Principles of Teaching Grammar
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Principle
1)
Teach in the target language, making input comprehensible.
2)
Contextualize grammar instruction using social issues, real life cultural
situations, and connections to other disciplines.
Practice grammar using culturally authentic materials (ads, children’s
books, comics, magazines, newspapers, realia, songs, videos, etc.)
State the communicative purpose the grammatical structure supports
(i.e., the present subjunctive allows us to boss people around, give
instructions, etc.).
Keep explanations simple (no more than 5 minutes).
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6)
Change only one variable at a time (to minimize confusion and so
students can identify patterns more easily).
7) Let the activities teach (i.e., help students discover processes and
patterns in the target language).
8) Give students lots of interpersonal, communicative practice (i.e., focus
on language USE).
9) Scaffold activities to support students’ success (with graphic
organizers, images, sentence frames, etc.).
10) Provide feedback (self-checking exercises, patterns of error).
Sample Activities:
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Board Games
Coloring Worksheets
Critical Thinking Activities
Describe & Draw
Drawing Activities
Flyswatter Game
Four Corners
Graphic Organizers or Foldables
Handouts
Hear/Circle
Human Graphing
Inductive Grammar Presentations
Journals
Learning Centers
Living Sentences
Manipulatives
Match Descriptions with Pictures
Mixers
Paired Activities
Pantomimes
Piensapapeles
Sentence Diagramming
Signature Searches/Human Bingo
Signal Cards
Snowballs
Songs
Sorting
Tic Tac Toe Games
Venn Diagrams
Teaching Grammar ♦ 2014 ♦ Adapted from Suzanne Kauer Beasterfield by Cherice Montgomery
Principles of Teaching Grammar
Teaching Grammar ♦ 2014 ♦ Adapted from Suzanne Kauer Beasterfield by Cherice Montgomery