To teach SWE or to not teach SWE, that is the question. This is one of the reasons that I chose to not be an English education major. In the end, I have a feeling that whether or not I, or any other teacher, thinks it should be taught won't matter. What will matter will be whatever happens to be on the tests, and that is what teachers will preach to their students in order to keep their jobs.
Aside from what some might call a cynical, but what I like to think of as truthful, view of the world; if there were a utopia, there are certain things that I would prefer. While I have a great disdain for SWE when it comes to knowing all of the terms and diagramming sentences, I do feel that it has helped me a great deal to be able to communicate in this manner. I'm not sure that it is absolutely necessary to know the ins- and-outs of grammar in order to efficiently speak and write in SWE. However, when it comes to learning a second language, I think that it does help a great deal.
I have heard many people say that they learned more about grammar while learning a foreign language than they did in their English classes, and I can say that I had a similar experience. I was taught the fundamental operations of the English language by way of speaking and writing, as opposed to learning the backbone of the language before putting it to use. This is necessary when learning a language from scratch, but when it comes to an individual's first language, these rules are engrained into the individual's mind. The problem arises when these rules are not those of SWE.
I have friends that communicate more efficiently in English as their second language than those that have been speaking it their entire lives. It could be argued that it is easier to teach someone SWE as a second language than to re-teach someone that speaks incorrect English. Schools have ESL in order to aid children in learning English, however, there is no aid for children that have been brought up in an ungrammatical atmosphere.
In order to combat both of these setbacks, why not let the children help each other in learning SWE? In areas that have had dramatic growth in Spanish speakers, some schools have instituted programs that have children learning in Spanish for half of the day and English for the other half. This approach would cultivate a better understanding in both areas, since the children would be forced to learn the rules for one language in order to catch onto the other language. In addition, children would progress at a faster rate and not have to be singled out from the rest of their class to go to a special class.
In the end, all of the children come out with a second language and a better understanding of SWE. This is not a fool-proof method. There are many children that might fall through the cracks or teachers that are not able to teach the grammatical aspects due to thier own deficency in this area while they were in school. However, if such programs were instituted at an early age and touched on throughout the years, the children would not have to worry about it later on when it is more difficult for them to learn this new information when they have grown accustomed to speaking and writing in a certain way.
6 comments:
So, you really do not want to be an English teacher because of politics?
not entirely, but that does play a large part in the decision. there's a good chance that i'll end up teaching any way.
that's what I thought (wink)
I feel the same way sometimes. During the first few days of class when we were taking the grammar quiz out of the Mulroy text, the only way that I could remember the answer to some of the questions was if I thought about it in Spanish. For the fact that I am not fluent in Spanish, I can see how this idea of yours could work, but I just don't see it ever happening for the reasons that you state. I think teaching English and Spanish in the classroom is directed towards the communities who have a large Spanish speaking population, and a lot of them probably cater to the immigration of workers.
I do think that this would work, but not in the typical high school setting. Using foreign languages as examples, since most students are required at least a couple of years of foreign language can go a long way in the classroom, depending on the students' knowledge.
And your comment about the politics that Tommy brought up is funny. Considering how bad some of my teachers were, I don't think you would have to teach grammar unless you really wanted to.
I don't know KB It seems like a morning of people saying whatever they want to would be hard to grade. I'm having a hard time picturing a school where grammar is taught during the second half of the day. Or did I misunderstand you?
I don't want to teach k-12 because of the kids. I know, I know, "thats mean... blah, blah, blah." Oh well. I think, when they are young, having grammar reinforce reading and writing, not reading and writing reinforceing grammar. Have you ever thought of grammar as a different subject from reading class, or writing class. I know I have, I was never able to connect all three untill college. And thats sad.
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