Thanks again Johanna. I certainly found your message interesting and
stimulating. As far as teaching English as a second language is
concerned I try to find a balance between grammar correction and true
communication.I teach in a monolingual Spanish context so it is kind
of difficult for students to use English as a means of communication.
Either they want to say more than their grammar enables them to or
their compositions are too silly and artificial. (Just a collection of
sentences not a true text) So what I do is to ask them to write things
that are suitable for the grammar I have just tought. For example if
we have worked through the present simple and they can produce
sentences like: " I sometimes go to the park on Saturday morning" I
would ask them to write a composition on such a topic as:"My weekend"
or " An ordinary week". That's my line of work as far as writing is
concerned. I have also found that I can give the students a test
focused on grammar items that goes much more into details such as the
adjective-noun relationship or the article-noun relationship than the
composition. So I can test if they know their grammar (in the broad
sense that is including sintax and spelling as well) and I can ask
them to use that knwoledge of English to produce a text in ordinary
English that should be correct enough for an average English person to
understand.
Grammar correction and true exchange of information. That must be what
is all about!!
Well, thanks again.
By the way if any of you is currently doing or plans to do a reseach
involving second language adquisition, I happily offer myself if I can
be of any help.