Many thanks, Craig, for the leads and the clarifying comments.  I agree that we are more or less on the same page in terms of the nature of future research.

What is of interest to me is the extent to which the research needs you have outlined have been heeded by the powers that be.  In my own field of SLA, though the need for empirical comparative studies is recognised, few have been forthcoming and most of those that have been, have been too short-term.

The problems with the carrying out comparative studies are numerous.  Here are just two:

1.  Such studies necessarily entail at least two approaches.  Now, unless one is lucky in having available two situations in which two approaches are being practised, one is obliged to form two groups and teach them in two different ways which raises all sorts of practical and ethical problems.

2.  Even if one can solve these problems, one cannot do so in the long term which reduces the usefulness of the findings.   I would argue that comparative studies aiming to compare the effect of teaching grammar on the quality of writing (assuming that one can solve the other problems entailed therein) need to be, at the very least, one-term long.

These two problems along with others make it very difficult for doctoral srudents to carry out such research thus depriving the field of a potentially useful source of important findings..

Ron Sheen


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Craig Hancock 
  To: [log in to unmask] 
  Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 8:34 AM
  Subject: Re: Supportive empirical evidence was Silly, rewarding grammar period


  Ron,
     The inherent or innate nature of grammar is, in fact, a theoretical underpinning of the anti-grammar movement. Part of that means thinking of grammar as a behavior, not as a body of knowledge, and as largely a neutral conveyor of meaning. We now test grammar in terms of what students can do, not what they know (even in the SAT test) because it is generally believed that conscious knowledge is unnecessary and unhelpful.
     You're right; the anti-grammar position that acquisition will just happen through exposure has never been tested. Debra Myhill makes these points nicely in an article in English Teaching: Practice and Critique (Dec. 2005. You can access it online. Martha and I have an article in the same issue.) Here's a few quotes.


  from abstract:  .there has never been a critical theorization of how grammar might support the development of writing, and thus there has been very limited research which has explored that relationship.. (77)


  Quotes Tomlinson (1994, p26) that condemnation of grammar on flimsy evidence was what many in the educational establishment wanted to hear.  (80)

  What would be so much more interesting,  and valuable, would be to explore in more subtly nuanced detail what research can tell us about what aspects of grammar and knowledge about language are most relevant to writing,  whether direct teaching of these features can help children improve their writing, and what teaching strategies are most successful in enabling this to happen. (80)



  The truth is that teaching grammar and knowledge about language in positive, contextualised ways which make clear links with writing is not yet an established way of teaching and it is, as yet, hugely under-researched.  (81)



  The rejection of decontextualised, and with it by implication, prescriptive, grammar teaching was rooted in insightful critique of what was happening in  English classrooms.  In contrast, the "grammar in context" principle is both less sharply critiqued and considerably less clearly conceptualised.  There has been little genuine discussion or consideration of what "in context" means.  Frequently, observations of classroom practice indicate that the notion of "in context" means little more than grammar teaching which is slotted into English lessons, where the focus is not grammar, but some other feature of English learning.  (82)


     I think we are absolutely on the same wave length. The people who rely on these empirical studies that critique the teaching of grammar have not done empirical studies of their own. The cure has proven worse than the disease. 
     But we need to conceptualize a program before we can try it out.


  Craig




  Ronald Sheen wrote: 
    Thanks, Craig, for your thought-provoking post.  It raises a number of issues which demand careful responses.

    Before providing any, I should clarify one or two things.  First, my area of experience is in SLA (second language acquisition) in which I have done most of my research.   However, I believe that in the field of SLA and FLA (first language acquisition) teachers and students have been the victims of the educational theorists who claimed that exposure to correct language in the classroom will result in the students' acquisition thereof in spite of massive exposure to non-standard language outside of the classroom.

    I take the position that such theorists were (and are) guilty of unaccountable irresponsibility and this because they did not support their advocacy with empirical evidence.  Thus, for reasons we need not go into here, educational authorities climbed aboard the bandwagon and suddenly teachers were forbidden to teach grammar and were made to feel quilty if they did.

    Now, before coming to the details of your excellent post, I would appreciate your responding to the above remarks.   I know that my assumption is correct in terms of SLA.  Is it also correct in terms of FLA?

