Approaches To The Teaching of Grammar: Methods and Strategies
Approaches To The Teaching of Grammar: Methods and Strategies
Abstract: Every language has its grammar. Whether it is one’s own mother tongue or second - language that
one is learning. The grammar of the language is important. This is because acceptability and intelligibility, both
in speech and in writing within as well as outside one’s own circle or group depend on the currently followed
basic notions and norms of grammaticality. A knowledge of grammar is perhaps more important to a second-
language learner than to a native speaker has intuitively internalized the grammar of the language whereas the
second – language learner has to make a conscious effect to master those aspects of the language which
account for grammaticality. It is, therefore, necessary for us, to whom English is a second – language, to learn
the grammar of the language. So, without the knowledge of the grammar of a particular language, we cannot
properly use the language in communication. But question may arise what should be the method and approach
to the study of grammar. Several approaches have been followed through the ages for the study of English
grammar. The major approaches are the traditional approach, the structural approach, the notional- functional
approach and the communicative approach.
Keywords: English grammar, language, communication, approach
1. TRADITIONAL APPROACH
Language has been studied for centuries in ancient Greece, Rome, Arab, India etc. The word
„traditional‟ is usually used to refer to the rendition of language study and writing grammars which
was handed down to us from ancient Greeks. Through Rome and then, after Renaissance, through
other European languages which generally followed the Greek and Roman tradition. Traditional
grammar also does not refer to any single author‟s or country‟s work. It was not as if a uniform, or
identical grammars were written or taught at that time. It refers to the general attitude of scholars of
the time, to their specific methodology, their ways of looking at things. For example, the ideas about
sentence and sentence analysis came from Aristotle and Plato (5th century B.C.): The stoic grammars
had written parts of speech, the scholastic philosophers of the middle Ages had speculated about
meaning, the concept of „correctness‟ came from the latter, eighteenth century grammarians of
England had ideas about the history of language deriving from the nineteenth century emphasis on
comparative philology.
Before the eighteenth century the study of the English language was neglected. Preference was given
to the classical languages such as Greek and Latin was the language of the church and of the
university and was widely used by the educated person throughout Europe. By the eighteenth century,
however, the knowledge of the Renaissance had been translated into the language which everybody
spoke. This gradual use of English for affairs of state and literature and the invention of the printing
press generated a need for the study of grammar. The scholar should want to codify what they felt was
a disorderly language.
These scholars believed in universal grammar- a perfect grammar of which individual grammar was
corruptions. (This belier in a universal grammar exists even today; this is because some grammatical
features are shared by all languages). Because the educated Englishmen of the 18th century knew
Latin so well that they naturally believed that that this classical language must be the closest to the
universal grammar. The differences between English and Latin they considered as errors or
corruptions of English. The grammar text books of period, then were written to correct these errors
and to prescribe desirable usage. As Johnson says in the preface to his dictionary:
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“I have laboured to refine our language to grammatical purity, and to clear it from colloquial
barbarism, licentious idioms, and irregular combinations”.
In order to establish a language as perfect, early grammarians obviously had to use Latin as a model to
build as English grammar. Their difficulties were great, however, Latin and English differ
significantly from one another. In Latin morphology (word from) is far more important than syntax
(word order). In English, syntax is more important than morphology. It is true that we alter word form
English too; „run‟ is changed into „ran‟ or „drive‟ into „drives‟. But we can understand an English
sentence in which the usual form changes are not made; for example, there is no difficulty in
understanding the sentences, “The engine of the car run well when he drives the car fast”. The
intended meaning of the sentence will not be grasped by us if our understanding depends primarily
upon word form. As it is, however, it makes sense though it sounds awkward.
What is essential to our understanding of English is syntax or word order. The sentence “Engine well
runs the fast car of the drives the car he fast when” is unintelligible because its order is simple not
common to the English language system. In Latin nearly the opposite is true. The form of most Latin
words is more important than their position.
Generally, the failure to alter the form of Latin words results in confusion. But except for a few like
„ad‟ and „cum‟, most Latin word do not have fixed places within a sentence.
More problems appeared when the grammarians attempted to analyse English structures in two ways
– some in terms of lexical meaning and others in terms of grammatical function.
The most widely known definition of the sentence is based upon meaning:
“A sentence is a group of word expressing a complete thought” But what exactly is a thought? And if
we could define it how would we determine its completeness?
Another popular definition is functional: “A sentence must have a subject which names a person,
place, thing or idea, and a predicate which says something about the subject”. This explains a
construction like “The child is crying”. But couldn‟t “the crying child” also fit the definition? The
word „child‟ names a person; and the word „crying‟ says the something about the child.
For traditional grammarians, written language was both the aim and the basis of their work. There are
few or no rules for teaching spoken language. Spoken language is generally neglected. Pronunciation
and suprasegmental feature find no mention in these grammars. The learners where asked to cram by
note memory rules of grammar and translate the language into the mother tongue or vice-versa. Where
used to be composition exercise, but no attention was paid to oral practice. The traditional grammar
included rules and even vocabulary that may be more characteristic of written English. The rule for
example, phonetic. Morphology, syntax and semantics, But traditional grammarians, discussed with
phonetics, phonemics, morphology and syntax. In this way we can see that the structured grammar
which deals with one more topic which is known a semantics.
2. STRUCTURAL APPROACH
One of the primary characteristics of structural grammar is its division of the study of the language
into basic parts: structure and meaning. Usually, the structural grammar prefers to study the
grammatical forms or structures of the language before considering lexical meaning.
