BTAN 1121 MA Language Awareness (Grammmar and the Language Teacher)
KGJ/2011
Instructor: Dr. Judit Kiss-GulyásCourse type: seminar
Year of training: I, semester 2 (MA teacher training programme)
Time: Tuesday, 14.00-15.50
Venue: Main building, Room 109
Office hours: Tuesday, 11.00-12.00 (Room 116/2), Wednesday, 15.40-16.40
E-mail address: kiss_gulyas@tigris.unideb.hu
Course description
Most potential teachers are afraid of dealing with grammar in the classroom. This fear comes from the
complexity and multiple demands of the task. The efficiency of the teacher’s treatment of grammar in
instructed environments depends, first and foremost, on his/her own understanding of how form,
meaning and function interact in the foreign language, and also on how aware s/he is of the
contribution of the chosen structure and vocabulary item to the successful communication of the
intended message. Equally importantly, the teacher, who acts as mediator has to adapt his/her
knowledge of the grammar of a language to student needs and levels. This certainly requires awareness
and special skills: awareness (i) of the similarities and differences between the mother tongue of the
learners and the foreign language, and (ii) of the connection between descriptive and pedagogical
grammars and the learner/user's own 'psycholinguistic' grammar. Special skills are needed to be able to
decide on the best approach to introduce or practice a structure with a given group of learners, bearing
in mind their proficiency level and age.
In the Language Awareness course participants will have ample opportunities (i) to analyze structures
for teaching purposes though language awareness raising activities, (ii) to explore areas of special
difficulty for the L2 learner and discuss their implications for the classroom. Also, the course aims to
equip participants with a variety of techniques and activities for the presentation and practice of
structures within the communicative framework.
Method(s) of assessment:
Participation, presentations, microteaching
Course outline
WEEKS
WEEK 1
WEEK 2
Topics
Introduction: Language awareness, basic principles. Grammar and Communication: New
directions in Theory and Practice.
Prescriptive grammar and language use.
Pedagogical grammar – a mediator?
WEEK 3
Product and process approaches to teaching grammar
WEEK 4
Cross-linguistic influence: Structural areas of special difficulty for the L2 English
learners of L1 Hungarian
WEEK 5
Analysing structures 1. The grammar of choice. The teaching order of structures.
WEEK 6
WEEK 7
Analysing structures 2. Aspects of a new structure
The importance of context.
WEEK 8
Ways of presenting structures according to the principles of ‘communicative grammar’ 1.
MT.
1
WEEK 9
Ways of presenting structures according to the principles of ‘communicative grammar’ 1.
MT.
WEEK 10
Ways of practising structures 1 MT.
WEEK 11
Ways of practising structures 2 MT.
WEEK 12
Grammatical and lexical cohesive devices MT.
WEEK 13
Error Analysis
Recommended readings:
AITKEN, R. 1992. Teaching Tenses. Ideas for presenting and practising tenses in English. Nelson.
ANDERSON, Bruce. 2007. Pedagogical rules and their Relationship to Frequency in the Input:
Observational and Empirical Data from L2 French. In: Applied Linguistics 28/2: 286-308.
ARNDT, V., HARVEY, P. & NUTTALL, J. 2000. Alive to Language. Perspectives on language
awareness for English language teachers. Cambridge: CUP
BATSTONE, R. 1994.Grammar. Oxford: OUP. .
BYGATE, M., TONKYN, A. & WILLIAMS, E. (eds.) 1994. Grammar and the Language Teacher.
London: Prentice Hall.
DE KEYSER, R. M. 2005. What Makes Learning Second-Language Grammar Difficult? A review of
Issues. Language Learning, Volume 55, Supplement 1, pp. 1-25.
HALL, N. & SHEPHEARD, J. 1991. The Anti-Grammar Grammarbook. Discovery Activities for
Grammar Teaching. Longman.
HINKEL, E. and FOTOS, S. (eds.) 2002. New perspectives on grammar teaching in Second language
Classrooms. London: Laurence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.
JAMES, C. & GARRETT, P. 1991. Language Awareness in the Classroom. Longman.
ODLIN, T. 1994. Perspectives on Pedagogical Grammar. Cambridge: CUP.
PARROTT, M. 2000. Grammar for English Language Teachers. Cambridge: CUP
RINVOLUCRI, M. 1984. Grammar Games. Cambridge: CUP.
RUTHERFORD, W. E. 1987. Second Language Grammar: Learning and Teaching. Part 1 pp.3-34.
Longman
SWAN, M. 1995. Practical English Usage.Second edition. OUP
UR, P. 1988. Grammar Practice Activities. Cambridge: CUP
WRIGHT, T. 1994. Investigating English. Edward Arnold.
YIANG, Nan. 2007. Selective Integration of Linguistic Knowledge in Adult Second Language
Learning. In: Language Learning, 51:1, 1-33.
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