Bob,
   I'm glad you're finding ways in which our understandings overlap. I'll
just respond to the following:

Now, my view might be incorrect, but I'm not quite sure Craig
objects to this point of view because he has evidence it is wrong. 
Rather, he objects to it because, he claims, it has relegated instruction
in grammar to a minor part of the curriculum.

   I can see why I may have left the wrong impression on this one. Let me
be clearer. I believe cognitive and functional approaches do a much
better job of describing language. In other words, the evidence points
their way and does so increasingly, including the most recent work in
cognitive science and in brain science. Goldberg seems to feel she (and
fellow researchers) have established a compelling case that even the
most schematic of "rules" arise from usage. "In fact, constructionists
argue that language must be learned from positive input together with
fairly general cognitive abilities since the diversity and complexity
witnessed does not yield to nativist accounts" (2006, p.15). Since
cognitive grammar has grown up under the shadow of generative grammar
in this country, almost anyone seriously involved in the enterprise has
defended the approach as more empirically accurate. You can evaluate
the evidence if you want, but it is not a view based solely on the
desire to see grammar return to the curriculum.

   That said, I'll refer back to a few quotes from Debra Myhill and my
post on whether grammar instruction can help writing. We can't test the
validity of grammar instruction until we come up with a theory that
links them. My point, I guess, would be that those theories already
exist. They connect grammar to meaning and grammar to discourse. They
pay serious attention to how a grammatical form will "construe" the
meaning of an utterance. They both pay attention to the ways in which
grammar participates in discourse. It's not just a matter of teaching
as little as we need to to make sure there aren't "errors."

   Are they true because they are useful? Useful because they are true? If
these approaches give us insight into language that makes us better
readers, writers, teachers, editors, then that, too, is in their favor.

   A few people have very kindly alerted me to articles on language
acquisition I should read. Perhaps I should back off for a week or so
while I get that done. I just want to end with my belief that these
positions are being empirically developed and adjusted accordingly as
the need arises.

Craig

I think there are two key questions we need to think about when we teach
> grammar to native speakers.
>
> 1) What does it mean to know grammar?
>
> 2) How do native speakers come to know that grammar?
>
> Our answers to those two questions guide what we teach and how we teach.
>
> Although both Craig and I believe grammar is essential in the curriculum,
> we differ on the answer to both questions and so our teaching suggestions
> are different.
>
> It is clear to me that all native speakers come to the classroom knowing a
> great deal about grammar that has been acquired because of our biological
> endowment to learn language.  Grammar, from this point of view, is not the
> result of general cognitive capacities.  Now, my view might be incorrect,
> but I'm not quite sure Craig objects to this point of view because he has
> evidence it is wrong.  Rather, he objects to it because, he claims, it has
> relegated instruction in grammar to a minor part of the curriculum.  Here
> is his quotation from the 6th that lead me to say this:
>
>>    If you think grammar is innate and meaningfully neutral, just a
>> system of forms, then don't teach it. It just happens. If you see it as
>> learned and deeply connected to cognition and discourse, then you ought
>> to attend to it and not just expect it to happen.
>>    There are views of language which support the teaching of grammar and
>> views of language that support our current status quo. Bob and I are on
>> opposite poles of that argument.
>
> I merely noted in my last post that the cognitive theories he cites are
> very concerned with knowledge EVERYONE has about particular properties of
> language.  Cognitive linguists do not seem to suggest huge variations that
> require instruction.  And, Langacker, to my knowledge, says nothing about
> variation in speakers' knowledge of grammar.
>
> In answer to the second question, because I believe grammar is innate, it
> is less a question of how children "learn" grammar then it is a question
> of how those innate principles of all human languages are realized in the
> language they are being exposed to.  From this perspective, EVERY native
> speaker knows more about their primary language than they have been
> exposed to and variation in exposure is a minor issue.
>
> In a post on the 6th, Craig wrote:
>
>>  If, in fact, language is learned and not just "activated", and if
>> interaction is a huge key to that, and if children differ radically in
>> the kinds of language they bring to school, then there are huge reasons
>> for rethinking our current practices.
>
> I interpreted this statement to justify the teaching of grammar because
> some children "differ radically" in their knowledge of language because of
> the language they have been exposed ot.  In other words, Craig puts a
> great deal more importance on the language children are exposed to than I
> do.
>
> He could be right when he says:
>
>    Again, I don't ever remember saying that interaction alone accounts for
> language. It is a critical component in any theory, including
> generative. The rest of the sentence just confuses me.
>
>
> Bob Yates, University of Central Missouri
>
> To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface
> at:
>      http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
> and select "Join or leave the list"
>
> Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/