Do not be too quick to judge this website by its simplistic layout: it is an absolutely wonderful reference tool for everything you ever wanted to know about English grammar. It also contains some rather handy quizzes and a hilarious section on the solecisms of George W. Bush,
President of the United States. Great fun!

It is a strange coincidence that, just as DNA has only four bases and yet accounts for the vast diversity of humanity, prose is made up of only four types of sentence and covers everything from a child’s first scribblings to Solzhenitsyn.

Teaching students about the four types of sentence is good practice in English teaching but better practice is to allow them to explore this idea for themselves. One way to achieve this that I devised, is to expose the sentence patterns using colour.

Firstly, students are shown how to complete this ’sentence investigation’ using a model text. This text is divided into its separate sentences and each is coded using one of four colours: simple sentences in one colour; compounds in another; complex ones in a third; and fashionable “fragments” in a fourth. The results looks like the image to the left. Now the reader has a way of discussing the patterning of sentences together with an insight into the link between structure and the writer’s purpose.

The next step is to supply a similarly formatted text for the students to explore, perhaps in small groups. I like to use passages where a character faces some conflict as they seem to provide more obvious patterns. Look again at the example above: the writer is signalling a character’s distress by his use of fragments (in pink) appearing so hot on the heals of all those complex sentences. As the character’s patience evaporates so too does their control of ‘full’ sentences.

Once students have investigated several passages for their differing effects, it is an appropriate point for them to turn their attention to their own writings. Using the same technique I ask students to analyse their own control of sentences. I ask them to see if they can find similar patterns. Students assess their own work and that of others and suggest ways forward in the development of their writing style. Sometimes these are crude comments about the range or frequency of sentences used but sometimes this work creates that breakthrough moment: young writers appreciate for the first time that there is a rhythm to prose and that they can achieve limitless effects simply by varying that pattern of four.

So why is that title wrong? What is the rule for making comparatives and superlatives in English? When do we use ‘er/est’ and when ‘more/most’ to form these words?

The resource below promotes an investigative approach to this grammatical question. If you download it you will find a set of cards and a sheet which will lead your students to discovering the answer.

Try it and you’ll never see “beautifuler” in your students’ work again!

[hint: syllables]

Investigating Comparatives and Superlatives.doc

If you are teaching grammar with your students, you will probably want to examine the common word classes at some point.

One word of advice, avoid trying to define these classes by their roles. It is still commonplace for many of my students to say, “Oh a verb, that’s a doing word.” Hmm. One immediate problem with this approach of course is the abstract. Imagine, believe and think are not thought of as ‘doing words’ by students. Likewise, all adverbs do not end ‘ly’ and telling students that adjectives are ‘describing words’ is not helpful when you think of words like kitchen (as in ‘kitchen wall’) or Christmas (as in Christmas music). And don’t get me started on demonstrative adjectives like ‘this’ or ‘those’!

A far better approach is to examine these word classes by the spaces that they occupy in our language. Thus an adjective occupies the space or spaces beside a noun. It modifies our understanding of that noun by virtue of its close proximity if you like.

To this end I have developed the following ‘test frames’ spurred on by my grammar guru, Adrian. Now when I ask students to consider Frost’s use of adjectives, I supply them with a simple frame that allows them to highlight those words as occupying those particular modifying spaces.

As students use the frames, which are very simple and easy to remember, they see connections in function for themselves. Over time, the frames are abandoned and students only refer to them occasionally.

Incidentally, I know that these frames are not entirely bulletproof: there are some weaknesses in several of them. However, they do serve as a very useful strategy that supports an investigative approach rather than learning ‘functions’.

Test Frame for Verbs.doc

Test Frame for Nouns.doc

Test Frame for Adverbs.doc

Test Frame for Adjectives.doc

A while ago I was fortunate enough to attend some training for English teachers on grammar. The course was led by Adrian Pymm, School Improvement Adviser in Doncaster and self-confessed grammar geek. It was one of those times where so many ideas ‘clicked’ into place. This posting is part of a series that shows how ideas gained from that learning are now part of my everyday teaching.

Prepositions are one of the trickiest word classes to explore with students. This is largely because they are ’structure words.’ They have no meaning of their own; they have to work with other words. Thus it is very hard to explain them in isolation.

Try presenting students with the following frame:

This is a quick way of identifying these tricky words. The idea is that any word that can fit either space and make sense must be a preposition.

There are about 100 prepositions in English and students should have a command of most of them if they are to understand the complex relationships they form in speech, reading and writing.

If you are exploring this word class with students why not try a preposition poem. The only rule is that each line of the students’ free verse begins with a preposition. [For a useful crib sheet see below]

It’s always great fun watching this part of the lesson as students realise slowly that the poem will never end.

When the majority of the class has made this discovery, ask them what class of word has to begin the final line of their poems.

The answer of course is a verb. Allow them to use a verb to start the next line and suddenly they find they can complete their poem. It’s a very neat way of demonstrating the relationship between these two word classes.

The Last time I taught this lesson idea one student said, “Prepositions are waiting words. They are waiting for that verb to help them to finish an idea.” Now that’s a novel understanding of English grammar.

Prepositions.doc

So begins the rather irritating tag-line of a series of TV advertisements for a well-known supermarket’s line in groceries (whose initials might be M and S). In case you haven’t seen them, the advertisements are an object lesson in noun modification. Yes, yes, I know, I should get out more…

In grammatical terms this is a very simple idea: start with a noun and add a modifier and another and another until you have… a sweet-tasting, all-butter, rich, over-egged pudding. ;o)

In the world of advertising there is nothing new about noun modifiers of course but their success in these recent supermarket advertisements reminds me of a grammar lesson.

Begin by showing students a menu that says, ‘Soup’, ‘Meat’ and ‘Pudding.’ Ask students to comment on why this is rather less than appetising. This will lead nicely into an exercise of modifying those nouns. Students can invent their own menus designed to attract a reader and simultaneously explore the effects of adding modifiers before the headword and after it (pre and post modifiers).

For example, “Delicious, fresh, home-made, tomato soup with crunchy brown bread rolls”.

Now, doesn’t that sound better?