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How do you help your students understand English grammar?

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Question added by Samar Saleh , Community Manager , Bayt.com
Date Posted: 2016/10/05
Ahmad Saleh
by Ahmad Saleh , Part-time English Teacher , ITA

I think that there is no one-size-fits-all method or way in teaching grammar. You need to consider important factors like your students needs, individual differences, learning styles and preferences. Grammar Translation Method, for example, wouldn't be a good choice if you were teaching a group of "communicative students" but would be appealing to a group of "conformists". Another important point to take into account is contextualization.Most students see no point in practicing endless worksheets on certain decontextualized grammar points. That is why a teacher should make sure that the exercises he or she gives are meaningful,interesting and useful.

Jamie Teal
by Jamie Teal , English Instructor , Berlitz UAE

If students first understand the use of different grammar concepts and then later apply a name to the concept, it will be easier for them to learn, to use, and to memorize these points. In my experience, introducing grammar concepts through communication exercises helps students to understand how each concept works and why it is relevant. I can tell my students that we have twelve basic verb tenses in English, and I can give them an explanation for the future perfect progressive tense, but this means little to them. However, it will make more sense to them if I first introduce the idea that sometimes we want to talk about an action that will continue on into the future without finishing, and then give an example sentence such as, "By the time I finish my pilot training, I will have been flying internationally for two years." Then if they need a label for this form of speech in preparation for an exam, I can explain that it is the future perfect progressive tense of the verb. In this way, difficult grammar concepts become simple and meaningful.

Daniil Shilov
by Daniil Shilov , Marketing and Business Development Lead , Henderson International LLC

The main goal is to ease understanding and therefore, direct instructions are a good start. However, since students learn differently, present grammar points in written or oral form to cover as much ground as possible. Provide examples and use them as teaching tools. Adult students require context to learning therefore relating knowledge needs to goals they may set up to achieve; providing case studies to back this up. Finally, providing a challenge/higher order thinking skills is essential as the mind can only learn something when it uses it at its own terms.

Faisal Bin Mohammed
by Faisal Bin Mohammed , RQ1 , RSAF

  • Never Do not to save the English language rules

  • Learn English in the form of sentences, not single words
  • Listen then spoke and then read and write
  • Look for a suitable environment in which to learn the language

مها شرف
by مها شرف , معلمة لغة عربية , وزارة التربية السورية

Using infographics in the classroom

 

It's best to use infographics with interactive whiteboards. You can display them on the board and explain everything.

 

It's a good idea to print explanations too. Colourful handouts are always really popular and students can consult them whenever they feel like it.

 

Last but not least, infographics can provide a motivating way to set homework. Students can see the grammar explanation and then play a related language game to test their understanding of the grammar.

It depends on their age and the way they are activating with the lesson. The good teacher uses the suitable methods and techniques to persuade and convince his students via simple examples and obvious explanation. 

Students must be aware of what is the teacher talking about and for this purpose the teacher uses different methods and techniques every lesson in order not to make students get bored of grammar. 

 

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