Philosophy Or Beliefs About Grammar Teaching - Article Example

?Grammar pedagogical Observations Philosophy or beliefs about grammar teaching Introduction This report explores an in service English teacher teaching of grammar in a second language classroom at Forsyth Technical Community College in Winston Salem North Carolina. The main objective is to focus on the perspective of personal pedagogical system, beliefs, knowledge, theories, assumptions, and attitudes that plays a significant role in shaping a teachers’ way of teaching. It throws light on the teachers' actual practices in an adult high intermediate ESL classroom. Background Information of the institution where I conducted the observation Forsyth Technical Community College is a preparatory type of institution that prepares ESL students to easily engage in the community, and bring their language skills to the required standard usage of English within the community. Enrollment into Forsyth Technical Community College is non-selective with incoming students being enrolled into different levels ranging from beginner to high intermediate. Enrolment using an in-house placement test is a priority, implying that students advance to upper levels when they improve their English language skills at that specific level. The institution set speci?c learning objectives for each level which were assessed by in-house tests and which teachers were required to teach towards. One set of objectives related speci?cally to the teaching of grammar. The institution has two fully equipped writing labs and a small corner library at the main hall. The labs are equipped with fifteen computers with numerous software programs installed and the internet is accessible on each computer for the student use. Regular classrooms are arranged to accommodate 15-20 students and this ensures improved interaction between the teachers and students. The classrooms are carpeted and contain whiteboards, overhead projectors and a chair used by the teacher and students during presentations. All teachers working in the institution, including the participant of this report, teach full-time (20-25 hours per week). Students are mostly have Spanish as their first language. During the study, some students had recently arrived in the United States while others had been around for a period of time and they aged 25-35. The teaching context is a monolingual setting where all teachers are native speakers of English. The preparatory school does not have its own syllabus and in-house textbooks and the teachers are encouraged to select textbooks and adapt to a syllabus that suits their students or teaching contexts to ensure the success of the teaching process. This is because a curriculum is often perceived by teachers as being fairly rigid. The participant teacher background Data on this report was collected through five non-participatory classroom observations. I refrain from naming the participant and restrict the following information to only assist readers in making sense of the specific features of the context to protect his anonymity. Prior to conducting this report I made a pre-observation interview with the instructor to see if he would be willing before formally requesting his participation as I felt that would provide an improved overall picture in order to determine the kinds of teaching beliefs he was mostly interested in and to what extent he put those beliefs into practice in L2 teaching. The Participant of this report was a 36-year-old native English speaker with an overall experience of ESL of 7 to 10 years. He taught ESL classes at various levels from beginner to upper intermediate. He started his career at the elementary level for two years and then started teaching at the ESL adult-level for the last six years in programs which service adult refugee and continuing education populations. He had other teaching experiences prior to his present ESL positions. He held an ESL teaching certificate, as well as a bachelor’s degree in elementary education. Philosophy or beliefs about grammar teaching The perceptions the teacher had included beliefs about the students he was teaching grammar to, the subject itself, the teaching and learning processes, his role and his instructional activities. The personal philosophies or beliefs held by teachers concerning the pedagogical systems determine the practices these teachers will have in the classroom. Personal pedagogical systems include the knowledge theories, beliefs, attitudes and assumptions that teachers might have about the work they do. The attitude that a teacher has on the importance of grammar teaching especially to adults is an important factor that is determined by the personal pedagogical systems that teachers have. By using non-participatory observations in classrooms it enabled the collection of data on the teacher’s beliefs by observing the teacher who is the subject of this study. Most teachers consider that a syllabus is limiting as they are too rigid and the school in which this study was carried out does not have one. The beliefs of the teacher about grammar teaching were analyzed by observing how the teacher explained a grammatical question asked by a student, how he used grammar teaching activities, and how he reacted to a grammatical error made by a student. Extent of confluence between teacher’s grammar-teaching philosophy and teacher’s in class handling of grammar The extent to which the teacher would handle grammar in class with reference to his personal philosophy about teaching grammar would be dependent on the various belief systems that the teacher might have. The teacher was only concerned about his own beliefs and principles and factors that he had direct control over such as his perception of the classroom and the content he chose to teach his students. He was not concerned about the factors around him that he had no control over such as the administration of the school, the characteristics of his students and the resources available to aid in teaching. The teacher would only apply his philosophy in teaching grammar to the level that would ensure all his students understood the content and that none of them felt left out in any case or rule learnt. Role of students’ needs/opinions in determining the grammar taught The teacher would most likely