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How far is teaching Traditional Grammar acceptable in modern teaching of a language?

How important are grammar drills in second language learning?

  • Where grammar is given too much priority the results is predictable and well known. ‘Course book’ become little more than grammar courses. Students do not learn English: They learn grammar, at the expense of the other things that matter as much or more. They know the main rules, can pass tests, and may have the illusion that they know the language well. However, when it comes to using the language in practice, they discover that they lack vital elements, typically vocabulary and fluency: They can recite irregular verbs but cannot sustain a conversation. Such an approach is also psychologically counterproductive, in that it tends to make students nervous of making mistakes, undermining their confidence and destroying their motivation.          Michael Swain (in Seven Bad Reasons for Teaching Grammar – and Two Good Ones).

  • Answer:

    This ill-advised strategy comes from a misunderstanding of what grammar is. In English, some of the more interesting rules relate to syntax and to some degree, morphology. Add to that the focus on syntax in the second half of the 20th c. due to and when we think of grammar, we think of word order and to some degree agreement (he *run/runs). This is what is considered grammar when when you crack open text books. But grammar is so much more than that (). There's a grammar of how sounds fit together. There's a grammar of how sounds are pronounced. There's a grammar of when to use certain words and how to respond to what other people say. There's a grammar of how ideas can combine together. And on and on and on. So, by focusing on syntactic rules, you're ignoring all these other important aspects of knowing a language. I wholeheartedly agree with Dr. Swain on this point. That doesn't mean grammar should be neglected -- it is, after all, some non-trivial proportion of what is involved in knowing a language -- but it's not the whole picture, not even half. I don't have the science handy to back up this particular answer, so take what I'm saying as anecdotal, despite my title. See 's answer for a more informed opinion.

Marc Ettlinger at Quora Visit the source

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English remains comprehensible even if you mangle the grammar.  It still sounds better if you know the basis rules.  (And is much easier if you go for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_English, which has just the most obvious forms and leaves out oddities.)   I don't think this works in all languages.  With the wrong grammar it can be impossible to follow.

Gwydion Madawc Williams

I disagree with the approach. The big thing at develops your ability at a language is practice and confidence. If you can converse then you can also listen and see how the language really works. Grammar is not what language is about: it is about communication. Conjugating verbs is dull. It kills enjoyment of the language. In conversations flow is important: so just talking and not worrying about being correct but being understood. Most people aren't going to write a dissertation in their second language: they are going to ask where the nearest bar is.

Joe Geronimo Martinez

As an English learner, I think grammar is very important. It is the essential thing before you can use a language properly. Fluency is the proof of a relatively good vocabulary and grammar.

Jenny Lu Garcia

Drilling it in one learns how to grammar more quickly than with Communicative approach. CTL is a prevalent approach in the language schools. It is good to marry drills and CTL (role playing etc) in one day [imho]

Libor Ruiz

Based on my own experience : the so called grammar is not heartbreaking.  When there is a rule, it's good, you can simply follow it and it really helps. It really helps. When there is no grammar I could  turn to, for example, the idioms,  I just wanna cry.

Anonymous

There has to be some practice of new grammar but this does not have to be done through boring drills.New grammatical concepts can be built in communicative tasks (eg. tell me what you did during your last summer holiday, I want you to use 10 irregular verbs in your written/spoken account).

Kawthar Abdullah

After the first and second stories are built, it's appropriate to build the third one, but not before.

Joel V Benjamin

If you've ever spoken to someone who is learning a second language, the conversation may flow, but the grammar is not necessarily correct, so I personally think grammar drills are very important. Thank you for the question!

Kalani Tom

Think about how people learn their mother tongue as they grow up. They start learning the words about their immediate surroundings and experiences (in other words, what's relevant) and the parent gradually corrects the child's mistakes. You need to pick up some extremely basic grammar rules (children do this intuitively through immersion), and you can start predicting the rest. If your prediction fails, you learn what's irregular. On Lingvist (https://lingvist.io/features) this is exactly how you learn a language. There are no grammar drills or verb conjugation lessons, but you do have access to that information at all times if needed, i.e. when you might fail to predict a rule based on earlier lessons. Disclaimer: I'm part of Lingvist's team :)

Ellen Murula

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