Dear Grammar Experts, Is Hartwell's Grammar 2,"the branch of linguistic science which is concerned with the description, analysis, and formalization of formal language patterns," also termed "Descriptive Grammar?" And is his Grammar 3 (linguistic etiquette) considered "Prescriptive Grammar?" Is Grammar 5 also considered prescriptive? I know that this is probably obvious to most people on this list, but I am trying to get the terminology down so that I may discuss grammar in a more educated fashion. Thank you! Carol Morrison --- Lorna <[log in to unmask]> wrote: --------------------------------- body{font-family: Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:9pt;background-color: #ffffff;color: black;} I want tothank you all for the fascinating discussion of Patrick Hartwell's glorifiedarticle, which I read last spring in a graduate seminar on teaching first-yearcollege composition. I had a hard time, way back then, falling into thewhole-language, anti-grammar line; I remember asking if the class could atleast read "Closing the Books on Alchemy" for clarification, arequest dismissed as suspiciously right-wing. At that time, a number of the teaching assistants and graduate studentsin this class, including me, suffered from deep confusion about how to teachgrammar. We had been forced (dare I sayit?) to endure blackboard-filling tree diagrams in Linguistics and mind-numbingincoherence in translation in Theory; yet as writng tutors and teaching assistants,we were expected to be able to helpundergraduates avoid sentence fragments and pronoun-antecedent disagreementwithout using grammatical terms any more explicit than"pointer-outers." Way backthen, I was a teaching assistant in a first-year composition class in which theconfoundingly popular professor failed any paper with five or more "majorgrammar errors." Outrageously, I thought and still think, this professorrefused to cover any of those errors in class and spoke of"grammarians" with contempt. No member of the English faculty that I could find could offer any realguidance (other than sending students to the writing center) on how to teach orwork with students on the tremendous grammatical problems the teachingassistants were seeing in student papers: not only Connors and Lunsford's big20, but also organizational issues of syntax, ESL concerns, etc., etc., etc. I acceptedthe absurdity of the situation and began to put my hands on every book orarticle I could find, theoretical or practical, remotely connected to theactual teaching of WEAP. (Some of mymost valued resources were written by members or former members of ATEG.) I teach developmental English at a largecommunity college now, so I am learning every day that some things can and mustbe taught explicitly—what a surprise to find, for example, that a first step infinding subjects and verbs is crossing out prepositional phrases! See such a technique as representative ofsilly, stupid mavenhood if you like, but my students must pass (some unfair andineffective) writing and grammar tests in order to get where they want to go. I work very hard every day to get and inventthe how-to grammar knowledge and skills censored in graduate school, the nutsand bolts of the teaching of it, the needed know-how. Hartwell's article should be carefullyanalyzed and challenged, not sanctified as untouchable. --Lorna Nelson [log in to unmask] -----Original Message----- From: "Hadley, Tim" Sent: Oct 19, 2007 4:45 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Patrick Hartwell's Article John and others, John has “hit the nail on the head” with thisstatement: >The real implications of this research seems to be that thereis an incredible dearth of quality evidence on the question. Rather than acknowledgingthis, the researchers choose to do as Elley and Braddock and so many othershave done before and make the ridiculous assumption that a lack of evidence tosupport teaching grammar proves that it is ineffective. If such conclusions aretaken as valid, then the opposite assumption can also be made: the lack of highquality evidence to support the prevailing belief of the anti-grammar crowd isevidence that teaching grammar does improve writing. I wish everyone could read this statement. It summarizes theessence of the overwhelming a priori bias that existed against grammarteaching since at least 1945 at high policy-making levels. Quick note: Earlier Geoff said that he thought Martha hadrefuted Hartwell’s article. Actually, Martha’s excellent articlecame out in 1981—“Closing the Books on Alchemy," CCC 32 (1981):139–151—and was aimed primarily at the earlier (1963) Braddockreport. Tim Timothy D. Hadley Assistant Professor of Professional Writing English Department Missouri State University Springfield, MO 65897 office 417.836.5332, fax 417.836.4226 [log in to unmask] Editor, ATEG Journal From: Assembly for theTeaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of johnwhicker Sent: Friday, October 19, 2007 12:55 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Patrick Hartwell's Article Janet, Thank you for the links; I found them very interesting if somewhatdisheartening. The most intriguing aspect of the grammar study is that two out ofthe three studies they found to be worth mentioning were 30 + years old (The(in)famous Elley study and the less well known Bateman and Zidonis study). Thethird study (Fogel and Ehri, which received the highest quality rating) wasfrom 2000 gives some indication that teaching grammar may help improve writing(something strangely dismissed and downplayed