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| This email is written by: Kenneth Beare English as 2nd Language Guide |
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Planning a grammar lesson
Tanya Cotter, British
Without grammar, words hang together without any real meaning or sense. In order to be able to speak a language to some degree of proficiency and to be able to say what we really want to say, we need to have some grammatical knowledge. By teaching grammar we not only give our students the means to express themselves, but we also fulfil their expectations of what learning a foreign language involves. Fortunately, nowadays with the emphasis on a communicative approach and a wealth of stimulating resources, teaching grammar does not necessarily mean endless conjugation of verbs or grammar translation.
Which approach?
There are two main approaches to teaching grammar. These are the deductive and the inductive approach.
- A deductive approach is when the rule is presented and the language is produced based on the rule.(The teacher gives the rule)
- An inductive approach is when the rule is inferred through some form of guided discovery.(The teacher gives the students a means to discover the rule for themselves)
In other words, the former is more teacher centred and the latter more learner centred. Both approaches have their advantages and disadvantages.
In my own experience, the deductive approach is undoubtedly time saving and allows more time for practising the language items thus making it an effective approach with lower level students. The inductive approach, on the other hand, is often more beneficial to students who already have a base in the language as it encourages them to work things out for themselves based on their existing knowledge.
Presentation, practice and production (PPP)
A deductive approach often fits into a lesson structure known as PPP (Presentation, Practice, Production). The teacher presents the target language and then gives students the opportunity to practise it through very controlled activities. The final stage of the lesson gives the students the opportunity to practise the target language in freer activities which bring in other language elements.
In a 60 minute lesson each stage would last approximately 20 minutes. This model works well as it can be used for most isolated grammatical items. It also allows the teacher to time each stage of the lesson fairly accurately and to anticipate and be prepared for the problems students may encounter. It is less workable at higher levels when students need to compare and contrast several grammatical items at the same time and when their linguistic abilities are far less uniform.
Presentation
In this stage the teacher presents the new language in a meaningful context. I find that building up stories on the board, using realia or flashcards and miming are fun ways to present the language.
For example, when presenting the 2nd conditional, I often draw a picture of myself with thought bubbles of lots of money, a sports car, a big house and a world map.
- I ask my students what I'm thinking about and then introduce the target language.
"If I had a lot of money, I would buy a sports car and a big house." - I practise and drill the sentence orally before writing it the board (positive, negative, question and short answer).
- I then focus on form by asking the students questions. E.g." What do we use after 'if'?" and on meaning by asking the students questions to check that they have understood the concept (E.g. "Do I have lots of money?" No." What am I doing?" Imagining.)
- When I am satisfied that my students understand the form and the meaning, I move on to the practice stage of the lesson. During this stage of the lesson it is important to correct phonological and grammatical mistakes.
Practice
There are numerous activities which can be used for this stage including gap fill exercises, substitution drills, sentence transformations, split sentences, picture dictations, class questionnaires, reordering sentences and matching sentences to pictures.
- It is important that the activities are fairly controlled at this stage as students have only just met the new language. Many student's books and workbooks have exercises and activities which can be used at this stage.
- When teaching the 2nd conditional, I would use split sentences as a controlled practice activity. I give students lots of sentence halves and in pairs they try and match the beginnings and ends of the sentences.
Example: "If I won the lottery," …. "I'd travel around the world." - I would then do a communicative follow up game like pelmanism or snap using the same sentence halves.
Production
Again there are numerous activities for this stage and what you choose will depend on the language you are teaching and on the level of your students. However, information gaps, role plays, interviews, simulations, find someone who, spot the differences between two pictures, picture cues, problem solving, personalisation activities and board games are all meaningful activities which give students the opportunity to practise the language more freely.
- When teaching the 2nd conditional, I would try to personalise the lesson at this stage by giving students a list of question prompts to ask others in the class.
Example:do / if / win the lottery? - Although the questions are controlled the students are given the opportunity to answer more spontaneously using other language items and thus the activity becomes much less predictable.
- It is important to monitor and make a note of any errors so that you can build in class feedback and error analysis at the end of the lesson.
Conclusion
When teaching grammar, there are several factors we need to take into consideration and the following are some of the questions we should ask ourselves:
- How useful and relevant is the language?
- What other language do my students need to know in order to learn the new structure effectively?
- What problems might my students face when learning the new language?
- How can I make the lesson fun, meaningful and memorable?
Although I try to only use English when teaching a grammar lesson, it is sometimes beneficial to the students to make a comparison to L1 in the presentation stage. This is particularly true in the case of more problematic grammatical structures which students are not able to transfer to their own language.
It is also important to note that using the PPP model does not necessarily exclude using a more inductive approach since some form of learner centred guided discovery could be built into the presentation stage. When presenting the 2nd conditional I sometimes present the language in context and then give the students a worksheet with a series of analysis questions to do in pairs.
PPP is one model for planning a lesson. Other models include TTT (Test, Teach, Test), ARC (Authentic use, Restricted use, Clarification and focus) and ESA (Engage, Study, Activate). All models have their advantages and disadvantages and I, like many other teachers I know, use different models depending on the lesson, class, level and learner styles.
