Rebecca,
Having students tape the language they hear is a great way to start the course!
Exploring the differences between talking and writing is important – and my students
(basic writers at a community college) have really appreciated it. It validates what
they already know - how to talk, it helps them appreciate the conventions of writing,
it explains many common writing errors, and it provides a framework we can use
throughout the course to explain these errors.
I begin by asking students, "Which would you rather do: talk or write?” After they
have voted their preference, I ask them why. Their answers reveal many of the
differences between writing and talking. As I jot their answers on the board,
students see the writing conventions emerge: spelling, punctuation, paragraphing. We
need to spell correctly so readers know what word we are using, mark sentences so they
know where ideas end and begin, organize our ideas and put them in paragraphs to help
readers follow our train of thought. As the discussion continues, I point out that
writing and talking involve different situations and different structures.
Different situations. When we talk, the listeners are right there with us. They can
see our facial expressions and body language, which communicate all kinds of
information. We can also see them. Often, we don’t even finish what we are going to
say because we can see that others already understand our point. In addition,
listeners can hear us. Whispering something, for example, gives a different message
than yelling those exact words. People can also hear us pause and therefore know
where one idea ends and another begins. Finally, because others are with us, we
create the conversation together. We do not need to know ahead of time what we think.
When we write, the readers are not with us. They can’t see our facial expressions and
body language. We therefore have to fill in the gaps and put that information into our
writing. We also can’t see them, so we have no way of knowing whether they understand
the point we are making. As writers, we have to anticipate their questions and supply
that information. In addition, readers can’t hear us pause and stop at the end of an
idea. If we don’t use punctuation to show where one idea ends and the next one
begins, readers will see nothing but non-stop words. The final difference is that we
cannot ramble the way we do when talking. Before we turn in a paper or send a letter,
we need to know what we think and present those ideas logically. If we ramble in our
writing, readers will think we are disorganized and confused.
Different structures. Writing and talking have different structures. We write in
sentences, which need both a subject and a verb (or predicate), but we talk in
chunks. When talking to others, we communicate our ideas in chunks of information,
saying things such as "In a minute,” "Sometime tomorrow night,” and "Because I was
busy.” People listening to us do not reply, "That’s not a sentence” or "You left out
the subject of that sentence.” When talking, we can communicate our meaning without
sentences. If students are writing fragments, they are writing the way they talk: in
chunks of information. (And when I explain this, their eyes light up. They they
understand why they are writing fragments.)
When we talk, we also string along our ideas until we have said what we wanted to
say. We might say something like, "We were both bored last night and we wanted to do
something different so we decided to rent a movie so that’s when we called you.” When
we have said what was on our minds, our voice goes down in pitch and we stop. If
students are writing run-on sentences, they are also writing the way they talk:
stringing along their ideas and placing a period where their voice goes down in pitch
and they stop. (And their eyes light up again, for they realize they are not stupid -
they are simply writing the way they talk.)
I end the discussion by saying that talking and writing are like football and
basketball. One game is not better than the other game; they are just different.
Although I have developed this approach in a basic writing textbook, Rhythms of
Writing, I think it would work with any grade level.
Pam Dykstra
South Suburban College
South Holland, IL 60430
"Rebecca S. Wheeler" wrote:
> Dear Gretchen (and everyone),
> As for alternatives to teaching the traditional 8 parts of speech, etc.
> I believe that the future of language arts lies in analysis of language variation
> -- by that I mean, the study of how people use different forms of langauge in
> different places, times, with different audiences, for different communicative
> purposes.
>
> Thus, while I do teach at a college level, I have my Language and Teaching
> students take a tape recorder out, and tape record 2 - 3 minutes of naturally
> occuring conversation. Some students tape record teens in conversation, some
> record children, some record their families. We get samples of talk fully in
> African American Vernacular English, in Southern English, samples of people who
> CLAIMED to always and only use "full complete 'proper' English sentences" who were
> astonished to find that, as is typically the case, in coverrsation, we follow very
> different patterns and structures of UTTERANCE construction.
>
> So then with that database, the students are stunned to realize that language in
> real time is of often fundamentally different structure than language in the
> books.
