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LECTURE 1.
TEACHING GRAMMAR TO A2 LEVEL LEARNERS
Lecture outline :
Presenting and practising the language
Key words: cognitive aspect, the grammar side of the speech, acquiring grammar acts, studying/learning ready material, mastering grammar generalizations, abstractions defining language situations, studying/learning ready material, mastering grammar generalizations, active grammar minimum.
REFERENCES
1. Jalolov J.J. “English language teaching methodology” T. 2015. Pp. lll-l25
2.Akhmedova L.T. Normuratova V.I. “Teaching English Practicum” T. 20ll. Pp. 60-66
3.Jalolov J.J. “Chet til o’qitish metodikasi” T. 2012. Pp.l45-l67
4.Lucy Pollard’s guide to teaching English 2008 pp. 25-32
Presenting and practising the language
From a language learner’s point of view, presentation of language is probably the most important aspect of studying English. Students expect lessons to contain some degree of language study, either long and intensive or short and sharp, depending on whichever is appropriate – it’s most often what they note in their books and take away with them.
The stages are:
1. find out how much students already know about the language point;
2. presentation;
3. check students have understood the presentation;
4. practice (controlled and/or free).
In following lessons:
1. If it was the first time the students encountered the language item, you can do
another brief presentation and then do some more activities to practise the language.
2. If students are familiar with the language item, you can go immediately to more
practice activities.
Stage 1: Pre-checking knowledge
Before presenting any language, it is useful to find out how much your students know about the language point in question. You can get an idea of what they have studied by looking through their course book and previous work. However, the fact that the students have studied a particular language point does not mean they know it. In class, you can check to what extent they know the language by eliciting phrases that include the language point. This can be done relatively quickly; e.g. you can show pictures of people in action to your students and ask them what the characters are doing to check knowledge of present continuous and / or verbs of action (he’s running, she’s dancing, they’re playing tennis).
You can also check the extent of their knowledge by asking them to carry out a speaking activity that requires use of the language point e.g. speaking about last year’s holidays to ascertain students’ knowledge of the simple past and other past tenses. This will take longer but you will have more of an idea of what students know.
You can take an exercise from your course book or workbook for this pre-checking stage. Course books contain many exercises that are intended to be used as practice after the presentation stage. You can take one of these exercises and use it before presentation to find out students’ level.
You can also design your own exercises. For example, if you want to find out whether beginner or elementary level students are familiar with “wh” question words (who, what, when, where, why) you could prepare a list of questions with “wh” words and the corresponding answers. Mix up the questions and answers and ask students to reorganise them. Below is an example:
What did she do? At 3pm.
What time did she do it? Because she thinks Meryl Streep is a brilliant actress.
Who did she do it with? She went to see “The Devil Wears Prada”.
When did she do it? At the cinema.
Where did she do it? Her best friend.
Why did she do it? On Saturday.
Comment: each question is similar to avoid giving away too many clues and to keep the focus on the “wh” word.
You can prepare similar exercises where students match items to practise other language points: e.g. words and their definitions to check knowledge of vocabulary. You can also use matching exercises to teach first and second conditionals. The first conditional involves the use of simple present and will, e.g. if it rains tomorrow, I’ll stay at home. The second conditional involves the use of simple past and would, e.g. if I won a million dollars, I’d buy a big house.
A further example is: if you are about to teach your students how to form questions through word order inversion; you can first of all check to what extent they can form questions already.
A quick and simple way to check students’ knowledge of word order is to write out some simple sentences and then to jumble up the words.I suggest you use approximately ten sentences varying in difficulty. Give students the jumbled sentences and ask them to put words in the right order.
Where did you buy your dress? Buy / dress / where / your / you / did /
What time do you usually go to bed? Usually / time / go / you / what / do / bed / to
What is your mother’s name? Mother’s / what / name / your / is
Organising activities such as the above can be used to pre-check any language point that involves knowledge of word order.
Of course, students can do exercises such as those above in pairs. This can help create an environment of cooperation, and works well when you want a general idea of how well the class copes with the language item. However, if you want to know the level of knowledge of individual students, pay very close attention while they’re working.
The beauty of exercises such as those above is that they are easy to prepare and they can be used to check extent of knowledge or be used as revision in a subsequent lesson. And why not, occasionally, use the same activity to pre-check knowledge and to revise? This will allow you and your students to compare initial performance with performance post-presentation of language. It can be very motivating for students to see how well they have progressed.
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