This article published: 9th December, 2005
Further reading
Grammar Practice Activities: A Practical Guide for Teachers. Penny Ur,
Grammar Games and Activities for Teachers. Peter Watcyn Jones, Penguin Books 1995
How to Teach English. Jeremy Harmer, Longman 1998
How to Teach Grammar. Scott Thornbury, Longman 1999
Overcoming Common Problems Related to Communicative Methodology
Stephen B. Ryan, ryan@human.kj.yamagata-u.ac.jp,
Introduction
English-as-a-Second Language (ESL) teachers are often faced with the challenging tasks of making our classes meaningful, practical and, yes, even fun for our students. In planning course curriculum for the year, it can be exciting to modify past curriculum or experiment with a new plan that can make teaching easier or more interesting for all. Unfortunately, there are recurring problems that need consideration and planning to overcome potential pitfalls to realizing our curriculums full potential. In this paper, six problematic areas in the Japanese university EFL classroom context are identified and a few suggestions offered to combat these weaknesses. Although there are more areas of concern than the six discussed here, these are believed to be the most critical to the success of the course.
Provide Adequate Feedback
Today's communicative methodology is learner-centered and emphasizes fluency over accuracy. Although fluency is much needed, it does, however, create a problem of providing enough concrete feedback for learners to correct their mistakes and keep focused on the immediate classroom task(s) at hand. Students often do not receive enough feedback as to how they are doing throughout the course. This results in loss of motivation and interest. Despite what students may say, they prefer and expect to receive some kind of concrete feedback as to how they are progressing in the course. Feedback can be the traditional test or weekly quiz but students can also benefit from "real time" feedback which requires them, for instance, to write their answers on the blackboard or collaborate with a partner. In sum, learners need a constant stream of feedback big or small that can keep them motivated and learning as opposed to a assessing them with a single final semester test.
Clarify Goals
Another weakness of a solely communicative approach is that it is a collection of principles that are loosely bundled together (Van Lier 1988:72) offering the learner little or no direction. Some teachers give a class syllabus on the first day that seldom gets used. Students can benefit more if they know specifically on a class-by-class basis what language they trying to practice and in what context. Rather than practice language for the sake of language, learners can be kept motivated and interested if, for example, they know that they will be practicing the past perfect or within a specific context such as language used in a hotel. The teacher can even write the lesson goal on the blackboard on a daily basis. All of this kind localized goal setting is more explicit and lets students know what they are expected to do. In sum, it is useful to set small achievable goals on a daily basis and make learners aware of how they are to accomplish these goals.
Have Consistency in Teaching Style
Communicative methodology is great for requiring our students to produce language albeit in a somewhat loose fashion. But, it also creates a division in teaching style. At some stages, we are expected to be strict about certain aspects such as regular attendance and punctuality. On the other hand, we often have to assume the role of friend-coach to make our learners feel compelled to speak and not be afraid of making mistakes. This creates a stark contrast between the teacher who can fail and the teacher that wishes to encourage speaking and, necessarily, making mistakes. Learners may feel betrayed if they score poorly on a test but do well in classroom tasks. As second or foreign language teachers, it is crucial that we maintain awareness of our "style" of teaching. It often helps to observe a colleague's class or have a trusted colleague observe your own. You may find some useful insights into your own lessons. For instance, I once had a colleague observe my own class, and he observed that I occasionally changed my English grammar to a Japanese grammar style, "On the blackboard, write your answers please." This usage was inconsistent with the goals of the course. It may feel uncomfortable to be critiqued or observed. However, if we do not become more aware of our teaching style and inconsistencies, we will have difficulty in continuing to grow professionally.
Lessons Need a Routine or Framework
There is a fine line between in communicative methodology between giving students too much responsibility to speak freely in class and not enough. The communicative approach in its pure form advocates making students speak as much as possible. However, language is also a routine and learners need a framework in which they can feel comfortable in taking that risk to speak out in front of others. A useful framework often presented by many teacher trainers is:
- Warm-up
- Presentation
- Controlled practice
- Free practice
- Feedback
Many current EFL textbooks adopt this kind of curricula. Below is an example how each phase can be done in a 90 minute lesson.
Topic: Hotel reservations
Language functions: making reservations, asking, expressing opinion
- Warm-up: The teacher asks students (in pairs) to think of 3 "hotel words" such as lobby or front desk and write them on the blackboard. The teacher then goes over each word explaining any difficult points and just trying to frame the context.
- Presentation: Learners listen to a short dialogue between a hotel clerk and customer. Then, they repeat it with the teacher aloud to raise awareness and practice pronunciation
- Controlled practice: Students practice the same conversation above substituting some words if they wish. After 10 minutes, learners close their books and can volunteer to perform the memorized dialogue. With books still closed, the teacher plays the same dialogue from the tape again allowing learners to gain additional confidence.
- Free practice: The teacher gives a hotel information gap exercise to each pair. Students are now required to freely practice the same language and are sufficiently empowered to do so.
- Feedback: The teacher goes over any problematic phrases, pronunciation difficulties or even acts out the drama with the students by changing the dialogue in "real time".
Have Cultural Awareness
We know that culture plays an important role in the day-to-day classroom activities. It is important for the teacher to recognize potential negative culturally based perceptions of their learners and vice versa. In
Be Clear About Student-Teacher Relationship
ESL teachers are often faced with choosing the kind of relationship they wish to establish with their students. Some prefer a strict division between the student-teacher relationship while others prefer a friend-coach relationship. Communicative methodology encourages the latter. Many students misinterpret this as tacit approval to pursue undesirable behavior such as cutting class or turning in late homework. To avoid this, it is important to clearly express not only the course requirements but one's own personal philosophy to assessing learners. For instance, students need to know from the first class that you will not accept late homework assignments or poor attendance, but that they will be allowed to make up tests and quizzes. By explicitly stressing this kind of seemingly trivial information, the teacher can save a lot of valuable class time and create a more productive atmosphere.
