This message is for Gretchen.  I apologize if I've already sent it, but I found
it in my drafts folder.

Connie Weaver

Gretchen, your immediately previous post brought tears to my eyes.  Clearly you
are a WONDERFUL teacher; I only wish that I, and my son, had had teachers like
you!

It's uncanny how much your experiences in teaching writing parallel my own at the
college level--especially in teaching developmental writing classes, but also in
teaching teachers-to-be and even practicing teachers.  No matter how effectively
I think I'm teaching grammar and editing (through individual conferences too), I
succeed better in all the other aspects of teaching writing!

I will cut and paste below the mini-lessons I've been using in my undergrad/grad
course Grammar for Teachers.  I've required the students to work in groups to
teach the mini-lessons themselves.  This has helped a great deal in that most
everyone has learned one set of concepts well!  But one set is hardly enough.
Because my class meets only once a week for 3 1/2 hours, there are too many
mini-lessons in one class session.  Furthermore, since the students are eager to
demonstrate their new knowledge, the mini-lessons tend to be longer than I want.
(Someday I will have the courage just to cut them off.)  Last semester, one
cluster of students was particularly resistant to the repeated teaching of
mini-lessons, and I can't say I blame them.  They claimed they liked my own
teaching of certain aspects of grammar better, but in truth, I don't think I
could/would sustain my best teaching throughout all those concepts.  (True
confession again.)

Beginning in the fall, however, I'm going to try something different.  I'm going
to use Harry Noden's Image Grammar for one strand of the course.  I think I'll
still have mini-lessons on some aspects of editing, but I'm not sure what I'll do
about the practice of having everyone participate in teaching some kind of
mini-lesson.  There's a possibility that we might have an "electronic classroom"
for English Education by this fall, though I'm not holding my breath on that
one.  But if we do have laptop computers hooked up with a display computer/screen
in the classroom, and hooked up to the Internet as well, then the teaching of
mini-lessons can be enlivened still more, and we can even use the CD accompanying
Harry Noden's book to access photos and other things, as well as to access
various Web sites dealing with grammar.  Will all of this enhance learning?  I'd
like to think so, but I don't know.

The references to TGIC in the list below are references to my Teaching Grammar in
Context.  I also have the bookstore order one of Diana Hacker's handbooks for
writers, plus books of readings for my students.  This year I'm going to try a
"Professional Book Club" approach as yet another strand of the course.  Students
will choose from among about a half a dozen books, then meet in groups weekly to
discuss what they've read in the books.

I hope my posting the following sequence of mini-lessons on the listserv will
encourage others to share their own sequences of lessons, as Jeff too has
recently done.  (The advice on resources is for my students, and I confer with
the groups, too, to suggest other resources.)

Gretchen, wouldn't it be fun for the two of us to keep in touch this fall as we
teach with Harry Noden's book?

Connie

Grammar minilessons

1 Understanding subject-verb agreement (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 198-199) [I will
already have taught subjects and verbs, or rather an introduction to them; like
others, I use a slot-and-filler approach mostly]
 2 Understanding S-V agreement when a prepositional phrase modifies
    the subject (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 199-200)
 3 Understanding other S-V agreement situations (See Hacker, pp. 121-127)


 4 Connecting independent clauses (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 200-201)
 5 Understanding independent and dependent clauses and the concept
    of fragment (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 201-203)
   [Locate the relevant pages in Hacker or in another book, and study]

6 Eliminating run-ons and comma splices (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 203-204)
7 Making limited use of comma splices (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 204-205)
8 Phrases versus clauses (see TGIC Appendix, p. 205)
9 More on fragments (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 205-207)
    In the Appendix, there is also an alternative sequence of lessons,
      on pp. 207-209; see also the relevant pages in Hacker

10 Introducing participial phrases (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 214-217)
11 Using participial phrases as free modifiers (see TGIC pp. 217-218)
12 Creating participial phrases and absolutes through sentence-combining
    (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 218-221)
13 Appreciating and using absolutes (see TGIC Appendix, p. 221)

14   Moving a medial modifier (see TGIC Appendix, p. 223)
15 Given/new information (see TGIC Appendix, p. 223-224)
16 Using the passive (TGIC Appendix, p. 227)
17 Using WH-word or It-transforms (TGIC Appendix, pp. 224-225)
18 Using It and there transforms (TGIC Appendix, pp. 226-227)
   Also, please look at the lessons on pp. 241-242 of the Appendix

19 Connecting clauses with conjunctive adverbs (see TGIC Appendix, pp.
209-211)
 20 Comparing 3 kinds of connectors (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 211-213)

21 Using the colon (see TGIC Appendix, pp. 237-239) & using dashes (see
Hacker)
22 Punctuating restrictive and nonrestrictive clauses (see TGIC Appendix, pp.
239-241)

23  How to punctuate quotes and how to include and punctuate references to
sources
24  How to do bibliography items and bibliographies