A Workshop for Teaching English Grammar: Grade 3
Amy Benjamin
www.amybenjamin.com
Curriculum Goals:
1. Using a graphic organizer to generate and understand the
difference between various kinds and forms of nouns and
verbs
2. Develop an intuitive “feel” for when to use adjectives and
when to use adverbs
3. Develop an intuitive “feel” for complete (declarative)
sentences
4. Create a mental model of the patterns of irregular plural
nouns and irregular verbs
5. Use manipulatives to create the three kinds of sentences,
classified by purpose: statements, questions, commands
6. Expand nouns in sentences in response to questions: which
one? what kind? how many?
Expand verbs in sentences in response to questions: when?
where? why? how? how much?
7. Using suffixes (“morphology kit”) to create abstract nouns,
etc.
The Language Tree I
some______________
Plural:
a few______________
Noun Branches:
Singular:
the______________ any_____________
the______________
Proper: (Names of
people, pets, countries,
cities)
the______________
the______________
the______________
Possessive Phrase:
the______________
the______________
Prepositional Phrases:
the _______’s
____________
the______________
in________________
on________________
at_______________
Sentence: ______________________________
for________________
with________________
The Language Tree II
Past Tense:
Verb Branches:
I see someone who already:
___________
Present Tense:
-ing form:
___________ ____________
I see someone who is…:
.
I see someone who can:
___________
____________
______________
____________
___________ ____________
___________
____________
___________ ____________
______________
______________
Participial form:
I see someone who has already…
Sentence: ______________________________
You are good.
You are bad.
Pepper seems…
Pepper is…
Pepper looks…
You do well.
You do badly.
good
well
bad
badly
Pepper behaves…
Pepper fetches sticks…
Pepper runs in a circle…
Pepper does tricks…
Pepper learns his lessons…
Action verbs are modified by adverbs.
bouncy
shy
friendly
shyly
vivaciously
protectiveprotectively
Pepper is… recklessly
hungry
silly
Pepper behaves…
Pepper acts…cautiously
jovially
Pepper looks..l
Pepper seems…
Pepper became…
playfully playful
adventurously
curiously
Linking verbs are completed
by adjectives.
adventurous
curious
Linking verbs
tell the nature of
things.
Linking verbs: BE, + sense verbs: look, sound, smell, feel; seem verbs: seem appear,
become, grow
(Declarative) Sentence Completeness
Guess what!
Frogs catch flies.
Don’t they?
With their sticky tongues.
Frogs are amphibeans.
Aren’t they?
This frog started life in the water as a tadpole.
That’s an interesting fact.
I like frogs.
Didn’t it?
Isn’t it?
Don’t I?
I have never, to my knowledge, eaten a fly.
Have I?
Addressing the problem of fragments and run-ons in English:
Page 6-11
Let’s try it with nursery rhymes and book titles
Irregular Plural Noun Villages
Village 1:
The village where plurals go like
this:
knife – knives
elf – elves
self – selves
life – lives
wife - wives
-fe
Change
f to v and
then add
s
Village 4:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Change
the inside
of the word
man – men
woman – women
person – people
tooth – teeth
mouse - mice
Village 2:
The village where plurals go like
this:
half – halves
wolf – wolves
loaf - loaves
-f
Change
f to v and
then add
es
Village 5:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Add -ren
Village 3:
The village where plurals
go like this:
-o
Add -es
potato – potatoes
tomato – tomatoes
volcano - volcanoes
Village 6:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Stay the same
child - children
sheep – sheep
deer – deer
salmon – salmon
Help the Lost Plurals Find Their Villages
Village 1:
The village where plurals go like
this:
knife – knives
-fe
Change
f to v and
then add
s
Village 4:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Change
the inside
of the word
person – people
Village 2:
The village where plurals go like
this:
half – halves
-f
Change
f to v and
then add
es
Village 5:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Add -ren
wife – wives
Village 3:
loaf - loaves
The village where man - men
tomato – tomatoes
plurals
deer – deer
go like this:
-o
Add -es
potato – potatoes
self - selves
volcano – volcanoes
salmon- salmon
child – children
wolf - wolves
loaf- loaves
tooth- teeth
elf - elves
women - woman
mouse – mice
life - lives
Village 6:
The village where plurals go
like this:
Stay the same
child - children
sheep – sheep
What if we are hearing this?
I goed to the zoo.
Page 34
I eated peanut butter and jelly for lunch.
My dentist gived me a new toothbrush.
I rided my scooter in the playground.
This child has learned how to follow the rule
of past tense (for regular verbs). His brain
is operating on its default setting for verbs.
Soon, he will start to notice that something is
amiss in his verb use.
This child’s brain has
figured out that some
verbs just don’t follow the
rule of adding –ed.
His brain has opened up a
“department of irregular
verbs” where “privileged
character verbs” get
memorized individually.
Village 5:
The village where verbs
go like this:
Irregular Verb Villages
Village 1:
The village where verbs go like
this:
have, had, have had
send, sent, have sent
build, built, have built
make, made, have made
Village 2:
The village where verbs go like
this:
sew, sewed, have sewn
swell, swelled, have swollen
Village 3:
The village where verbs go like this:
keep, kept, have kept
sleep, slept, have slept
sell, sold, have sold
bring, brought, have brought
catch, caught, have caught
teach, taught, have taught
think, thought, have thought
Village 4:
The village where verbs go
like this:
fly, flew, have flown
take, took, have taken
shake, shook, have shaken
see, saw, have seen
blow, blew, have blown
break, broke, have broken
steal, stole, have stolen
speak, spoke, have spoken
freeze, froze, have frozen
get, got, have gotten
write, wrote, have written
cut, cut, have cut
hit, hit, have hit
put, put, have put
quit, quit, have quit
cost, cost, have cost
hurt, hurt, have hurt
Village 6:
The village where verbs
go like this:
spin, spun, have spun
sit, sat, have sat
stand, stood, have stood
win, won, have won
Village 7:
The village where verbs go like
this:
swim, swam, have swum
ring, rang, have rung
sing, sang, have sung
go, went, have gone
drink, drank, have drunk
Ten Most Common Irregular Verbs in English
(in order of frequency)
Be: is am are was were be being been
Have: have, has, having, had
Do: do, does, doing, did, (have) done
Say: say, says, saying, said
Make: make, makes, making, made
Go: go, goes, going, went, (have) gone
Take: take, takes, took, (have) taken
Come: come, comes, came, (have) come
See: see, sees, saw, (have) seen
Get: get, gets, got, (have) gotten
Use the Reading Rods to create three different kinds of sentences:
Statements: What do you notice about the
colors?
Questions: What do you notice about the
colors?
Commands: What do you notice about the
colors?
Expand noun phrases by adding information that answers the questions
what kind? which one? how many?
Expand verb phrases by adding information that answers the questions
where? when? why? how? how much?
This “Morphology Kit”
is a great way to
expand vocabulary
because most
Noun-Making
of the words
created by
Suffixes
these suffixes
express abstract
ideas.
Morphology Kit
-ment
-ness
-ation, sion
-ity
-ism
-hood
-itude
-ence
-ance
-ide
Verb-Making Suffixes Adjective-making
suffixes
-ate
-ify
-ize
-acious,icious
-y
-ous, ious
-ant
-able, ible
-er; est
Adverb-making suffix:
-ly
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