Learner Data

* I lived here since six months but can’t find no job.  (Puerto Rican student, lower intermediate)

A.  Student’s problem: wrong tense, wrong adverbial, double negative

B.  What the student got right: pronouns, adverb, syntax, lexicon (except adverbial), modality

C.  Interlanguage: L1 Transfer: In Spanish, the present perfect is not used in this situation, the subject is not mandatory, “no” can be used as a general negative. No as a general negative is also a normal step in second language acquisition.

D. Correction: I’ve lived here for six months but I can’t find a job.

E.  To address the present perfect (and the difference between “for a period of time”, and “since a certain time”) resume-type activities are very effective (activities which allow for discussion of living people’s recent pasts and activities started in the past which they continue to do in the present. Work on negative vs. declarative forms. Maybe work with contrasts between definite and indefinite article.

*I didn’t have a breakfast this morning. (French intermediate)

A.  Student’s problem: unnecessary article before breakfast

B.  What student got right: Everything else.

C.  Interlanguage: L1 Transfer. In French, breakfast takes an article (definite article)

D.  Correction: I didn’t have breakfast this morning. To review article usage and meal times (all of which take an indefinite article). Teach it as a set expression. A good activity could be a nutrition lesson where students have to plan healthy meals for a week.  “On Monday, for breakfast, I’ll serve spinach omelets and a glass of orange juice.” This will allow for input flooding.

Terminology:  Provide a definition(s)/ an example(s), sentence(s) illustrating the terms below:

Generic Sentences  – Generic sentences are statements of fact (“The sun rises in the East”) which use the simple present tense. Aristotelian formula, “An A is a B that C.” All jumbo shrimp are shrimp but not all jumbo shrimp are jumbo.

Minimal Oppositions (think of examples in the area of articles, prepositions, modality, and the passive) – grammatical phenomena that are close in meaning, but used inappropriately, affect the meaning of the whole utterance.  Comparisons between forms that have only one formal difference between them, so that students can see the contrast and understand “what it is by what it is not…” Minimal pairs in phonology have only one sound difference. Minimal oppositions in grammar include:

• Articles: a vs. an a(n), the vs. a(n); the vs. zero article
• Prepositions: Over vs above. Under vs below.

Present Perfect Progressive Tense/Tense +2 aspects and it represents an action that started in the past, but is still going on, usually marked with the time frame. He has been writing a letter for 2 hours. Some kind of product is evident. Something has been written, but the letter is not finished yet.

Inductive / Deductive Teaching; Preventative/ Remedial Teaching

Inductive teaching is a way of presenting material that allows students to discover rules or reasons for any given phenomenon by means of analyzing and synthesizing of the examples provided by a teacher.  Elka’s tree exercise fits in this category, as does input flooding in general: draw a tree, put a flower next to the tree… so Ss can start to infer difference between first and subsequent references.

Deductive teaching – implies a way of presenting material, which can be described as “from the rule to the example”. Students analyze reasons given and apply them to their own examples. “The passive form takes the action away from the subject and gives it to someone else, often in conjunction with the preposition ‘by,’ either stated or implicit… for example, the mirror was broken.”

Preventative teaching is based on the anticipation of possible mistakes. It’s teachers’ awareness of such phenomena as a language transfer, overgeneralizations and the level of learnability of a particular linguistic item. We don’t have a single example of this, but it can be any grammar form that we know poses particular problems for English-learners. Prepositions is a big one, as are articles, etc.

Remedial teaching deals with perceived student deficits. It includes working with students’ interlanguage and analysis of students’ errors, needs assessment and formative assessment. In other words, what needs to be fixed in students’ interlanguage and how to do it. With the examples above, we’re thinking of exercises to help correct their (possibly entrenched) misunderstanding of, say, articles.

Locative Prepositions – locative prepositions indicate a noun’s location in relation to another noun (the cat is out of the bag, the monkey is on the branch, the mouse under the chair). The meaning and usage of them depends on spacious dimensions that every particular preposition describes.

Subclasses: source, proximity, surface or volume, vertical space, separation [The Grammar Book].  One book says that just “at, in and on” are locative. Practical English Usage says there are prepositions of relative position (behind, between), proximity (against, near), continguous (over, underneath), noncontiguous (above, off); prepositions of passage (under, past, across); planar: across, throughout… and others.

A Short Cut in a Challenging Area of Language Learning  is a tool to lessen the period of time students need for acquisition of a challenging and broad grammatical phenomenon. A pyramid: at five o’clock, on Monday, in December, in 2009. “Elka’s Triangle” for locative in, on, at to show relative specificity. “At” is at the bottom of the triangle (the largest piece) and represents the broadest locative category: “at my apartment building.” “On” is the middle, to show you’re getting more specific: “on the second floor.” And “in” is at the top, with the most narrow focus: “in my apartment.” A mnemonic like “under the sun” in our presentation last week” using visuals and TPR to “set” concepts. Prepositions are good for that since many of them are… [drum roll] locative.

Theme/Rheme, also known as Topic/Comment (how are these concepts important?) Given vs. new. Thema-rhematic relationships help to identify given and new information on a sentence level and on the level of discourse. It’s critical in learning the word order within a sentence, using articles on the discourse level, writing paragraphs and making speeches. Ginna has a cat. The cat is very clever. A cat – new. The cat – given. New information is at the end in most cases. Not all languages follow a theme/rheme structure.

