When Should We Teach Grammar?

I really wish I could show this textbook to the seventh grade teacher that I am shadowing right now. Having been in her classroom for six months and observing how she instructs her class every Tuesday and Thursday on grammar, I feel like this textbook would be a great benefit for her…and maybe the entire district. Every Tuesday and Thursday, Ms. B. goes over grammar lessons. She teaches out of a manual and reads line from line to teach the students. While I watch this happening, I notice that all the kids are almost comatose in their seats. After the mini-lesson, Mrs. B. instructs them to go through their workbooks and they guess on all the answers. They are not interested in learning about grammar, because she is not applying the lesson to anything. They are simply going through the motions of “skill and drill” at a seventh grade level, and then moving on the next day. Grammar is not being incorporated with their writing and reading which is obviously essential considering that Weaver is basing a lot the book off of that specific belief.

In Chapter 3, Weaver explains why and how grammar should be positive, productive, and practical. She lists twelve concepts and discusses them briefly. While I was reading, I realized that Ms. B. is actually damaging her students according to Weaver’s beliefs. The “skill and drill” is not helping them become successful writers. In fact, she is actually on the verge of damaging their ability to grow into exceptional writers. For example, #6 states that Grammar conventions taught in isolation seldom transfer to writing. This is exactly what she is doing. They are not applying any of the grammar lessons or rules on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday which are their writing days. Furthermore, Weaver states that few grammatical terms are actually needed to discuss writing. She writes that most students will turn a deaf ear to the details of pronoun cases, noun subcategories, and vagaries of different “kinds” of nouns (27).

Each student in the lower level classes are doing just this…they are not paying attention in class, because they are not interested in the subject matter. If grammar was being taught with writing, the students may not exactly know they are learning different grammatical terms as well as how to properly take apart of sentence or even write a sentence the correct way. Now I am not bashing Ms. B’s teaching style. I respect her and her ability to teach different types of writing and poetry to students who are only twelve years old. I am simply critiquing the way she presents her grammatical lessons. I believe that if we would follow most of Weaver’s rules for teaching grammar that not only would the testing scores increase, but the children’s interest in writing and reading would sky rocket.