Conclusion
In conclusion, by being consistent, explicit and offering immediate feedback, there are fewer opportunities for learners to consistently misinterpret the goals of a course curriculum. While a communicative methodology is an excellent tool for increasing fluency, used exclusively, it also creates recurring problems that need to be addressed and counterbalanced with different methodology. Overcoming these common recurring problems that plague our courses can free the instructor to become more creative while allowing learners to become more competent in the target language.
Reference
- Van Lier, L. (1988). The Classroom and the Language Learner. Longman:
The Internet TESL Journal, Vol. VII, No. 11, November 2001
http://iteslj.org/
http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Ryan-Communicative.html
Integrative L2 Grammar Teaching: Exploration, Explanation and Expression
Pavel V. Sysoyev The
Abstract
This paper addresses the issue of L2 grammar teaching to ESL students with the focus on form and meaning. A method of integrative grammar teaching, consisting of three major stages (a) exploration, (b) explanation, and (c) expression (EEE), is proposed. To illustrate how each of these stages function, several experimental lessons were conducted. The paper describes and discusses the lessons themselves, their rationale, and their implementation of the proposed method. An evaluative questionnaire conducted after the experimental lessons, shows that students preferred to learn L2 grammar using the EEE method, as opposed to form-based or meaning-based only approaches.
Introduction
Beginning in 1970's interest in the teaching of 'real-language' has increased as scholars have become more and more interested in the language used in various social and cultural settings. As a result, there has been a rapid shift of research and practice from audiolingual and grammar-translation methods to the exploration of communicative language teaching, and much attention has been paid to focusing on global and integrative tasks, rather than on discrete structures. In her entry to the Routledge Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics, Savignon (forthcoming) makes clear that "communication cannot take place in the absence of structure, or grammar, a set of shared assumptions about how language works...." Therefore, as she continues, Canale and Swain (1980) included grammatical competence into their model of communicative competence. However, a review of the research starting from 1970's (Ellis, 1997) shows that communicative L2 teaching was perceived as a departure from grammar in favor of focusing on the meaning only. Comparison of communicative (also referred as meaning-based) to form-based (also referred as structure-based) approaches in L2 teaching shows that communicative language teaching enables students to perform spontaneously, but does not guarantee linguistic accuracy of the utterances. On the other hand, form-based approaches focus on the linguistic and grammatical structures, which makes the speech grammatically accurate. But this accuracy is observed in prepared speech only, and students lack the ability to produce spontaneous speech.
There are not many studies that compare communicative to form-based approaches. Prabhu (cited by Beretta & Davies, 1985) conducted an experiment in communicative language teaching and found that the experimental group, which received meaning-based instruction, did well on the meaning-based test, but showed low results on the discrete-point test. The control group, on the other hand, having received structural instruction, performed better on the grammar structure tasks, rather than on the global and integrative tests. The outcome of this experiment is quite logical and obvious and can be explained by the washback effect. Students' performance was better on the tasks they were trained for. The question then rises, what method is the most effective? It has become popular these days to refer to the goals and needs of students. Therefore, if students need grammar for communication, it should be taught communicatively, that is, meaning-based. On the other hand, if students need the grammar knowledge to be able to translate from L2 to L1, and that is what they are going to be graded on, then form-based approaches will be more appropriate. However, these are polar opposite positions that leave no room for nuance.
In learning an L2 grammar, students face a dilemma. On the one hand, students need to know the rules, as that is what they are tested on at schools. On the other, with a number of foreign visitors, or living in an L2 country there is a good need for communication in an L2. That is why there is a need to look at the ways of combining form and meaning in teaching foreign languages.
Integrative Grammar Teaching
As a possible solution, integrative grammar teaching combines a form-based with a meaning-based focus. Spada and Lightbown (1993) have also argued "that form focused instruction and corrective feedback provided within the context of communicative interaction can contribute positively to second language development in both the short and long term" (p. 205). Thus, integration of form and meaning is becoming increasingly important in current research. Celce-Murcia, Dornyei and Thurrell (1997) call it "a turning point" in communicative language teaching (p. 141), in which "explicit, direct elements are gaining significance in teaching communicative abilities and skills" (p. 146). Kumaravadivelu calls this a "principled communicative approach" (cited by Celce-Murcia, Dornyei and Thurrell, 1997). Of course, depending on the students and their particular needs, either form or meaning can be emphasized. But in having various students with different needs in the same group, or having various needs in the same students, an integrative grammar teaching approach creates optimal conditions for learning for everyone in the classroom. Musumeci (1997) mentions the idea of connecting form and meaning in grammar teaching as a developing trend in reference to the proficiency oriented curriculum. She points out that students should be able to learn explicit grammar rules as well as have a chance to practice them in communication in the authentic or simulation tasks. Interestingly, Musumeci advocates giving students a chance to look at the language on a sentence level to see how certain grammatical rules are applied.
