Cynthia,
    This is a delightful post.  You should think about joining us this
summer, as helper in the Scope and Sequence project and/or presenter.
If you want, I could help set that up with Amy Benjamin.
    Like you, I have been given a huge amount of space in coming up with
curriculum for the Educational Opportunity Program students I teach. 
As with you, some of that builds from success.    >
    Without a set curriculum to work from, you have made some very
thoughtful and creative choices. I like the way you try to get
students ready to meet prescriptive standards, but seem at least
equally interested in effectiveness and meaning.  (We have no history
of talking about grammar in that way. Even generative grammar largely
sees itself as irrelevant.) Australia is now teaching language
awareness right from day one, with functional grammar as the
underlying theory and "genre" (language in practice) as a focus.
   My book is aimed at a semester course in college, but I have former
students who are trying to apply it to high school.  Let me know if you
want me to get them to send you a review copy.
    Dedicated teaching creates its own rewards, but it can get lonely,
especially when people in the profession seem totally unaware of what
you are dealing with. The day we can give up grammar is the day we can
give up words. It's especially pleasing to learn about people making
sense out of nonsense, however awkward it can be at times.  Scope and
Sequence should give some solidity, including advice, to teachers like
yourself looking for a way to give students what they obviously need.

Craig



I assumed you wanted a private reply.
>
>   Thanks for the compliment on my post--I am as much impressed by many of
> the people on this list as you are and after reading their messages for
> several years now, I feel I almost "know" these people, especially the
> regulars like you, Paul, and Johanna ( I really love her posts--she must
> be an incredible instructor).
>
>   As to my approach--well, I have quite a bit of latitude in my school.
> We are very small, rural, and few people take language arts seriously,
> so I get away with quite a bit.  However, I am pleased to say that I
> have a very good reputation for preparing students adequately for the
> colleges they attend, and over the years I have had students attend in
> colleges, both private and public, from Florida (e.g, Pensacola) to
> Washington, and even West Point.  So, yes, I do have my school's
> support, and since we are rural, my district tends to be more
> traditional (you know, the 3 R's), English wouldn't be English to my
> parents without the teaching of grammar.
>
>   I really just teach from the heart--common sense stuff--and have a great
> respect and love for languages in general--my maternal grandparents were
> Russian-German immigrants to this country, my husband's family are from
> Applachia, and my siblings are spread from one coast to another, so I
> have a great understanding of dialect and communication confusion!   I
> have received instruction from both camps--pro- and anti-grammar--and
> firmly believe that, whether conscious or subconscious, good writers are
> good grammarians, and the best writers know how to break, bend, or
> comply with the "rules" of grammar--they are true masters of the
> language.
>
>   What I meant by layering is that each year I try to take two steps back
> and one step forward, expecting students to review and master
> previously-taught concepts (for example, I will not "teach" parts of
> speech to 10th-graders--how absurd and, really, not that helpful) and
> when I do review that concept, I throw in the "tests" that most
> textbooks do not contain (e.g. nouns can be made plural, can follow
> determiners alone, etc.) nor will I drill them (I do teach them, though)
> on parts of the sentence because I don't think that level of grammar
> helps much in writing or speaking.  I also use a math formula (if/then,
> P + N, etc.) approach (again, not in textbooks) to teach phrases,
> clauses, parts of the sentence, even parts of speech.  This approach
> does work better with older students who have mastered algebra.
> However, I will focus strongly on usage (not in a strict prescriptive
> sense), which is a broad term and varies from textbook to textbook, but
> usually covers informal wo!
>  rd choice
>  vs. formal word choice, proper use of modifiers (e.g. less/fewer, etc.),
> at every grade level, reaching the final limit when I work with my
> seniors on what I consider higher-level usage (e.g., proper use of
> prepositions following verbs.  Do I say "explantion of" or "explanation
> for,"  or "make amends with" or "make amends for"   By the way, I have
> never found a high school textbook that addresses this area of usage--I
> always have to refer to a usage handbook).  I had a wonderful linguistics
> professor in college who came from a transformational grammar background
> and I throw in lots of stuff I learned from him--my students all know
> what a determiner is and I frequently argue with textbooks that confuse
> verbs with participles (predicate adjectives) and reluctantly use the
> Reed-Kellog method of diagramming (I am an X-bar fan, or tree
> diagrammer).  I also stress agreement, logical use of subordinating
> conjunctions, and teach puncutation from a grammatical perspective--for
> examp!
