Keywords

grammar instruction, writing connection, teaching challenges

Abstract

When I first started teaching, grammar education was specifically addressed in my district's learning objectives: students will identify adjectives and adverbs; they will diagram subjects and direct objects. As a new teacher, I did my best to meet the objectives. I tried to make the content interesting and, somehow, connected to writing: we wrote clues for treasure hunts using prepositional phrases and descriptions of our own 'wild things" (a la Maurice Sendak) with elaborate adjectives. Once, I spent a week teaching verbals with comic strips to a ninth grade honors class, only to receive a scathing letter from a parent condemning me for spending "countless hours on stultifying grammar exercises." Although we had spent around four hours total—hardly countless—and although I didn't think writing bubbles for comics counted as stultifying exercises. I could see the parent's point. How did this help my students with their writing?

Original Publication Citation

“Grammar without Grammar: Just Playing Around, Writing.” English Journal, 91.2 (2001): 86-89.