GRAMMAR DEFINITION:

It is the set of logical and structural rules that govern the composition of sentences, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology (words) and syntax (phrases and sentences), often complemented by phonetics and phonology (sounds), semantics (meaning), and pragmatics (the ways in which contexts contribute to meaning). They are always interacting at different stages and functions or purposes. In addition, each language has its own distinct grammar.

Reference: Wikipedia.org (2010) “Grammar” Retrieved 16th of March, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammar





martes, 1 de junio de 2010

My video experience

First of all I was aware that I had to prepare an everyday class considering the time and my students. Thus, it had to be brief and entertaining in order to succeed.
I decided to start with a brief review of what will come next to make sure transition from one activity to the next one will be smooth.
The warm-up was intended to introduce the topic and use of the new language. I felt very pleased to see that they remembered countables and uncountables.
At this stage students use their schemata and are aware of learnt concepts (Harmer, 1991). Also I always kept in mind giving instructions when needed being these clear and loud.
As my group is a pre-intermediate one I considered not forcing students because if I did, acquisition of the language will be blocked (Brown, 1994). I constantly tried to elicit answers from them. Thus, their participation during the warm-up was free.
After the students have been introduced to the structure, they were given opportunities to interact with their peers in some kind of discourse and focus their attention on the activity asked. Most of the drills were controlled to let them go from accuracy to fluency.
I intended to present grammar in an inductive approach trying to keep natural language as I think it is a better way of acquiring the rules subconsciously and students feel relaxed not being overwhelmed by grammatical explanations (Brown, 1994). In addition, it is a way to motivate students allowing them to discover the rules rather than to give them everything.
I think the lesson was very interesting because it is a real situation that may happen to all of us. We have to be aware of our health. It was presented in both reading and speaking approaches, as well as corrections to students, were done by themselves while they were working in pairs and then by me. This is useful for accuracy work and to let them understand the meaning of the new language they are learning (Harmer, 1991). Judith Quintana Vessi

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