Integrative grammar teaching, which presupposes students' interaction while learning, can be viewed as a cognitive process of learning an L2 that reflects the sociocultural theory proposed by the Russian psychologist Vygotsky (1978). In talking about the development of a child's brain and his socialization, Vygotsky argues that there is a strong relationship between learning and cognitive development, in which cognition develops as a result of social interaction and sharing the responsibility with a parent or a more competent person. From an early age, children look to their parents for clues to acceptable social behavior. This brings us to Vygotsky's zone of proximal development (ZPD) in which there are two main stages of an individual's development. The first stage is what a child or learner can do by himself; the second stage is his potential, what he can accomplish with the help of another, more competent person. The distance between two points is called the zone of proximal development. Vygotsky also introduces the notion of a mediator - a person who helps students to accomplish what they cannot do by themselves. According to Appel and Lantolf (1994) and Lantolf and Pavlenko (1995), the role of the mediator in teaching an L2 is placed on an L2 teacher, whose task is to direct students in the right direction and help them reach the second stage in the ZPD.
Similar to Vygotsky's theory is the often-criticized Krashen's (1981, 1985) Input Hypothesis, also well-known as the "i +1" hypothesis. According to this hypothesis i represents students' current level of L2 proficiency, and +1 is level of the linguistic form or function beyond the present students' level. Krashen's Input Hupothesis and Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development are basically describing the same cognitive process of social interaction in students' development. For Krashen, optimal input should be comprehensible, i.e. focused on the meaning and not on the form. In this study students will be focusing on the form, but actively, through communicative, meaning-based, exploratory assignments. Even though well-criticized for lack of empirical evidence (Faerch & Kasper, 1986; Gregg, 1984; McLaughlin, 1987, etc.), the significant contribution of the Input Hypothesis to the field of applied linguistics is that it shows how teachers can focus on the actual level of students, adjusting the complexity of the material so that learners will be able to reach what initially was beyond their level.
In this research I would like to share my understanding of integrative grammar teaching, combining the form and the meaning, and propose what I call the EEE method, which consists of three equally important stages: exploration, explanation, and expression.
- Exploration is the first stage of integrative grammar teaching. This stage is characterized by "inductive learning." Students are given sentences illustrating a certain grammar rule and are asked as a group to find the pattern and, with the help of the teacher, to formulate the rule. Many scholars have arguing against passive or inactive learning (see, for example, Johnson, 1995; and others) in which teachers refer to a textbook for explanations of rules. I completely agree with this critique. Students should be given opportunities to figure out everything by themselves, receiving help only when necessary. To make the task easier in the beginning, some grammatical forms or endings can be highlighted. Students tend to prefer assignments that allow them to explore the language. The knowledge they obtain becomes theirs and it is often much easier to remember. Exploration, then, works as an excellent tool for motivation.
- Explanation is the second stage of learning. As students find sequences or patterns in the examples they used during the exploration stage, the teacher or the students can summarize what was previously discovered, now focusing on the form. In some situations it may be essential to go to the textbook and together with students relate 'textbook rules' with the examples and findings of the exploration stage. The explanation stage is quite important because students feel safer when they know the rules and have some source to go back to in case of confusion or for future reference. Depending on students' proficiency, confidence, and actual performance, this stage can sometimes be omitted. However, students should be aware of and experience the strategies they may use to refer to the explicit rules, if needed.
- Expression is the third and last stage of the process. After discovering certain grammatical patterns in the exploration stage and getting to know the rules in the explanation stage, students start practicing the production of meaningful utterances with each other in communication and interactive tasks. The rationale of this stage is to provide students experience in applying their acquired knowledge in practice by making meaningful utterances. On the one hand, this may also serve as a motivation technique, since learners can actually see what they can do with what they have learned. On the other, the expression stage gives them the opportunity to practice communicating under the teacher's supervision, which usually assures the students that they can produce a correct utterance. Communicative interaction will be better if it is content-based, which allows students to relate it to something they care or know about, thus making it authentic.
To show how the proposed method of integrative grammar teaching can function and what students' attitude towards it will be, several lessons were conducted to see how the method really works and what its potential is. The subjects were 10 undergraduate international students from
As we examine the excerpts from the ESL lessons that were conducted based on the EEE method, the explanation and interpretation of the patterns of classroom participation will be provided. The topic of the lesson presented in Excerpts one, two, and three is "The formation and use of the present simple tense."
Excerpt 1.
The rule: The use of the ending -s with verbs in the present simple tense.
Stage 1. Students were given the following sentences and were asked to find the grammatical pattern. All instruction was done in English.
1). I go_ to school every day.
2). My mother works at the IBM company.
3). Water boils at 100 C.
4). My friends play_ tennis with me.
5). They ride_ bicycles.
1. T: Now, I want you to look at the board. You will see several sentences. In some of them we add "-s" to the verb, in some we do not. (T points at every sentence.) Thus, where ending "s" is, it is underlined (sentences 2 and 3). In sentences where we don't have "-s" (points at 1, 4, and 5) the underlining shows where it could be. Words in bold determine whether we should add "-s" to verbs or not. Your task will be to think why we sometimes use and sometimes don't use "-s" with verbs. Imagine yourself being scholars who are finding the pattern or making a new rule. Do you see any sequence?
2. Chien: because of the ... how do you say the ... the nouns in the first.
3. T: OK, so we do not use ending -s with "I", right?
4. Chien: Yes.
5. T: Ok. We don't use it with an "I". Do we use it with "mother"?
6. Chien: Yea.
7. T: Is it only with "mother" or with any noun?
8. ...