>  le, it's
>  much easier to teach the use of semicolon and colon if students have an
> understanding to independent clause or verb/object first.  Each year, the
> amount of time I have to spend on review decreases as student cognitive
> ability increases.  I don't drill on tenses until the senior year--by
> then, they can understand mood, tense, and aspect so much more quickly.
> Younger students can memorize irregular verb forms but I don't think they
> really understand when to use the perfect tense--their knowledge is
> simply mechanical.  My older students, who are writing quite critically
> by that time, see the real need to use tenses and aspect correctly in
> order to convey the meaning intended.  Same goes for many subordinating
> conjunctions and conjunctive adverbs, which express relationships that
> require critical thinking that many younger students simply do not have.
>
>   I don't know if that really explains to you what I do--so much of
> teaching is second nature and arises to address the need before us
> rather than from a prescribed curriculum.  My best description to people
> who ask how I teach is that I go back and forth, in and out, up and down
> with whatever I am teaching--writing, reading, or grammar.  My teaching
> is linear, but not perfectly so.
>
>   thanks for asking--I look forward to your future posts!
>
>
>
>
>
>   My supervising teacher during my student-teaching had spent a year in
> Australia where, at least then, they delayed grammar instruction until
> late high school because so much of grammar is highly abstract. I
> believe that.
>
> Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>   I was away from my mail for a day or so, so I'll reply to a number of
> posts in one message.
> Paul, I very much enjoyed your "rant" (much more sensible than the term
> implies.) It would be nice to have a sense of scaffolding so that
> students entering high school would have a solid base of knowledge
> about language to build on.
> Cynthia, I was impressed as much by the tone of your post as I was by
> its substance. I would love to know more about your approach and how
> you layer things in over those three grades. Are you supported by the
> school?
> Jan, Allison, I'm sorry if I created the impression that a scope and
> sequence draft already exists. What I was hoping to say, no doubt
> awkwardly, is that we should make it a very open process, and that
> everyone should have a chance to read it and comment on it as it
> unfolds. The ATEG website would be a natural place.
> A good place to start for reading about grammar would be Grammar
> Alive, put together by ATEG members and published by NCTE. It lacks
> scope and sequence sections because, if I understand this correctly,
> NCTE would not have published it if it had. You can't do wrong with
> Martha Kolln's two books (Understanding Grammar and Rhetorical
> Grammar.) A book I have found enormously rich and helpful is
> Halliday's Introduction to Functional Grammar, now in its third
> edition. It's not easy going, but I much prefer it to the softer
> explanations I have looked at so far. My own attempt at a new kind of
> synthesis (Meaning-Centered Grammar) is now in print. It's aimed at
> being a text for a college course in grammar, but I'm hoping it's
> readable and accessible. Ed Schuster's Breaking the Rules... casts a
> critical eye on entrenched practices and includes advice about
> teaching the rest. Lots of people like Joseph Williams' Ten Easy
> Lessons in Style and Grace (It comes in a few different forms with
> different titles.) All of these are easily googled and all are readily
> available from Amazon. I'm sure other people on the list could add
> their own suggestions.
> A good next step for the project would be to divide it up into smaller
> units, delegate responsibilities, and sign people up. The SCOPE
> section will be critical:it should include what a well educated
> citizen ought to know (on graduation from high school.) The SEQUENCE
> section would give advice for parceling that out (scaffolding) over
> various age levels. We should have an OFFICIAL POSITION, a clear and
> direct alternative to the position of NCTE. We need to make
> recommendations for ASSESSMENT, which should include a position on
> standardized testing practices and procedures. We should make
> recommendations about TEACHER TRAINING, the preparation that would
> help teachers confidently carry this out. I would also suggest
> recommendations for CURRICULAR PRACTICES, including ways in which
> grammar instruction should be integrated with critical reading and
> writing. Obviously, each of these sections should work in harmony with
> the others.
> Anyone who want to be a part of it should let me know and let me know
> your preferences and what you bring to the project.
>
> Craig
>
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>
>
>
>
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