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FEATURES OF TEACHING ENGLISH GRAMMAR AS FOREIGN
Seyitmamedova Aygul Toreyevna, Turkmen State Institute of Finance, c. Ashgabat
E- mail: [email protected]
Abstract. Our aim is to form grammar skills and prevent students from making grammar mistakes in their speech. The aim of foreign languages at primary institute is to develop students' skills in order to understand speech and participate in conversation.
Key words: method, teaching grammar, ability, grammar skills. *
In the epoch of Might and Happiness under the leadership of the Esteemed President the country education system has reached huge achievements. For a purpose of strengthening the scientific potential of our country world famous innovative technologies are implemented in all scientific and educational spheres. Our Respected President always admonishes the younger generation to learn Turkmen, English and Russian languages. Learning foreign languages helps strengthen fraternal friendly relations among nations. This is the issue we focus on.
Language is the chief means by which the human personality expresses itself and fulfills its basic need for social interaction with other persons. Language skills help us to choose different words and models in our speech.
It is clear that the term "grammar" has meant various things at various times and sometimes several things at one time. This plurality of meaning is characteristic of the present time and is the source of confusions in the discussion of grammar as part of the education of students. There have been taking place violent disputes on the subject of teaching grammar at high-school.
The ability to talk about the grammar of a language, to recite its rules, is also very different from ability to speak and understand a language or to read and write it. Those who can use a language are often unable to recite its rules, and those who can recite its rules can be unable to use it.
Grammar organizes the vocabulary and as a result we have sense units. There is a system of stereotypes, which organizes words into sentences. But what skill does
grammar develop?
First of all it gives the ability to make up sentences correctly, to reproduce the text adequately (the development of practical skills and habits).
The knowledge of the specific grammar structure helps pupils point out the differences between the mother tongue and the target language.
The knowledge of grammar develops abilities to abstract systematize plural
facts.
The grammatical systems of Turkmen and English are fundamentally different. English is an analytical language, in which grammatical meaning in largely expressed through the use of additional words and by changes in word order. Turkmen is a synthetic language, in which the majority of grammatical forms are created through changes in the structure of words, by means of a developed system of prefixes, suffixes and ending.
No one knows exactly how people learn languages although a great deal of research has been done into the subject.
Many methods have been proposed for the teaching of foreign language. And they have met with varying degrees of success and failure.
We should know that the method by which students are taught must have some effect on their motivation. If they find it deadly boring they will probably become de-motivated, whereas if they have confidence in the method they will find it motivating. Child learners differ from adult learners in many ways. Students are curious, their attention is of a shorter duration, they are quite differently motivated in, and their interests are less specialized. They need frequent of activity; they need activities which are exciting and stimulating their curiosity; they need to be involved in something active.
We shall examine such methods as "The Grammar - Translation Method", "The Direct Method", "The Audio-lingual Method". And we pay attention to the teaching grammar of the foreign language. We shall comment those methods, which have had a long history.
The Direct Method appeared as a reaction against the grammar-translation method. There was a movement in Europe that emphasized language learning by direct contact with the foreign language in meaningful situations. This movement resulted in various individual methods with various names, such as new method, natural method, and even oral method, but they can all be referred to as direct methods or the direct method. In addition to emphasizing direct contact with the foreign language, the direct method usually deemphasized or eliminated translation and the memorization of conjugations, declensions, and rules, and in some cases it introduced phonetics and phonetic transcription.
The direct method assumed that learning a foreign language is the same as learning the mother tongue, that is, that exposing the student directly to the foreign
language impresses it perfectly upon his mind. This is true only up to a point, since the psychology of learning a second language differs from that of learning the first. The child is forced to learn the first language because he has no other effective way to express his wants. In learning a second language this compulsion is largely missing, since the student knows that he can communicate through his native language when necessary.