9. T: ok is "mother" singular or plural?
10. Olga: Singular, right?
11. T: If instead of "mother" we use a different word, such as "father" or "son" will we put ending "s" or not?
12. Olga: Yea, because that singular, right? If it is singular we should put "s."
13. T: But "I" is also in singular.
14. Olga: Yea
15. T: And "mother" is in singular.
16. Olga: Yea
17. T: So, why do we add "s" to the verb used with "mother" and don't add "s" with "I"?
18. Olga: ...
19. Chien: Because I is a first ... what is that?
20. T: First person.
21. Chien: Ye, and that's the third person.
22. T: That is a third person. Right. So, we do not add "s" with the nouns in the third person. Good, so, if we pass to "Water boils at 100 C". What is here?
23. Olga: We use -s in singular, right, and that is a third person, no not a third person ...
24. Alex: Third person? Yea.
25. T: Third person. That is correct. Ok, now let's go to the examples number 4 and number 5. Here we have "friends play" and "they ride."
26. Olga: That is plural, right? My friends play tennis with we, that is right because that's the plural, right?
27. T: Hu hu.
28. Olga: And they ride cycles. That's right, because it is plural too.
29. T: Good. So, can we form a rule?
30. Chien: Yes, you mean?
31. T: In what cases we add
32. Alex: -s at the end of the verbs?
33. T: Yea.
34. Alex: If the noun is singular and third person and this is present simple tense we add -s at the end of the verbs.
35. T: And if it is in plural?
36. Alex: we don't put -s.
Teacher-Student Interaction in Exploration of the New Rules
Excerpt one is a good example of an initiation, response, evaluation (IRE) interactional sequence (Mehan, 1979). The teacher begins by introducing the topic for group exploration and then elicits students' responses. The way the teacher gives the task in turn 1 is actually amazing and potentially very powerful: "Imagine yourself being scholars who are finding the patterns or making a new rule. Do you see any sequence?" This invitation to participate had a tremendous effect on the students. It contained several implicit messages. One was that because "making new rules" is a discovery, it is acceptable to make mistakes; students need not to be afraid of talking and expressing the thoughts. Another was encouraging confidence and students' potential, who were responsible for investigation and participation in the learning process. The flow of teacher-student dialogue, as a rule, depends primarily on the students' reactions, responses, and their understanding of what is to be learned. If students do not understand something, or misinterpret the rule, the teacher tries to control it and puts them on the right track by paraphrasing their statements or with leading questions. This occurs in turn 12, Olga overgeneralizes, saying "If it is singular we should put '-s.'" The teacher quickly responds in turn 13 by shifting students' attention to the first sentence "I go to school every day," by saying "But "I" is also in singular," thus, telling them that the pattern they have found should be clarified or revised. Moreover, in turns 15 through 17, the teacher guides the cognitive thinking of the group by using leading questions, keeping the students' thinking under control. Here he says "But 'I' is also in singular [turn 13] and 'mother' is singular [turn 15]. So, why do we add -s to the verb used with "mother" and don't add -s with "I"?" [turn 17]. But a couple of times, in turns 18-20 and 31-32, students initiated the co-constructioning the teacher-student dialogue, when some learners took the opportunity to answer teacher's question, which were addressed to a different student. We will get back to this later.
The classroom interaction is governed by the teacher and by the students, a situation which creates optimal conditions for learning. Thus, in turn 2, Chien does not know how to call "I" from the first sentence and asks the teacher to help him "because of the ... how do you say the ... the nouns in the first." Responding to Chien's implicit request, the teacher does not give him the grammatical term Chien is expecting in order not to confuse the other students with terminology. However, it might have been done. By his answer in turn 3, "OK, so we do not use ending -s with 'I,'" instead of saying the word "pronoun," the teacher gives a clue to the group that an inductive style of learning is more important than the use of terminology and that they are expected to say what they see in a way that makes them feel comfortable. They were encouraged not to worry about the metalanguage. However, the interactional sequence (teacher-student communication) established at the beginning, breaks several times into "student-student" interaction. Thus, in turn 19, Olga answers the question, which was initially expected from Chien, saying "Because it is ... what is that ..." He knows the answer but does not have the lexical competence to respond immediately. In turn 24, Alex, breaking the student-teacher sequence, enters the discussion and helps with Olga's confusion "We use -s in singular, right, and that is a third person, no not a third person ...," by saying "Third person, yea."
The break in the teacher-student response sequence is a vivid example of how ZPD theory works. The teacher starts from where the students are and with his help they improve their knowledge of grammatical structure. As soon as they reach a certain level on which they (or at least some of them) feel confident, they are eager to show their understanding of the subject matter by, for example, breaking into the student-teacher dialogue. It completely agrees with Lantolf (1993) who emphasizes that ZPD is negotiated between the teacher and the student(s).
Paraphrasing is an important technique used in cognitive learning. Instead of giving the explicit answer, the teacher employs different strategies to help them discover the answer by themselves. In turn 7, the teacher says, "Is it only with "mother" or with any other noun?" and, not getting any answer from the group, the teacher rephrases the question in turn 9: "is 'mother' singular or plural." Thus, the teacher gives contextual clues as to what is expected. The clue turns out to be essential and in turn 10, Olga enters the discussion, saying "Singular, right?" In turn 30, the teacher asks Chien "Ok, can you formulate the rule?" Chien was eager to speak but did not understand the question, which explains his words ("yes, you mean?"[turn 31]). That made the teacher become more detailed in giving the task. "In what cases we add," in turn 32, was enough for Alex to grasp what is expected; moreover, he continued for the teacher: "'s' or 'es' at the end of the verbs?"
