which is even more impressive.)
I've come to think that grammar is incredibly important, thanks to a book Verghis put me on to: The War Against Grammar
Mulroy argues that the study of grammar is essential to understanding complex and or archaic text.
That was a revelation to me.
I'm a very good reader, but I can't read archaic texts. I'm lost when it comes to Shakespeare & the King James Bible.
Reading his examples, I realized that if I understood grammar, I'd be able to use it to "decode" archaic uses of the English language.
I'll get a passage from his book posted at some point.
I try to make Christopher do Schaefer's book, but we're not getting through it quickly.
I would very much like to teach him sentence diagramming, which Schafer covers to some extent.
I've come to put sentence diagramming into the same category as Singapore's bar models. (Saxon, by the way, uses bar models to teach fractions and, in particular, fraction-of-a-group problems).
I just ordered the Shaefer book.
ReplyDeleteI'm so impressed with Saxon Math that I would love to try the Hake books. But there's just not enough time during the school year. Maybe during the summer I can try this program. I'm totally sold on the idea of distributed practice.
I agree that grammar is important. I can see it helping not only with archaic texts, but also with foreign language.
By the way, I remember my high school French teacher complaining that we didn't understand grammar because we hadn't been taught Latin. Talk about a traditionalist! He thought education went into the crapper after the 1960's. I can't imagine what he'd say about discovery learning. Good thing he's retired.
He thought education went into the crapper after the 1960's.
ReplyDeleteI think that's when it happened, right?
My mom remembers her mom going back to teaching at some point and discovering that things were really bad. I think that happened in the 60s.
Same thing in Ed's house.
His youngest brother is 10 years younger than he, and his mom said the schools were completely different by the time younger brother got there.
I wanted to do the Hake ones also, but they are big and we are now in middle school. I have to pick my battles, so it's still spelling and vocabulary, along with math.
ReplyDeleteI do love their throroughness and clarity, though.
We did a good portion of the Schaefer book, but we need to pick it back up and make sure we're clear.
Interestingly, I started my now middle school kid on that book in second grade, along with making up easier practice ones because he was 7 at the time. I combined it with some aspects of the book Language Lessons (I think he chanted the definitions as one practice thing we did.)
At that age he thought diagramming simple sentences and 8 parts of speech were cool.
I went back to it here and there over the years to make sure he had retained the basics. When he got tested in 6th grade (they finally do a serious grammar section after barely touching it in grade school), he aced all of his tests. Many smart kids did not because they were being presented with all of this at one time.
Another thing that reinforced his year of grammar in the second grade with me, was to do Latin 1 (Latin 1 Primer from Canon Press is the one I used. Easy to after school with.) All of the 8 parts of speech work has to be applied in translating sentences.
That's when the light dawned on me as to why I only could go so far in Spanish. I didn't have my grammar down.
Another thing that reinforced his year of grammar in the second grade with me, was to do Latin 1 (Latin 1 Primer from Canon Press is the one I used. Easy to after school with.) All of the 8 parts of speech work has to be applied in translating sentences.
ReplyDeleteThat's when the light dawned on me as to why I only could go so far in Spanish. I didn't have my grammar down.
INTERESTING
I'm missing the edit feature of the old wiki, also. Even with preview I seem to miss really obvious things.
ReplyDeleteI know, it's horrible not having "edit."
ReplyDeleteSusan, if you're around - can you delete your own comment?
I have a trash can beside every comment (mine & everyone else's).
Can you delete your comments?
(btw, if you can't, and you want me to trashcan something for you, just let me know)