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Approaches to the Teaching of Grammar: Methods and Strategies
English grammar in terms of structure is not as complicated as it seems. The native speakers
remember learning lexical meanings because this takes place every time they encounter a new word.
They do not learn grammatical signals because this happens early and informally in their lives. But
the second language learner is not in the same position as the native speaker is. His internalization of
grammatical to the structures though not complicated is through deliberate exposure to the language.
That is why; he has to learn both lexical meanings and grammatical signals more or less at the same
time.
3. NOTIONAL -FUNCTIONAL
The term “functional-notional approach” embraces any strategy of language teaching that derives the
content of learning from an initial analysis of the learner‟s need to express three different kinds of
meaning: Functional (i.e. the social purpose of the utterance); Modal (the degree of likelihood);
Conceptual – the meaning relations expressed by forms within the sentence (categories of
communicative function) .These method of language teaching is categorize along with others under
the rubric of a communicative approach. The method stresses a means of organizing a language
syllabus. The emphasis is on breaking down the global concept of language into units of analysis in
terms of communicative situations in which they are used.
Notions are meaning elements that may be expressed through nouns, pronouns, verbs, prepositions,
conjunctions, adjectives or adverbs. A notion is a concept, or idea: it may be quite specific, in which
case it is virtually the same as vocabulary (dog, house, for example); or it may be very general – time,
size, emotion, movement – in which case it often overlaps with the concept of “topics”. A notion may
be “time past”; this may include past tenses, phrases like a month ago, in 1990, last week, and
utterances using temporal clauses beginning with when….., before…., after…. and so on;
A function is some kind of communicative act: it is the use of language to achieve a purpose, usually
involving interaction at least between two people. Examples would be suggesting, promising,
apologizing, greeting, inviting.
“Inviting” may include phrases like “Would you like to….? I suggest…., How about…? Please…
4. STRATEGIES OF TEACHING GRAMMAR
The strategies of teaching grammar depend on certain key areas of focus. These areas may be
identified with reference to the practice and use of grammar.
Practices Use
Drill
Contextualized clues Communicative
Communicative
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Arm Mahbuber Rahman & Md. Sumon Ahmed
Cue/Response
Dear Bhanu,
We _________(enjoy) our holiday a lot. Every day, we__________ (walk) down to the
beach, ____________(take) a dip the sea; __________(go) for a ride and
___________(have) lunch at Tropicana.
In fact, I _____________ (write) the letter from Tropicana. We _____________ (wish)
you were here.
Love
Lata
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Approaches to the Teaching of Grammar: Methods and Strategies
In order to find out how teachers felt about various styles of grammar teaching a number workshops
were help in which teachers (and in least one case, student) were asked to assess a number or
activities (see below) in terms of where they fitted on lines between covert and over; student – centred
and teacher-centred; creative and non-creative and finally helpful and unhelpful. What exactly do
these terms mean in this context?
6. CONCLUSION
Amid the plethora of differed approaches, theories, grammar debates and discussions on the
usefulness or otherwise of the teaching grammar what should be the standpoint of a teacher of
English? Certainly he cannot do without grammar. Grammar is essential to second-language learning.
As Wilkins observes:
“The acquisition of the grammatical system of a language remains a most important element in
language learning. The grammar is the means through which linguistic creativity is ultimately
achieved and an inadequate knowledge of the grammar would lead to serious limitations on the
creativity for communication. A notional syllabus, no less than a grammatical syllabus, must seek to
ensure that the grammatical system is property assimilated by the learner”.
What Wilkins means is that grammar should be taught; without knowledge of the grammar of the
language, one‟s learning of the language is inadequate; conscious learning of grammar is slowly
converted into an automatic process.
Once it is recognized that the teaching a grammar is necessary but the question arises: how is it to be
taught? In spite of the disagreements which exist between linguists regarding the relationship of
traditional, structural, notional-functional and communicative approaches. Some predict an eventual
synthesis of all these approaches to the study of languages. Each approach has made valuable
contribution to our knowledge of language and each has assimilated some of the facts and methods of
the one preceding it. So we should be eclectic in our approach; we should be select is best suited for
our purpose in the classroom. We need not have a whole hearted commitment to traditional grammar;
nor should we reject outright the insights of modern linguists. We should select what is the best in
these approaches suited to the study of grammar. We should explain and describe grammatical aspects
of structure illustrate them with examples and lay down certain rules for our students‟ guidance and
practice. In other words, we should have our own approach based on a synthesis of the insights we
have gained from our study of the different approaches to the teaching of grammar.
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AUTHORS’ BIOGRAPHY
ARM Mahbuber Rahman, is a senior lecturer of English at KhwajaYunus Ali
University in Bangladesh. He received his B.A &M.A degree in English from
Aligarh Muslim University, India. His publications are „Students Attitudes towards
English: The Case of Life Science School of Khulna University‟ (2012), „English
Teaching and Learning in the primary Levels in Sirajgonj‟ (2016).His research
interests include English language Teaching, sociolinguistics, SLA.
Md Sumon Ahmed, is a senior lecturer of English at KhwajaYunus Ali University
in Bangladesh. He received his B.A &M.A degree in English from Northern
University Bangladesh.His publication is „English Teaching and Learning in the
primary Levels in Sirajgonj‟ (2016). His research interests include English
language Teaching, sociolinguistics, SLA.
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