Inevitably, at least at the beginning of integrative grammar teaching, students look to and ask the teacher for clarification and confirmation that they are saying the right things. Vivid illustrations of this can be found in turns 3, 10, 24, 26, 32, when either by rising intonation or with the help of the clarifying word "right?," students expected approval on behalf of the teacher. Interestingly, it looks as if students picked up "right?" from the teacher, who used it first for clarification in turn 3. The response to students' request for clarification is usually done by the teacher in the form of a brief message ("hu, hu" [turn 27]). Sometimes the teacher does not give direct approval, but rather catches the correct idea from a student, extends it, and keeps the discussion going.
The analysis of the types of questions used by the teacher in the activity is reflected by students' participation. The activity starts with Yes/No questions (turns 1, 3, 5, and 9). They are primarily used when students participate only slowly. Thus, to ensure they are not lost, the teacher says, "OK. We don't use it with "I," do we use it with "mother"?" [turn 5]. When the students' participation decreases, alternative questions are used as the teacher reinforces and encourages students. There may be several explanations to students' slowing down. The first may be that the instructional method was new and even though students were told what was expected of them, they were not sure about what to do. The second may be in the nature of each new task. At first, when students were introduced to the unknown format, it was new and took much time to figure out how they were supposed to behave. However, when the learners grasped the idea about the formation of the tense and were active in their responses, the teacher used wh-questions, which challenged them to think and directed them in the right way [turns 22, 31, 35].
This classroom participation structure follows the IRE interactional sequence. As Johnson's (1995) research shows, the teacher and students set implicit rules of interaction. At the beginning, at turn 1, students are waiting for the teacher to initiate the discussion by giving an assignment. Then, starting from turn 2, once students are asked a question, they receive the responsibility for completing the information cycle by interpreting what they see to make up grammatical rules. As it was stated above, in some cases some students break the established rule by answering their peer's questions without waiting for the teacher. As we saw, the teacher supported such break-ups, since it involved several students in the discussion, thus giving equal opportunities for interaction.
Excerpt 2.
Stage 2. In the explanation stage, the teacher ends the first stage and tells the students the explicit grammatical rules. Sometimes, depending on the level of difficulty of the particular grammatical construction, students may be asked to open the book to a certain page and with the teacher go through the rule.
T: Very good. You proved to be very good scholars and found the rule correctly. You were right. In using the present simple tense, we add ending s (-es) to the verb in the first person singular, that is, when it refers to 'he,' 'she,' and 'it,' like in our examples: 'My mother works at the IBM company,' and 'Water boils at 100 C' (shows on the board). In the other cases, like you can see here (points at the other examples) we have just the infinitive of the verb or the way it is in the dictionary without 'to.' You can use Present Simple tense to describe what you or others usually/often/sometimes do. For example, "My wife's name is Linda. She works at the Giant. She is a cashier. She likes to talk to people," and so on. Or we can use this tense to talk about facts that represent a universal truth. For example, "The sun rises in the East. Water boils at 100 C."
Even though this task is similar to the grammar explanations typical in the learners' L1 countries, the teacher tried to make this "routine" activity cognitive and that is why he compares examples used in the first stage with examples given in the textbook. Even though it sounds simple, this technique has a great effect on learners. It serves as a bridge between what students consider "theory," or what is usually given in textbooks, on the one hand, and "practical use," what students have discovered, on the other. In the explanation stage it is important to make a connection between the examples and the explicit rules. This connection will help learners build on what they already have discovered. After the explanation of the explicit rules, the teacher again gives students meaningful examples of how and in what situations the tense can be used. For example, the specific example about the teacher's wife illustrates the rules in a content-based utterance, which can be a good technique for modeling. After discovering the rules and providing students with models of their usage, it will be interesting to see how learners are going to use their knowledge in the actual interaction.
Excerpt 3.
Stage 3. Expression. The teacher divides students into pairs and gives them the task.
1. T: Now split into pairs and tell your partner about each of your family members, friends, relatives: where they live, where they work, what they like to do, and so on. You can imagine some things, if you want. Like if you do not have a brother, imagine that you do and think what he does. After you listen to each other's stories, you will be asked to report to the whole group about your partner's family or friends. Ok? Do you have any questions?
2. Ss: ...
Students split into pairs and began working in pairs. Interestingly, the tape recorder had been placed near one pair (Olga and Alla), who apparently did not see it. Their discussion was extremely valuable and interesting.
3. Olga: So what we need to do?
4. Alla: I will tell you about my family and you tell me about your. Then I will tell them about you and you about me.
5. Olga: So I ... not tell them about me?
6. Alla: No. You will tell them about me and I will tell them about you. Is it ok?
7. Olga: ye.
8. Alla: ok. My family is very big. I have mother, father, two sisters and a brother.
9. Olga: Wow, How old are they?
10. Alla: I don't know about parents. Tanya, my sister is 12, Dasha, another sister is 16, and Anton ... my brother is 14.
11. Olga: They are smaller than you.
12. Alla: Yes. So, now I will tell you about them.
13. Olga: OK
14. Alla: Tanya go ... goes to school. She likes to read books about love.
15. Olga: Wow. I like about love also.
16. Alla: Dasha plays on the piano. She goes to the musical school in my town. She plays very good. My brother Anton likes video games. He plays SEGA. And my parents works ... oh work at school.
17. T: How are you doing here? Do you have any questions?
18. Alla: No, it's ok.
19. Olga: it's ok.
20. T: ok.
21. Olga: Your parents teach?
22. Alla: Yes, they are teachers and they teach mathematics. Now, what about you?
23. Olga: ok. My family is small. My mother, father and I. My mother work at factory.
24. Alla: You must say "works".
25. Olga: ok. Works at factory. Why?
26. Alla: because mother is one, singular and third person, remember?
27. Olga: oh, yes. I forgot. My father works in his office. He is a businessman. He like ..ss to read newspapers about politics and likes to eat tasty food.