Teacher!  Teacher!: Student Questions

• A student asks you: Every night when I watch T.V. the reporter says ‘Here’s the weather.’  Why is the definite article in front of weather?

  The concept of weather in this example is concrete. It’s the weather for tomorrow in the particular area. It stands for a basic rule or a reason for the usage of the definite article.

• My former teacher told me that ‘beer’ is non-countable and so you don’t use an article, but I was at McNeil’s last night and my friend said to the waitress, ‘Get me a beer.’  Why?

  We would say, “You’re absolutely right that beer, the liquid, is non-countable. When you order a beer, however, you’re really ordering a glass or a bottle filled with beer.”

• I learned that ‘an’ is used before vowels and ‘a’ before consonants, so why do people say ‘an honor’ instead of ‘a honor’?

  Because we use that system based on the sound, not the spelling, of the words. We pronounce “honor” as “anər” — that is, with a preliminary vowel sound — so we need to use “an” before it.

• I learned to use ‘the’ in front of ‘United States’ so why don’t I say ‘The America’?

  Most of the expressions with “of” require the definite article: The beauty of a girl. The is usually used with the compound names of countries: The United Kingdom, The Russian Federation, The Dominican Republic. The Ukraine is an exception.

• Teacher, you told us that when we talk about transportation we say ‘by train, by plane, by car’ but yesterday my friend Sam said, ‘We’re going in my car.’  And everyone nodded.  What am I missing here?

  Traveling by car refers to general transportation. Once we’re referring to a specific vehicle (i.e. My car, that blue car, Lauren’s Subaru) we generally use the preposition in. Generally speaking, if we’re talking about transportation as generic, we’d say “by.” Generally if it’s a big conveyance we go “on” or “onto” it. Generally when the mode of transport is smaller and personal, it’s “in” or “into”: car, truck. Exception: bike, motorcycle, which are different because we physically get ON them. [I wouldn’t explain all those things at once, but rather in pairs with sufficient examples and exercises.]

1/ what is working in EAL for you?

I can see that the course is really practical and you can easily move from theory into EFL/ESL classroom. A lot of group discussions facilitate deeper understanding of some phenomena and brainstorming of various teaching ideas (Tatiana).

I like the classes in which we gain a greater familiarity with a concept AND discuss (or practice) how that knowledge can transfer to the classroom. I thought our phrasal verb classes did that. (Ginna)

I enjoy when we get a chance to compare English linguistics with other languages. I always feel more engaged when language history, comparative linguistics , and sociolinguistics come up, I’m excited about the language and power project.  (Jessamyn)

2/  what isn’t working and why?

At the same time, I have this duality about the practical side of the course, because I personally feel that I need more theoretical knowledge. I wish I could have more understanding of some complicated and intriguing aspects of grammar,  as the middle voice or the different types of phrasal verbs, or the theme – ream relationships on different level of discourse. Probably, these are the time constraints that prevent us from digging deeper (Tatiana).

Sometimes I’m frustrated that we don’t have time to delve more deeply into a topic. I realize we have limited time. I wonder if we could have one class during which you lectured only, without group activities, illuminating for us those topics about which we have lingering doubts or high interest: any of the topics on the Grammar Clinic 2 list, for example.  (Ginna)

I’d like to go more in depth on theory. I’m not as concerned with designing effective activities. I feel that SLA and other aspects of the curriculum have prepared me well in terms of designing creative, engaging and culturally appropriate student-centered activities. My concern is having a strong theoretical background which allows me to enter the class prepared for most any question or confusion my students may throw at me. My goal in this class is to acquire in-depth theoretical knowledge. In the NEST / NNEST debate, native-speakers are often labelled as being less knowledgeable of grammar and linguistics. I’m concerned that I may be denied professional opportunities based on an assumed lack of grammatical knowledge. I aspire to have the same detail of linguistic knowledge as a non-English Mother Tongue teacher. In this class, I wish we had more opportunities to learn about other applications of linguistics (besides pedagogical applications). I want to be able to pass on that knowledge to my own students (who in learning to speaking a second language are starting down a potential career path in linguistics themselves). This is not to say that I want NO discussion of teaching application. As a cert, I’d like to know more about how grammar is dealt with in an inclusion classroom and other K-12 models of ESOL instruction. For example, what is the SIOP approach grammar? (Jessamyn)

3/ what can you as a learner / a member of the group do to maximize our learning experiences in this course?

I am trying to share my prior knowledge and what I get from readings and internet researches with my classmates, especially working in our small groups (Tatiana).

Keep doing all my homework on time so that I can continue to take part fully in the class discussions. Keep an open “learner’s mind.” Reading helps me get up to the grammar speed of those who have studied linguistics or taught for many years. Classroom discussion, and study-buddying when there’s time, helps cement concepts. (Ginna)

Continue to do my homework and contribute to class discussions. Do more independent reading on the topics that interest me. (Jessamyn)

4/ what can the instructor do?

I think it could be helpful maybe if you assigned us one of the exercises at the end of a chapter of The Grammar Book, AND spent a few minutes at the beginning of class — choral would be efficient — going over it to ensure comprehension. (Ginna)

Give us a lecture every once in a while. You’re a huge resource for us and I think everyone would love to hear more of your understandings. (Jessamyn)

Any personal note or question you may have     ÿ

THANKS!