LING 322 TEACHING LANGUAGES TO YOUNG CHILDREN CHAPTER 5 – LEARNING GRAMMAR

GRAMMAR AND YOUNG LEARNERS Grammar is necessary to express precise meanings in discourse Grammar ties closely into vocabulary in learning and using the foreign language Grammar learning can evolve from the learning of chunks of language Talking about something meaningful with the child can be a useful way to introduce a new grammar Grammar can be taught without technical labels

WHAT IS GRAMMAR? THE GRAMMAR OF A LANGUAGE THEORETICAL AND PEDAGOGIC PATTERNS OR RULES HOW WORDS ARE PUT TOGETHER THEORETICAL AND PEDAGOGIC THEORETICAL – theories of grammar, how they are internalised, how meaning is expressed PEDAGOGIC – descriptions of patterns/rules INTERNAL GRAMMAR Every learner has a different internal grammar Referred to as ‘interlanguage’ or ‘linguistic competence’ Helps teachers understand why

DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL GRAMMAR Rote learning chunks lead to early learning, development of grammar How words are used in the same places FROM WORDS TO GRAMMAR Children produce random word orders and work out how to use the language, try using them and amending them With more input, hypotheses will change HYPOTHESES TESTING Resort to using L1 when data is limited Assumes L2 works like L1 L1 INFLUENCE

LEARNING CENTERED APPROACH TRENDS IN GRAMMAR TEACHING - shift from grammar translation to task-based, communicative, and target oriented GRAMMAR AS EXPLICIT RULES Language learning is the accumulation of mastered rules of grammar Grammar rules are introduced one-by-one Learners learn the rules and practise using the rules COMMUNICATIVE APPROACHES Learners learn the language by using it to communicate with others