28. Alla: Does your mother cook or you go to the restaurants?
29. Olga: Yes.
30. Alla: what yes?
31. Olga: ah?
32. Alla: does your mother cook and you eat at home or you go to a restaurant? (more emphatically)
33. Olga: oh, at home. We eat at home. Yes, my mother cook..ss good food.
34. Olga: so, what do we need to do now?
35. Alla: he will ask me to tell about you and you will tell him about me.
36. Olga: ye, ye, ye.
37. T: Ok. Now your time is up. Now everyone will need to tell the whole class about your partner. Who wants to start.
In transcribing, I decided to pass other students' answers and go to the pair near the tape-recorder.
38. T: OK. Now, it is your turn. Who would like to begin, Olga or Alla?
39. Alla: I want.
40. T: ok.
41. Alla: Here is Olga. Her family is small. Her mother works at the factory and her father is a businessman. He likes tasty food, and he ... goes to the restaurants. And her mother cooks good food. And Olga studies English, he he.
42. T: Very good. It is so nice if a woman cooks well. Right? Ok. What about you Olga? Tell us about Alla's family.
43. Olga: Alla's family is big. Her father work and mother work, I mean her father and mother work at school. They teach mathematics. Her sister plays on the piano, and another sister reads books about love, hehe.
44. T: So, Alla has two sisters.? And one plays the piano. Interesting.
45. Olga: yes, she has two sisters. And she has one brother. He like(s) SEGA ... likes to play ... SEGA.
At the beginning of excerpt three, the teacher establishes the structure for student-student interaction. Arranged in pairs students take turns telling about their families using Present Simple Tense. Presumably, every student will have an equal opportunity to be the leader when telling about his family and then change the roles. The way it turns out in the classroom, though, shows the complexity of the group interaction. In turn 1, the teacher asks if there are any questions. Nobody asks any because there will be an opportunity to clarify the assignment with the peers and nobody wants to show that he/she did not understand the task. Once students are in a group, they assign themselves roles. In this case, the role distribution is based on "who knows what to do." Immediately after the students split into pairs, Olga asks Alla about the assignment "So what we need to do?" [turn 3]. Thus, from the very beginning in this particular pair Alla, being asked and being referred to as to the expert, will be playing the role of a leader.
Being a self-imposed leader and hence implicitly responsible for the completion of the task, Alla several times shifts back to the major topic of the discussion. We can see this in turn 12, "Yes, so now I will tell you about them." In turn 15, Olga reacts to the previous phrase and says that she "like[s] about love too." Alla simply ignores Olga's comment and sticks to the core topic of the discussion.
As leader, Alla seems to consider herself responsible for grammatical accuracy during the activity. She corrects herself, for example "Tanya go ... goes to school" [turn 14], "My parents works ... work at school" [turn 16] and she also suggests the right answer when her partner makes errors. In turn 23, Olga makes a grammatical mistake, saying "My mother work at factory." Alla immediately corrects her giving the correct for of her sentence "You must say 'works'" [turn 24]. Her correction leads to the explanation of the rule, in turn 26, "because mother is one, singular, and third person, remember?" Using the word "remember," Alla is trying to relate a particular grammatical feature from the context to the previous stages, thus showing the implementation of form in producing meaningful utterance. In some cases, Alla focuses on the content and asks Olga to elaborate when eliciting information about her mother [turns 28-32]. "Does your mother cook or you go to the restaurants?"[turn 28]. Olga does not understand the questions and responds "yes" [turn 29]. Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman (1999) see the source of this misunderstanding in incorrect intonation. Quite often ESL/EFL students pronounce Yes/No questions and alternative questions with the same falling intonation, which does not show to the interlocutor the choice. In turn 30, Alla tries to clarify what the right answer (from the choice) is, saying "What yes?" It was not enough for Olga, who does not understand what she needs to say "Ah?" [turn 31]. That makes Alla clarify the question more emphatically, making it more explicit "Does your mother cook and you eat at home or you go to a restaurant?"
Excerpt 3 represents a meaning based task, which reflects the nature of social interaction. It enables students to simulate a real-life situation, asking follow-up questions and reacting consequently. For example, in turn 9, after hearing that Alla has brothers, Olga interrupts her and asks "How old are they?" Or, in turn 28, after Alla heard that Olga's father likes to eat good food, she asks "Does your mother cook or you go to the restaurants?" What family members usually do is not important from the perspective of the task, but rather is a natural reaction of a listening interlocutor. Furthermore, in turn 11, after Alla tells her brothers' ages, Olga gives a remark "They are smaller than you" [turn 12]. Or after Olga heard that Alla's sister Dasha likes to read books about love [turn 14], she responds in turn 15, "Wow. I like about love also." Thus, the major advantage of combining form and meaning is that in practicing the form in meaning-based tasks, students negotiate the meaning in their L2. That results in spontaneous use of the target language.
