Just to clarify a point regarding ATEG members' attitudes towards traditional grammar: I think most of us would probably agree that it is the use of traditional grammar instruction methods and not the grammar itself that we take the biggest issue against. The old idea of teaching grammar (or just about anything else for that mattter) using decontectualized "drill and kill" worksheets is no longer acceptable. If we can well teach parts of speech, sentence structure, etc., using methods that help students retain and use their knowledge, then ATEG will have accomplished one of its highest goals. The purposes of the scope and sequence project include discovering and disseminating such methods.
 
I think it would be counterproductive of us to consider going back to methods that did not (or if they ever did, that no longer) work. It has been more than three quarters of a century since John Dewey wrote Education and Experience, and public education has only just begun to properly take his concept of progressive education to heart: that we must begin where the students "are" in order to be able to educate them at all (let alone well).
 
Eduard quotes David Mulroy's wonderful book, The War Against Grammar to great effect.  In it, Professor Mulroy points out that Dewey believed in mixing both the formal and the informal. He states that "the ideal approach to education is one that alternates in a rational way between progressive and traditional approaches" (63) and that "there is no intrinsic opposition between the goals of progressive education and formal instruction in grammar"  as recommended by Dewey (64). However, formal isntruction does not have to done in the traditional manner. If we insit on following traditions that have failed, then we will not achieve our goals. [Note for Eduard: I don't understand why you asked in an earlier posting, "Any idea who the author is and how his perspective and experience would help move this forum forward?" You obviously know David's book well, and you quoted from it at length just before asking the question.]. 
 
The reasons for ATEG's existence include our disapproval of the old NCTE stance "that the English teaching profession is opposed to formal instruction in grammar" (Mulroy 66). Our conference last week included much talk about the need for formal instruction and our skepticism regarding the "grammar in context" methods of the recent past. We exist in large measure to change NCTE's stance. And we have made progress. NCTE has published our book and is about to publish another book by one of our members on the subject of grammar teaching. Also, they have published three issues of English Journal solely devoted to grammar instruction during the last ten years -- many with articles by our membership. There is no need for either doom-saying nor hoplessness. We all need to work together to share ideas and find methods that work. To assume that this is easy, I think we would all agree, would be foolish. To employ "back to the basics" methodology would be suicidal to the cause and to
 the education of modern students.
 
Paul E. Doniger


----- Original Message ----
From: Eduard C. Hanganu <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 2:36:22 PM
Subject: Re: Traditional Grammar


Craig,

There is no need to get defensive here. Constructive criticism is the 
need of all academic endeavors, and should be invited and appreciated 
in this forum. There are some problems which need to be addressed in 
order for things to move forward, because:

1.Some members of the ATEG forum have trashed traditional grammar in 
books and articles repeatind the idea propagated by NCTE that 
the "good, old grammar" is just a bunch of absurd prescriptions. 

2.Some have advocated the mixing of contemporary linguistics with 
traditional grammar to make it "better," ignoring the fact that even 
Chomsky defended the teaching of traditional grammar. Here is how 
David Mulroy quotes him:

"I don't see how any person can truly be called "educated' who 
doesn't know the elements of sentence structure, or who doesn't 
understand the nature of a relative clause, a passive construction, 
and so on.Furthermore, if one is going to discuss literature, 
including here what students write themselves, and to come to 
understanding, and to come to understand how it is written and why, 
there conceptual tools are indispensable.

For these purposes, I think traditional grammar so-called ( say, the 
grammar of Jespersen) remains today a very impressive and useful 
basis for such teaching. I can't see any reason for teaching 
structural grammars of English, or for teaching transformational 
grammar in the manner of some instructional books that I have seen."

3. Some people are very opposed to the traditional nomenclature and 
defition of parts of speech and parts of sentence, and believe that 
it should be totally and completely discarded, but cannot offer 
anything better because no contemporary grammar has been able to 
offer a better grammatical taxonomy and better definitions for the 
parts of speech and sentence of the traditional grammar. Again, David 
Mulroy, explains that though the nomenclature and definitions of the 
traditional grammar are not perfect, they are "prototypical" and more 
than sufficient for most public school and college students:

"Fries was right that traditional grammarians have not been entirely 
consistent in their definitions of the parts of speech. The parts of 
speech are traditionally taught to young students, and the ways in 
which they have been taught reproduce the way in which classificatory 
schemes are usually internalized. One starts with the prototypes: the 
clearest,  most familiar examples of a category...As people grow, 
they refine their criteria and in the end are capable of making more 
or less scientific distinctions..."

At this time ATEG struggles with nomenclature and definitions because 
there is confusion about them. Ed Vavra states:

"As long as this group refuses to make such distinctions, it will 
fail. In effect, it is speaking and writing nonsense (as I understand 
Hobbes to call it), since different members use the same terms to 
refer to different constructions, and different terms to refer to the 
same constructions. Clear definitions are first principles of 
philosophy and of the natural sciences. It amazes me that this group 
cannot understand that."

4. Some members have repeated again and again the myth of the "native 
speaker" which is contained even in "Some Questions and Answers about 
Grammar" listed by ATEG: 

"All native speakers of a language have more grammar in their heads 
than any grammar book will ever contain. Part of our goal as teachers 
is to help students discover that knowledge." 

People who still treat Pinker's theories as scientific facts need to 
read Sampson's "The 'Language Instinct' Debate" and see for 
themselves how much evidence there is against the notion of "language 
innateness" or "Universal Grammar." They also need to read Davies'
"The Native Speaker Myth and Reality," and realize that a lot of the 
students who participate in English classes are not "native speakers" 
who "have more grammar in their heads that any grammar book will ever 
contain," but *semilingual* individuals, that is, people who "never 
achieve[d] native speaker status in any language." Davies explains:

"What semilingualism argues (Skutnabb-Kangas, 1981) is that in 
certain situations, either of a multilingual character or an 
impoverished one, which creates a climate of disadvantage, children 
may be brought up with no fully developed linguistic systems and what 
they have will be either (a)a set (two or more)of partial systems or 
(b) one inadequate system."

Such discovery would help teachers and instructors to understand that 
their responsibility is not to bring to the surface the innner 
grammarians inside their students, but to TEACH the *semilingual* 
students English as "another language" so that such students could 
use their mother tongue adequately at home, in school, and at work. 

Eduard 



On Wed, 19 Jul 2006, Craig Hancock wrote...

>Ed,
>   It was AFTER he wrote those words that David Milroy was invited 
to be
>our keynote speaker. I was delighted to meet him then and delighted
>that he was with us at our recent conference. I certainly don't want 
to
>speak for David, who is perfectly capable of speaking for himself, 
but
>he seems to think we are at least capable of redemeption. I am
>delighted to have among us strong voices for the value of traditional
>grammar.
>
>Craig>

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