The basic premise of Direct Method was that second language learning should be more like first language learning: lots of active oral interaction, spontaneous use of the language, no translation between first and second languages, and little or no analysis of grammatical rules. We can summarize the principles of the Direct
Method:
- Classroom instruction was conducted exclusively in the target language;
- Only everyday vocabulary and sentences were taught;
- Oral communication skills were built up in a carefully graded progression organized around question-and-answer exchanges between teachers and student in small, intensive classes;
- Grammar was taught inductively, i.e. the learner may discover the rules of grammar for himself after he has become acquainted with many examples;
- New teaching points were introduced orally;
- Concrete vocabulary was taught through demonstration, objects, and pictures; abstract vocabulary was taught by association of ideas;
- Both speech and listening comprehension were taught;
- Correct pronunciation and grammar were emphasized.
The Audio-lingual Method (It is also called Mimicry-memorization method) was the method developed in the Intensive Language Program. It was successful because of high motivation, intensive practice, small classes, and good models, in addition to linguistically sophisticated descriptions of the foreign language and its grammar.
Grammar is taught essentially as follows: Some basic sentences are memorized by imitation. Their meaning is given in normal expressions in the native language, and the students are not expected to translate word for word. When the basic sentences have been overlearned (completely memorized so that the student can rattle them off without effort), the student reads fairly extensive descriptive grammar statements in his native language, with examples in the target language and native language equivalents. He then listens to further conversational sentences for practice in listening. Finally, practices the dialogues using the basic sentences and combinations of their parts. When he can, he varies the dialogues within the material he has already learned. The characteristics of ALM (audio-lingual method) may be summed up in the following list:
- New material is presented in dialog form;
- There is dependence on mimicry, memorization of set phrases and overlearning;
- Structures are sequenced by means of contrastive analysis and taught one at a
time;
- Structural patterns are taught using repetitive drills;
- There is a little or no grammatical explanation: grammar is taught by inductive analogy rather than deductive explanation;
- Vocabulary is strictly limited and learned in context;
- There is much use of tapes, language labs, and visual aids;
- Great importance is attached to pronunciation;
- Very little use of the mother tongue by teachers is permitted;
- Successful responses are immediately reinforced;
- There is a great effort to get students to produce error-free utterances;
- There is a tendency to manipulate language and disregard content.
We shall briefly review the treatment of grammatical explanations by some of the major methods. This is not meant to be an exhaustive study of all available methods; rather it is an attempt to show the variety of ways in which different methods deal with grammar explanations and may help teachers in evaluating available materials.
Grammar translation is associated with formal rule statement. Learning proceeds, deductively, and the rule is generally stated by the teacher, in a textbook, or both. Traditional abstract grammatical terminology is used. Drills include translation into native language.
The direct method is characterized by meaningful practice and exclusion of the mother tongue. This method has had many interpretations, some of which include an analysis of structure, but generally without the use of abstract grammatical terminology.
The audio-lingual method stresses an inductive presentation with extensive pattern practice. Writing is discouraged in the early stages of learning a structure. Here again, there has been considerable variation in the realization of this approach. In some cases, no grammatical explanation of any kind is offered. In other, the teacher might focus on a particular structure by isolating an example on the board, or through contrast. When grammatical explanation is offered it is usually done at the end of the lesson as a summary of behavior, or in later versions of this method the rule might be stated in the middle of the lesson and followed by additional drills.
Each method is realized in techniques. By a technique we mean an individual way in doing something, in gaining a certain goal in teaching learning process. The method and techniques the teacher should use in teaching children of the primary school is the direct method, and various techniques which can develop pupils' listening comprehension and speaking. Pupils are given various exercises, connected with the situational use of words and sentence patterns.
We will consider ways in which students can be introduced to new language structure.
When we present grammar through structural patterns we tend to give students tidy pieces of language to work with We introduce grammar, which can easily be explained and presented. There are many different ways of doing this, which do not (only) involve the transmission of grammar rules.