>
> Then I equip the students with basic grammatical knowledge of sentence structure
> (as in Kolln's work, or Morenbergs), and with that tool, they begin a contrastive
> analysis, seeking to identify what it is that makes conversation patterns, well,
> conversation -- what are the differences of structure? Well, for starters, a
> "complete sentence" may be a rarity in conversation while a frequent trait of
> book-writing. This then provides the teacher and student understanding of why
> students have such a hard time learning to WRITE Standard English -- they are
> putting on paper their accustomed conversational patterns, and the syntax of
> conversation and the syntax of Standard Edited English are quite different.
>
> The whole process is inductively driven, with students doing discovery.
>
> By the way, this is not just for college students. I'm working in the inner city
> schools of my local area, seeking to reduce the achievement gap between African
> American children and children of the dominant majority. Resources for 3rd graders
> are robust -- Thus, see Noma LeMoine's English for Your Success which uses a range
> of African American centered children's book to prompt metalinguistic awareness of
> language variation and language structure in context.
>
> So for example, Flossie and The Fox is a children's book in which the Fox speaks
> in Standard English, and Flossie and her family, in African American Vernacular
> English. The 3rd graders are prompted to contrast what the fox sounds like, with
> what Flossie sounds like -- to get detailed, and to make their own language
> notebook.... their own grammar book, as it were.
>
> This kind of approach fosters critical thinking, closeness of analysis, use of the
> scientific method (in collecting data, forming hypotheses, testing, revising,
> etc), and it's flat out fun for the kids.
>
> See also the teaching section in The Real Ebonics Debate: Power, Language, and the
> Education of African-American Children, Theresa Perry and Lisa Delpit (eds).
>
> regards,
>
> Rebecca
>
> Gretchen Lee wrote:
>
> > In a message dated 8/15/2001 2:55:04 PM Pacific Daylight Time, [log in to unmask]
> > writes:<< It is inthe K-12 (or, perhaps, 5-12) grades that help is needed.
> > From what I have seen of various series displayed at NCTE, traditional
> > grammar still reigns, with its emphasis on error avoidance and error
> > correction. >>
> >
> > Martha,
> >
> > You have hit the nail on the head. I would beg of you all to ignore Texas
> > and traditional publishers. If necessary, follow Ed Vavra's lead and put up a
> > website. But realize those of us in middle school who are reading the
> > research and avoiding the drill and kill of the past are risking our jobs to
> > stay true to your/our principles.
> >
> > The perennial problem remains, if not traditional grammar in school, then
> > what? What do I say to my parents who tell me that I should be teaching
> > traditional parts of speech because it "worked for them"? I have two new
> > teachers in my department this year (total dept is three!) who are open to
> > new methods. Grammar (and spelling!) are the big issues in any English
> > departments. My new teachers are primed to teach grammar and spelling in
> > context, but I have no texts to show them how. Everything is aimed at
> > college and hs.
> >
> > This is the plea that I started with last year. What resources do you have
> > for me? For my teachers? What should we be doing in 6-8th grade? Nothing
> > infuriates me more than hs or college teachers railing about lower level
> > teachers not doing their job in teaching grammar when I can't get any help in
> > what I should be doing to support you. (Please don't take this personally -
> > the teachers on this list serve are our most ardent supporters, but most
> > instructors are much less invested in helping us at the lower levels.)
> >
> > We're willing. But where (outside of Ed's site - I can't get a schoolwide
> > buy-in) do I start? Linguistics should be fun. Language is fun. Why can't
> > anyone communicate this on a middle school level?
> >
> > I am torn between those who think that an educated person should be able to
> > talk about language and those who say we only need to learn to use it. Is
> > there no middle ground?
> >
> > Help!
> > ~Gretchen in San Jose
> > [log in to unmask]
> >
> > 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/
>
> --
>
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
> Rebecca S. Wheeler, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor of Linguistics
> Department of English
> 1 University Place
> Christopher Newport University
> Newport News, VA 23606-2998
>
> Telephone: 757-598-8891
> Fax: 757-594-8870
>
> Rebecca S. Wheeler is Editor of Syntax in the Schools, the quarterly journal of
> the Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar (ATEG), an assembly of the
> National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). www.ateg.org.
>
> Research Interests:
> * dialects and language varieties in the schools,
> * reducing the achievement gap between inner city minority children and middle
> class children,
> * discovery learning of grammar in the classroom
>
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
> 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:
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and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
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