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Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center
Contextualizing Grammar TeachingUsing Authentic Materials
LEARN ConferenceApril 28, 2010
Jong Oh Eun,Dept C Chair, Asian School II
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The problem
Teachers tend to teach grammar featuressimply by translating invented sentences.
Existing literature in Korean does notsufficiently explain how and in what contexts
forms are used and how they can bedisambiguated using a discourse-basedperspective.
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Why context? Example 1
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Context can change the meaning.
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Example 2: .
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Example 3: .
Why? 1. It should be something edible.
2. Koreans dont eat raccoon for lunch.
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Three Dimensions of Teaching Grammar
1. Form (how is it formed?)
Accuracy: syntax2. Meaning (what does it mean?)
Meaningfulness: semantics3. Use (When/why is it used?)
Appropriateness: pragmatics(O)
. (X)
Three are interrelated.(Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman, 1999)
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Example: Verb stem +.
Form
VS+
Meaning
Reason
Function
making excuses
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Three Levels in Teaching Grammar
1. Sub-sentential level: (morphology) (actionin the past)
2. Sentential level (Syntax)
.*Traditional grammar usually stops here.
3. Discourse level
..
Topic marker expresses contrast.
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Approaches to Grammar
1. Prescriptive Grammar
2. Descriptive Grammar
3. Transformational-Generative Grammar
4. Functional Grammar
5. Discourse Grammar
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Prescriptive Grammar (Quirk et al, 1985)
Concerned with rules about the structure of alanguage
Focus on what is right/correct and
wrong/incorrect
Prescriptive rules make a valued judgmentabout correct way to speak and write rather
than the way people actually speak and write
e.g., Musics are my favorite subject (X).
Mass noun is not countable.
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Descriptive Grammar(Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman, 1999)
Concerned with how people actually use alanguage and then attempts to analyze it andformulate rules about the structure.
Descriptive rules allow for different varieties esp.in spoken language
However, people can still use this prescriptively.They tend to follow what these rules say.
e.g., 1) .
2) .
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Transformational-generative grammar (Chomsky,1957, 1965, 1981, 1991, 1995; Cook & Newson, 1966;Radford, 1988)
Concerned with competence (native speakersknowledge) rather than performance (actualrealization)
Provide a methodology for describing sentencestructure through the concept of underlying "deepstructure" by means of various transformational rules
Discover a finite set of rules/mechanisms whichgenerate an infinite set of sentences
Determine how words and phrases combine to formlarger syntactic units, up to the sentence level.
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Example
Questions are formed by moving the modal verbwill to the front of the sentence.
a. The audience will enjoy this presentation.
b. Will the audience enjoy this presentation?
Subject-Aux inversion
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Functional grammar (Halliday, 1973; Givn, 1995)
Focus on meaning and functions of language as
conveyors of information rather than just on forms
Contextual in orientation--looking at how languageis used for different purposes in differentcontexts.
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Functional grammar (Halliday, 1973; Givn, 1995)
Formal grammar
Boys (subject: noun) throw (verb) stones (object: noun)
Functional grammar
Boys (actor/agent) throw (process) stone (patient)
a. John lost his wallet. (Stress occurs in the lastlexical item because it is new information.)
b. John lost it. (Main stress in different positionbecause pronominal element is given information)
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Discourse grammar (Coulthard, 1994; McCarthy, 1999;Chafe, 1994; Ochs, Schegloff, & Thompson, 1996)
Discovers recurrent patterns Inductive methodology and data-driven analysis
Looks at forms from functional approaches using
actual data and large stretches of discourse.
By looking at grammatical forms as they occur inactual discourse (both spoken and written), we can
find many more patterns and help studentsunderstand the usages and formulate their ownanalyses of these forms to account for larger
number of patterns.
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Discourse Grammar
Data include: spoken media (e.g., telephoneand face-to-face conversations, classroom
interactions, narratives, interviews, TV shows,
commercials, etc.) and written media (e.g.,
newspaper and magazine articles, essays,
literary works, contracts, policies, etc.)
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Example: count noun vs. non-count noun
Traditional grammar categorizes nouns ascount vs non-count nouns, but this cantalways apply to actual instances. Non-
count nouns are mass nouns such aswater, paper, coffee, music
It depends on how people conceptualizethe entity. For example, I like coffee. Butwe can say Can I have two coffees,
please? (Two cups of coffee)
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Example: count noun vs. non-count noun
1) Email: could be email message.a. I received an email from my friend. (Email message)
b. I think I must have sent 6 emails to Dr. Roberts.
2) Email: Electronic mail system
c. I sent a message by email.
The choice of counting is motivated by speakers
conceptualization or categorization (e.g., Lakoff, 1987)
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Discourse Grammar
Formal grammar:Polite form: / formal
Deferential form: : more formal
Discourse Grammar:
Polite form: shared information, inclusion
Deferential form: new information, exclusion
(Eun & Strauss, 2004; Strauss & Eun, 2005)
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Teaching Grammar Using Authentic Materials
The resources that have been developed for nativespeakers.
Authentic materials include:TV Commercials, TV drama clips, movie clipsFace-to face/ telephone conversations,talk shows, interviews, debatesnews broadcasts, newspapers, magazines,Cartoons, songs, pictures, etc
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Teaching Grammar Using Authentic Materials
Contextual in orientation: focus on how thegrammar feature is used
Can provide larger stretches of discourse, notdiscreet phrases or sentences
Can show more naturally occurring data rather
than made up sentences Can capture prosodic features and non-verbalcues
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Examples from Authentic Materials
Example
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Grammar Project at Korean School (DLI)
Example
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Conclusion
Multiple approaches to teaching grammar (Formfocused + functional, Deductive + inductive)
Grammar is dynamic, not static
Grammar doesnt have to be boring.
Beyond the sentence level discourse level
Teach grammar in context
Use of a variety of authentic materials
Culture and grammar integration
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This speech/presentation is authorized by the Defense Language Institute Foreign LanguageCenter and the Department of Defense. Contents of this presentation are not necessarily theofficial views of, or endorsed by, the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, Department of theArmy, or the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center