    Ron.
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Craig Hancock 
      To: [log in to unmask] 
      Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 6:36 AM
      Subject: Re: Supportive empirical evidence was Silly, rewarding grammar period


      Ron,
         My comments were rather unfocused and unclear, and I suspect you and I are not far apart on positions. I'll try again.
         For the most part, empirical studies of grammar effectiveness that i have read measure their effect on writing as compared to students who have had writing instruction, but not grammar. Generally, this has been measured over the short term. Generally, this has measured students receiving grammar instruction, but not practice in writing. (What we would call control groups.) This implies that our only goal is improvement in writing and that this can be accurately measured in the short term, with grammar versus writing as an either/or choice. 
         In other words, under this pattern of accountability, Gretchen could excite her students about grammar, help them become explorers of language, deepen their understanding of what nouns are all about, and then have that determined to be "ineffective" because these students don't produce more "accurate grammar" (your term for it) or don't score better on holistically assessed writing samples after a semester or a year. For an accurate control group, they would have to be denied real writing practice. Perhaps a better test would measure their knowledge about nouns as opposed to students who have only memorized "person, place, and thing" as a definition. Perhaps we should find a way to test their confidence as language explorers or their deeper interest in the subject. We could compare knowledge about language between a group studying language and another merely writing. Everything depends on a match between the testing and the goals.
         I don't know of a good empirical assessment of a knowledge based approach to grammar over a lengthy period of time. In both England and Australia, teachers now seem to believe that reintegrating language into the curriculum has been a good thing, but it's hard to test that out empirically. Perhaps the most direct test would measure knowledge about language, since that would be the central goal. We could then try to monitor how well that knowledge is put to work in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and so on. The problem is that we don't have a current consensus that knowing about language is a reasonable goal. Whether or not Gretchen's students can now produce more "accurate grammar" would be, I think, irrelevant, at least in the short term. Very real benefits will be ignored if they are not thought of as valuable goals in their own right.
         Knowledge about language does not come quickly and easily, and putting it to work is not easy as well. We need empirical testing that does not diminish the value of knowing about language and does not demand short term results. 
         We need to envision a K-12 curriculum, not a single course with no other follow-up by other teachers. Once we do that, we can measure progress along the way.

      Craig


      Ronald Sheen wrote: 
        My comments on empirical evidence, Gretchen, were, as I think I made clear, in no way an expression of doubt in your success.  My comments were both an implicit criticism of the proliferation of how to teach grammar books without including any attempt to demonstrate empirically that the approach proposed has been shown to be the optimal choice, and a suggestion to you that you consider doing some sort of comparative study yourself.in order to justify the publication of a book.

        However, Craig Hancock claims that 'One of the problems with many "empirical" studies of grammar is that the outcomes have been so narrowly defined' and then, unfortunately, goes no further.  The whole area of comparative studies is a minefield waiting to blow up in the face of anyone attempting them.  This, however, is no reason to dismiss them with the sort of unsupported comment that Craig makes.

        A discussion group such as this one provides a marvellous forum for teachers to engage in mutally helpful exchanges.  This said, however, following such exchanges quickly reveals that the 'evidence ' provided is largely anecdotal and, therefore, unreliable.   Though comparative empirical studies are not always reliable, it is undeniable that such studies rigorously carried out are the only way in which we can arrive at reliable findings which demonstrate for example that approach A is more effective than approach B in situation X with students of type Y with aim Z.

        Now though the so-called action research carried out by practising teachers may sound seductive, we all should realise that the burden it imposes on teachers is enormous.  Consequently, before teachers embark on such a project, they should make themselves aware of what is involved.

        Ron Sheen
          ----- Original Message ----- 
          From: Gretchen Lee 
          To: [log in to unmask] 
          Sent: Monday, September 10, 2007 6:46 AM
          Subject: Re: Supportive empirical evidence was Silly, rewarding grammar period


          In a message dated 9/10/2007 5:45:53 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, [log in to unmask] writes:
            Though it is clearly desirable to trial approaches which engage students' interest and involvement, one should not confuse the latter with effectiveness in improving studens' production of more accurate grammar.
          Hello,

          I absolutely agree that empirical evidence is necessary.  I'm a loooong way from a book.  However, my students are lucky to be from the upper middle class and in some cases, the wealthy upper class.  Their production of "correct" grammar is very good, barring a few "between you and I" and lesser/fewer problems.  My aim is to engage them in analyzing grammar and making it seem interesting at the same time.  I can't teach lesser/fewer with countable nouns if they don't know (and don't care) what a countable noun is.

          At this point the class is less about error detection/prevention than it is about helping them find out that grammar is fascinating.  With a little luck, they will stay interested enough to want to take a linguistics class in college, rather than avoiding it at all costs.  My little class is obviously silly in many ways (see original subject line).  But for the first time in many of their lives, grammar is a class to which they look forward. I hope that's worthwhile.

          Thanks,
          Gretchen





----------------------------------------------------------------------
          See what's new at AOL.com and Make AOL Your Homepage.
          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/ 


      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/ 


  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/