It is certainly possible to teach aspects of grammar - indeed that is what language teachers have been doing for centuries - but language is a difficult business and it is often used very inventively by its speakers, In other words real language use is often very untidy and cannot be automatically reduced to simple grammar patterns. Students need to be aware of this, just as they need to be aware of all language possibilities. Such awareness does not mean that they have to be taught each variation and linguistic twist, however. It just means that they have to be aware of language and how it is used. That is why reading and listening are so important, and that is why discovery activities are so valuable since by asking students to discover ways in which language is used we help to raise their awareness about the creative use of grammar -amongst other things.
As teachers we should be prepared to use a variety of techniques to help our students learn and acquire grammar. Sometimes this involves teaching grammar rules; sometimes it means allowing students to discover the rules for themselves.
What do we introduce? Our job at this stage of the lesson is to present the pupils with clear information about the language they are learning. We must also show them what the language means and how it is used; we must also show them what the grammatical form of the new language is, and how it is said and/or written.
What we are suggesting here is that students need to get an idea of how his new language is used by native speakers and the best way of doing this is to present language in context.
The context for introducing new language should have a number of characteristics. It should show what the new language means and how it is used, for example. That is why many useful contexts have the new language being used in a written text or dialogue.
A good context should be interesting for the students. This doesn't mean that all the subject matter we use for presentation should be wildly funny or inventive all of the time. But the pupils should at least want to see or hear the information.
In order to understand a language and express oneself correctly one must assimilate the grammar mechanism of a language. Indeed, one may know all the words in a sentence and yet fail to understand it, if one does not see the relationship between the words in the given sentence. And vice versa, a sentence may contain one, two, and more unknown words but if one has a good knowledge of the structure of the language one can easily guess the meanings of these words or at least find them in a dictionary, No speaking is possible without the knowledge of grammar, without the forming of a grammar mechanism. Students need grammar to be able to speak, and write in the target language.
Our aim is to form grammar skills and prevent students from making grammar
SCIENCE TIME
mistakes in their speech. The aim of foreign languages in primary schools is to develop students' skills in order to understand speech and participate in conversation.
The method and techniques the teacher should use in teaching students of institute is the direct method and various techniques which can develop students' listening comprehension and speaking.
We have examined two kinds of grammar skills: the reproductive and receptive grammar skills. The reproductive grammar skills give pupils an opportunity to make up their own sentences in oral and written forms in other words to communicate and the receptive grammar skills give them an opportunity to read texts or aud and understand it.
To master the reproductive grammar skills one should study the basic sentences or models (grammar is presented as itself in the basic sentences), to master the receptive grammar skills one should identify and analyze the grammar item. We teach students to read by means of grammar. It reveals the relationship between the words in the given sentence.
We have such a conclusion that the forming of grammar skills depends on training. Training is of great importance to realize the grammar item. We must use a lot of training exercises for the assimilation of grammar. We should provide the motivation of learn English, encourage children to communicate and remember that the correction of errors in the early stages of a language course may foster the following negative aspects:
- students lose confidence when they have fear of making grammar mistakes;
- students become reluctant to take risks: they only the say the information they know they can say.
We should realize the importance of training exercises and the role of the individual approach to teaching the children. Besides, the teacher must have a clear idea of the grammar of the language, its structure and usage; everything he teaches must be based on it; he should always be conscious of introducing or practicing some point of grammar.
Literature:
1. Rogova, G.V., "Methods of teaching English"; М.,1970
2. Harmer, Jeremy, "the practice English language teaching"; London-New York; Longman,1991
3. Синявская, Е.В. и др., «Вопросы методики обучения иностранным языком за рубежом.» /сост.: Е.В.Синявская, М.М. Васильева, С.В.Калинина/; М., Просвещение,1978
4. Handschin, Charles H., "Methods of teaching modern languages."; N.Y., World Book Co.,1926
5. F.L Billows., "The Techniques of Language Teaching."; Longman, 1962