Another interesting thing is that Alla, playing the role of the dyad's leader, is focusing on the form. For example, in turn 24, she says "you must say works." As for Olga, in the opposite, she is concentrating on the meaning. As I mentioned before, she shifts the natural flow of the interaction to subject matter that she finds more interesting [turns 9, 11, and 15]. Interestingly, in turn 21, Olga still remembers that Alla's parents work at school [turn 16] when the teacher interrupts the discussion to offer help [turn 17]. After the teacher leaves she restarts the flow of the discussion by asking Alla "Your parents teach?" Focusing on both form and meaning, even though doing so may be good, is very difficult to do. It seems that when Olga is focusing on the form, she uses the right form of the verb, for example, in turn 25, (speaking about Alla's father) "... works at factory." At the same time, in turn 27, "He like ...ss to read," and turn 33, "My mother cook ...ss good food," when Olga focuses on the meaning, she forgets about the form. That is exactly what Pica (1985) argues is the trouble for L2 learners when they switch their attention from the form to the meaning.
Group work in the third stage of the EEE instructional method is very powerful. Students are often less comfortable asking the teacher questions. Peer interaction creates a certain micro-world that enables the students to negotiate the assignment, clarify tasks, and even provide each other with corrections. It definitely develops their strategic competence (Savignon, 1972). In excerpt 3, students twice rejected the teacher's help and coped with the problem alone. It can be assumed, even though we obviously cannot be sure, that if the students did not have the opportunity to work and negotiate the meaning in groups, some questions would remain unsolved.
The last part of the excerpt (tuns 38-45) shows the way the teacher reacts in listening to the students' talk. Instead of interrupting, which would be disruptive, the teacher listens to the very end and then corrects the mistakes by repeating the sentence in the grammatically correct way. In turn 43, Olga says "... plays on the piano," which is a typical mistake of ESL students whose L1 is Russian, in which the preposition 'on' identifies the object of the activity. The teacher, then, in turn 44 repeats and rephrases the sentence, emphasizing and modeling the correct use "So, Alla has two sisters. And one plays the piano. Interesting."
Although groups can be very effective, teachers should not be naive about group interaction. Even though it looks like students are creating meaningful utterances by themselves, the instructor holds the responsibility for making sure that there is no misuse, that 'leaders' do not impose wrong forms and rules, and that students have equal opportunities to participate and express their thoughts. In turn 18, Alla very abruptly makes it clear to the teacher that his help is not wanted. However, we cannot be sure that Olga wanted the same. Thus, teachers need to find other strategies and techniques of controlling what is going on in groups, without explicitly "invading" a group.
An Evaluative Questionnaire
The method worked fairly successfully with the students. They were willing to respond and participate in classroom communication. To find out their attitudes towards learning grammar using the EEE method, an anonymous evaluative questionnaire was administered to the group after several lessons of integrative grammar teaching. The questions were formulated in such a way that the learners would be able to express their attitudes towards each task of the new method, as well as towards form-focused instruction only. The reliability of the instrument was investigated using the Kuder-Richardson Formula 20 (t(10)=26.28 at p<0.001).>
Conclusion
This paper described a way of combining form and meaning in teaching L2 grammar to ESL students. What I call the EEE method, consisting of three stages (exploration, explanation, and expression) has been proposed. A series of experimental lessons were administered to ESL students to study the patterns of classroom interaction during each of the suggested stages. As the analysis of the lessons shows, in the first, exploration stage, learners look at certain sentences and discover a grammatical pattern under an instructor's supervision. This stage also involves cognitive learning. Instead of being given an explicit rule, students spend some time discussing and discovering grammatical patterns, which, as the survey shows, helps them understand the rules. A teacher is given the role of the mediator working within the zone of proximal development. He starts at the point where his students are and pushes them, with his help, to grow and improve their L2 competence. In the second, explanation stage, the teacher explains explicit rules, which, as Lightbown (1980) and Pica (1985) show, will make their speech more grammatically accurate. It is important for the teacher to connect the rules to the examples from the exploration stage, which builds on what students already know, as well as provides content-based examples for the third stage. In the third, expression stage, students use new structures in interaction, producing meaningful utterances. This stage prepares L2 learners for spontaneous L2 use by helping them focus equally on form and on meaning in using their language in communication. Finally, the evaluative questionnaire, which was administered to determine the attitudes of the students towards a new method of grammar teaching, showed that students liked the method and thought its work was effective.
Acknowledgements
The author is grateful for and recognizes the insightful comments of Susan Strauss, Sandra Savignon, and Aaron Johnson on an earlier version of this article.
Research for this article was supported by President Yeltsin's and American Councils for International Education (ACTR/ACCELS) grants. None of these organisations are responsible for the views expressed.
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Appendix
Questionnaire
What is your preference for integrative grammar learning?
Please circle the number that best describes your attitude.
(SD - Strongly Disagree, D - Disagree, U - Undecided, A - Agree, SA - Strongly Agree)
| Question | SD | D | U | A | SA |
| 1. You learn English grammatical rules easier through exploration, rather than through reading the rules in a textbook. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 2. You don't like discussing topics in small groups. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 3. You think it is helpful to know explicit grammatical rules, which you could use in creating utterances in L2. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 4. You think you cannot learn a foreign language in group interaction. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 5. Exploration of grammar rules helps you to remember rules. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 6. You feel comfortable practicing new rules under an instructor's supervision. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 7. I feel safe when I know explicit grammar rules. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 8. Integrative grammar teaching is less interesting than reading the rules in a textbook. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 9. I do not like challenging tasks. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 10. I feel very confident in using English, even though I do not know all the rules. 11. Learning grammar is a waste of time. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 12. I have more opportunities to use English spontaneously when using an integrative method. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 13. Integrative grammar learning is boring. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
The Internet TESL Journal, Vol. V, No. 6, June 1999
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