4. Reflection on ways being taught grammar

Consider the following points individually.

1. Do your teachers usually start with explaining a rule or with giving examples?

2. Do your teachers ever ask their Ss to formulate the rules themselves?

3. Do your teachers’ examples include any new vocabulary items?

4. Which aspect - form, meaning or use - do your teachers usually draw their Ss' attention to first?

5. Which ways of presenting a grammar item do you prefer?

Share your ideas in groups.

5. P – P – P paradigm. What can these letters stand for?

P

P

P

6. Analysis of ways of presenting grammar items (in pairs) Grammar Presentation Techniques

1. Using a picture

A teacher demonstrates a picture of a street and makes statements about it using can and can't, e.g. "I can see a bird in the tree. But I can't see any birds on the ground. I can't see any flowers but I can see snow. It is winter." Then she asks the class to describe what they can and can't see in the picture. The teacher elicits sentences and corrects the mistakes. Then she asks some learners to repeat correct sentences and puts them on the blackboard. She draws learners' attention to affirmative and negative form and explains the meaning - "possibility", "ability".

2. Using a reading text

The teachers have a text describing what a schoolgirl did yesterday (got up at …, had breakfast at …, went to school at .., played in the yard after classes, etc) The teacher asks learners to read the text and mark T/F statements after it.

3. Using actions/realia

The teacher comes into class and starts performing some actions commenting on them: "I have closed the door. I have opened the window. I have written a word on the blackboard. I have cleaned the blackboard, etc." She asks the class: "What have I done?" and tries to elicit examples of the Present Perfect. She writes some examples on the blackboard.

4. Using a time-line

T he teacher draws a time-line on the board explaining that actions described in Past Perfect had happened before some point in the past. Past Perfect Past Now Future

5. Comparing

The teacher presents Past Simple comparing it to Ukrainian Past tense. He explains that they both denote actions in the past and are formed in a similar way - with grammatical affixes or by changing the root.

6. Eliciting

The teacher tells the class what she is going to do next year: "I am going to visit my friends in Lviv next year. I am going to move to another flat next year. I am going to teach a new class next year." She asks individual learners what they are going to do next year trying to elicit sentences with the target structure. She corrects the learners' mistakes. Then asks them to repeat correct sentences and put some examples on the blackboard. Then she elicits from the students that the structure is used when we speak about plans for the future.

7. Brainstorm of characteristics of Practice Stage

What should a teacher do to make it more communicative and effective? How can she/he do this? Complete the statements:

— get a good balance between …………………………………………………………………..……….

— exploit all four ………………………………………………………………………………………..

— keep up the ……………………………………………………………………………………………

— personalise the new grammar item, which means to get the Ps to ……………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

— guide, support, encourage: in practice activities only success succeeds (i.e. the Ps won't learn if they can't do the task).