select what content to teach his students depending on the age group of the students at that time or the level of understanding of the language such as intermediate level or beginner level. The involvement or activity of students in a lesson would enable the teacher to evaluate whether the rule he is teaching is being understood or not and this would enable him to vary the pace of the lesson accordingly. The students during the lessons would stop the teacher whenever something was not clear and he would try to explain it illustratively or by use of the students’ first language. By making errors in the interactive session, they revealed to the teacher the areas that were still not understood. Without their constructive feedback by taking part in discussions and answering questions orally, the teacher would not be able to determine where to place more emphasis on during the lesson. Also by participating in grammar exercises, the students are able to focus on the errors they make and this would help them become more aware of these errors in subsequent lessons thus improving their skills in grammar. Methods of presentation of grammar-related material The teacher presented the material he taught his students by writing sentences on the board and asking the students in an interactive session which tenses were most appropriate to use for different examples. A topic would be introduced and the necessary rules explained to the students. If the students acknowledged they had understood the topic or rule, the teacher would initiate a discussion which involved the use of the leant rules in sentence structures. The teacher would also write questions on a sheet of paper then photocopy the papers for each student to answer the questions individually. This would usually be followed by an interactive session in which the students would argue out the answers to determine the rules that were most appropriate to apply for each case. Types and methods of presentation of grammar rules The various generalizations that describe the meaning, form and use of grammar by the teacher are also major features that reflect his beliefs on their application in his teaching practice. The teacher would mostly let the students find out the rules of grammar by themselves during guided class discussions in which the students would argue out facts to determine the rules to consider in different grammatical contexts. This would be helpful in aiding the students to further investigate the language and learn more about the language on their own which would instill more understanding and interest of the language among the students. The rules that the teacher focused on were based on his observation of the problems his students had during the group discussions and presentations. As such he only focused on the rules that he felt the students would understand best at their level of learning and based on their level of activity during that day of learning. Use of grammatical terminology A profound feature of the teacher’s work was the use of expressed discussions in which the students as well as the teacher used grammatical terminology. This implied that the teacher was augmented about using one language to describe the English language structure in order to explain to the students in grammar teaching practices in ESL. The biased explanations of some grammatical terminologies with more importance placed on helping the students understand the important grammar tenses without having to understand terminologies would suggest the concern by the teacher on the effect it would have on the students. By explaining the important factors to consider in grammar exercises that use of these terminologies would help ensure that some students don’t feel left out. Types of practice used The teacher also promoted the use of specific items in grammar in practical activities to encourage practice of grammar among the students. After every lesson on a given rule in grammar or new concept the teacher would have a practice session in which the students would practice what they had learnt in active discussions which the teacher monitored and made notes on to evaluate what had been understood and what was still a problem to the students. He also asked questions concerning the learnt topic which the students were to answer in their booklets and the teacher would go round correcting them where appropriate. Types of error analysis used The teacher analyzed the grammatical errors made by the students during oral presentations. He further used questions which he presented to the students on sheets of paper to discuss in groups and provide answers. He also wrote sentences on the board with grammatical errors that he expected the students would be able to identify. He was confident that the lessons he had given his students prior to the exercises were sufficient to enable them self-evaluate themselves. The errors that the students made showed their areas of weakness and enabled the teacher to make note of which areas to put more emphasis on while teaching grammar. Extent of in-class use of the ESL students’ first language The teacher like his colleagues at the school, is a native speaker of English. As such, there was minimal use of the first language by the ESL students during class practices and sessions. One time they used their first language was when a student would relate patterns in the English sentence structure too their first languages. Multiple European languages with similar tenses would also be used to show the different meanings that direct translation presented. Conclusion More research into pedagogical systems on which teachers base their teachings of grammar is important in ESL teaching. This would provide more insight on how to clarify and improve the process by evaluating the confluence of the teachers’ philosophy in grammar-teaching and their handling of grammar in the classroom. This study is thus valuable in its contribution to the understanding of the conceptualization of ESL grammar teaching which would aid in training teachers accordingly and provide more insight into the psychological context of teaching. References North Carolina public Schools. (n.d.). Retrieved October 4, 2013, from www.ncpublicschools.org/docs/charterschools/resources/application/2014apps/w-smiddle Read More