WEAVER CH. 2

Interesting. I never really sat down and thought about why you do teach grammar in school. I just assumed that you taught grammar in school because the students need a general knowledge of the mechanics that go into the language that we speak. I didn't really think about why or how it is taught. Point 1 on page 7 states: "The study of grammar is important simply because language is a supreme human achievement that deserves to be studied as such." This is one of the reasons that teachers teach formal grammar to their students. It does deserve to be looked at and studied. The way that grammar is taught in all schools, does not take grammar down this road. Many teachers think that teaching grammar rules will improve student writing. This is so not the case. It's as if grammar is a bandaid that is put in place to solve all the problems that students face in their writing. If teachers want to work on the improvement of writing, then they need to look at the tools and methods that go into teaching specific kinds of writing. Just like diagramming sentences serves a purpose. You diagram a sentence to be able to pull out the different parts of speech in the sentence. This would help a student to be able to see different parts of speech and how they work in a sentence to make the sentence a complete thought or not. The big idea that I took away from this chapter, was that when teachers are teaching anything, there needs to be a reason and a why to the students. Each teacher must have a goal in mind for why they are teaching what they are teaching. It can't be just a reason like, well I teach grammar because they need to know certain aspects of the English language. No matter how much you throw grammar down their throats, it might not improve their writing, because it's not just one size fits all type of deal. The students want you to make it interesting, not just a math - type worksheet that they just fill out to get a grade for completing something. If you truly step back and analyze the method behind the madness, you will find purpose in what you are teaching and then this in communicated to the students to bring understanding and learning.
Point 2 on page 9 says: "no more relation exists between knowledge of grammar and the application of the knowledge in a functional language situation thn exists beween any two totally different and unrelated school subjects" (1960). One investigator found a higher correlation between achievement in grammar and mathematics than between achievement in grammar and composition or oral language abilities." (9) This was shocking that there is more similarity between grammar and math than grammar and composition? what? This seems scary. Maybe we need to take another look into how and why we are teaching grammar to our students. Grammar should help to improve writing and reading skills, so we need to get into that shift. Students should feel prepared to write a paper because they know the grammar that they want to use, and they know how to use it properly.