by the researchers). The disheartening aspect of the study is that, ignoring the studythey themselves rate higher in quality than either of the others as well as theminimal positive results found in the Bateman study as inconsequential, theychoose to conclude that "there is no high quality evidence to counter theprevailing belief that the teaching of the principles underlying and informingword order or ‘syntax’ has virtually no influence on the writingquality or accuracy of 5 to 16 year-olds." It seems to me, based on thefact that they could find only three studies worth mentioning and two of thoseshowed some positive if not conclusive indications that grammar instructionmight improve writing, that the researchers should have concluded that there isno conclusive "high quality evidence" to SUPPORT the prevailingbelief that the teaching of grammar has no influence on the writing qualityeither. The real implications of this research seems to be that there is anincredible dearth of quality evidence on the question. Rather thanacknowledging this, the researchers choose to do as Elley and Braddock and somany others have done before and make the ridiculous assumption that a lack ofevidence to support teaching grammar proves that it is ineffective. If suchconclusions are taken as valid, then the opposite assumption can also be made:the lack of high quality evidence to support the prevailing belief of theanti-grammar crowd is evidence that teaching grammar does improve writing. Thisassumption might even be the more rational considering how many researchershave tried and failed to put the final nail into grammar's coffin. The sheervolume of bad studies, and the very questionable nature of even thoseconsidered to have "high to medium" or "medium tohigh" quality should hint at some positive aspect of the teaching ofgrammar that resists all efforts to banish it completely. These of course are far from good reasons to teach grammar, butthey follow the same logic as the continued argument that if there is nohigh quality evidence showing improvement then no improvementoccurs; having no conclusive either way is not evidence against. Thereal implications of this research is that quality research needs to beconducted less we continue to simply rehash old and questionable studies. The findings on sentence combining also simply come to the sameconclusions made thirty years ago, and will likely be treated in the same way. At the risk of being cliché, "the more things change the morethey stay the same". John Whicker Utah Valley State College ----- Original Message ----- From: Castilleja, Janet To: [log in to unmask] Sent: Friday, October 19, 2007 10:17 AM Subject: Re: Patrick Hartwell's Article I currently teach a grammar class for prospective teachers. I always have them read the Hartwell article, which I believe I first read around 1985 or 86. I would encourage anyone interested in a synthesis of research into the effect of grammar-teaching on student writing to read these reports: http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Default.aspx?tabid=229 http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Default.aspx?tabid=232 The EPPI Centre "conducts systematic reviews of research evidence across a range of topics and works with a large number of funders" according to their website. What they are trying to do is influence public policy by studying research that has been done in a number of areas, including the teaching of English, to determine what the research actually shows. Their question is "what has been shown to work?" I'm surprisedmore people in the US aren't aware of this group. Janet Castilleja Toppenish WA -----Original Message----- From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Carol Morrison Sent: Thursday, October 18, 2007 3:17 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Patrick Hartwell's Article Thank you. I am only halfway through his article, but it seems quite important. I currently give formal grammar instruction to four freshman sections of basic writing (at the most basic level) and I am trying to figure out why so few of the other composition teachers do this. I am sure that there is value in it, but I suppose that this needs to be proved. CLM --- Bob Yates <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Carol, > > In the grammar course I teach for pre-service > English teachers, I make specific mention of them. > > If there is one grammar Hartwell leaves out, it is > one that describes the kind of grammar an second > language learner of English needs to have. > > Bob Yates, University of Central Missouri > > >>> Carol Morrison <[log in to unmask]> > 10/18/2007 12:30 PM >>> > Can someone tell me whether the (5) categories of > grammar that Hartwell outlines (Grammar 1-Grammar 5) > are commonly referred to when one speaks of teaching > grammar? The article to which I am referring is > "Grammar, Grammars, and the Teaching of Grammar." > Until reading this article, I did not realize that > grammar had been divided into those classifications. > Thank you. > > Carol Morrison > > 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/ > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com 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'sweb 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.htmland 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.htmland select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/ __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? 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