Is grammar the main goal of a second language learning?

It is known that a teacher of a foreign language has to develop all skills of a language in his students and at the same time he has to train his students for getting a good fluency and accuracy of the language. It is not easy work, because to have a higher level of language the students and teacher have to take into account that grammar has an important place in any language. However, there are different opinions on teaching or not teaching grammar explicity.

 

As we have been learning in the course of Principles English Language Teaching III, there are many theories about how to teach grammar. Certainly all theories have worked in different periods of time and have had their benefits for developing something new, which helps to learn and teach a foreign language. The believes about the bes way to learn whether teaching or not teaching grammar are varied for each people and  also it has to do with the purpose that people have about the language that they are learning.

 

According to the text "Should we teach grammar? (Part II)", grammar is similar to have sex and for this reason it is important in the life, I think that what the text mentions is tru because grammar is always presented in everything that we speak, listen to, read or write and it is supposd that the same occurs when we use a second language. I said it is supposed because not all the learners when speak or write the foreign language use an accurate language. It is for that text mentions that is necessary to take into account the three important elements, which are the goal of instruction or the time instruction, the structure of the target language and the style of the learner. The first one has to do with the time that teacher has for developing the course, because time could be determinating in the level that students get of language. More time instruction gives more input and a higher level. On the other hand, less time instruction does not give enough input and the level of the language is lower. The second one mentions that grammar should not drive the curriculum, because all languages are different in its structure. Finally the third one which is related to the age of students and for that reasons it says that each learner has different interests.

 

All those factors have their importance and will be good that each teacher has this in his mind. However those are not the only factors for taking into account, there are more like those which also are focused on more things and have different perception about teaching grammar.

 

This is the case of what H.D. Brown (1994) mentions in his book "Teaching by principles". He makes a question saying if teachers should or not teach grammar in language class and how to teach it. He also mentions that grammar and some techniques for learning a language have been a central parto in the history. He talks about the variables that Celce-Mauricia(1991) did about the role of grammar. For instance, the learner variables like the age, which makes grammar varies. Children do not care about grammar so it is not important for them. On the other hand, for adults is the main thing; beginners do not focus on it, but advanced learners do it; something similar happen with preliterate people that think grammar is the most important thing for learning a language. In the case of instructional variables skills like listening and reafing the grammar is less important, nevertheless fr writing it is the most important thing; the same occurs in formal conversations which focuses on fluency and on the contrary the inforal ones like speech demands grammatical accuracy and this is related to the porpuse that people have.

 

The importance of understanding and paying attention in all those factors should be taken a big place in teaching a second language. Besides this, the book of Thornbury, Sccot "How to teach grammar" (1999) says that all the learners are different because of their needs, interests, level ad goals and also he mentions that the evaluation of the activities has to be appropriate with the criteria of efficiency and taking into account some factor, for example the age, level size of the group, how the group is integrated, their needs and interests, their experince affects a class in different ways, so as each group is different teachers can not evaluate in the same form.

 

In conclusion, as we can see the three text that mentioned talks about meny factors related to whether teaching or not teaching grammar, nevertheless at the same time all of those are the same but with different names and they are divided into many ways; however they mean te same but in other words. Personally I think all those factores are too important for teachers, because it lets see the variation that they could have in their class and that not all the classes should be focused on grammar. It is true that grammar is important in language; in addition students should know the bases of this, but the purpose of learners is variable so teacher would make an evaluation about the group in order to know what are the goals and needs of the students, so that teacher can determine how much grammmar teach or whether teaching or not teaching grammar.

 

By: Miss Boop