Dear Martha,
      It appears that you do not understand the problem. The sentence
you give as an example would not cause any problem for my students. I'd
also point out that "It" is not even in the sentence, so it is not the
subject of "can be solved." My example involved a pronoun subject, a
pronoun that stands for a previous noun that functions as a complement:

They saw the man who robbed the bank.

Typical textbooks teach students to identify the subject by asking "Who
or what robbed the bank?" The textbooks do not teach the students how to
identify complements (or prepositional phrases). Thus the textbooks
cannot add to the instructions that the complement of one verb, or the
object of a preposition, cannot be the subject of another verb. The
students, following what they were taught, look at that sentence and
then say that "man" is the subject of "robbed the bank." It is true that
"man" is the semantic subject, but it is not the subject that teachers
will expect students to "underline twice." My point was that current
instruction is inadequate, and that the KISS Approach can solve those
problems because it teaches students how to identify prepositional
phrases and complements.

Ed



>>> [log in to unmask] 04/11/05 8:54 PM >>>
Dear Ed,

As I've said to  you many times through the years, there are ways in
which new grammar--call it linguistics--can enhance your traditional
KISS approach: Your attitude toward your students' understanding is
much too negative.  They have knowledge to be tapped!  For example,
one simple addition to your lesson on "finding subjects and verbs" is
to have students apply their inner expertise:  Have them substitute a
pronoun for the subject, a simple step that will show them the
parameters of the subject.  No matter how long or involved the
subject may be, the pronoun they substitute will clearly show them
the line between subject and predicate.  From there, it's easy to
find the main verb.  Here's an example:

        The problem of finding the line between the subject and verb,
which Ed has pointed out as a special problem for his students, can
easily be solved.

        In other words, "IT  can easily be solved."

That's linguistics in action.

Martha




>Herb,
>     About linguistics, I think we are in agreement. But ATEG was
>founded with the express purpose of improving the teaching of grammar
in
>K-12. That is why I named the newsletter "Syntax in the Schools"
rather
>than "Syntax in the Universities." I'm continually frustated with the
>KISS Approach at the college level, and I completely understand why
you
>would not want to use it at that level. Most of the incoming students
>cannot identify subjects and verbs, and it takes a lot of practice
for
>them to get to the point where they can. (And many of the students
don't
>want to do that practice, especially because they have been
frustrated
>by the grammar that they have been "taught" in K-12.)
>     My problem with the linguists is that, in the decade and a half
>that ATEG has existed, they do not want to address the question of
what
>should be taught in K-12, when, how, and why. This group, and I think
it
>is primarily because of the linguists, cannot even agree that high
>school graduates should be able to identify almost all of the
subjects
>and verbs in their own sentences.
>      I'll stop complaining about the linguists when I see some of
them
>attempting to address the K-12 curriculum and sequence questions.
>Ed
>
>>>>  [log in to unmask] 04/08/05 4:19 PM >>>
>Ed,
>
>You have a limited view of linguistic training and of linguists.
>Certainly theory is an important part of that training, as it is in
>literature and in English Education.  But linguists are trained first
>and foremost to analyze and describe languages, and applied linguists
>are trained to apply the theories, methods, and findings of
>linguistics
>to language as it relates to other areas of human behavior.  Even at
>the
>theory-rich schools like MIT, Berkeley, Stanford, Ohio State, Texas,
>etc., heavy emphasis is laid on accurate description of linguistic
>phenomena as a basis for any theoretical work.  The heyday of
>off-the-top-of-the-head theorizing is long past, if, in fact, it ever
>existed.  It's otherwise known as bad linguistics.  We can disagree
as
>to how much and which theory to bring into the classroom at which
>level,
>but you can't teach any respectable amount of grammar without some
>fairly well thought out theory that the students must also confront
at
>some point.  I think KISS reflects this.  As a linguist and college
>grammar teacher, there are things I don't like about KISS, and I
don't
>use it, but I can see its usefulness in elementary and secondary
>school.
>But get off this thing about linguists and theory.  It ain't so.
>
>Herb
>
>Subject: Re: Washington
>
>Herb,
>     I'll agree with that. But within the medical profession, not
>everyone studies the theory of pathology. In fact, most health
>professionals probably do not. There is a difference between learning
>what one needs to know and learning more than what one needs to know.
>I
>have no problem with the latter, if the former is met. Teachers need
>to
>know how to analyze the structure of sentences. Otherwise, they mark
>correct sentences as incorrect, and they push their prejudices (Don't
>begin a sentence with "But.") onto their students. Linguists are
>trained
>primarily as theoreticians, and from what I have seen, they want to
>bring their theory into instruction at the very basic of levels. In
>essence, this is harmful because it takes time away from what future
>teachers really need to be learning.
>Ed
>
>>>>  [log in to unmask] 04/08/05 2:40 PM >>>
>I doubt if I'll sway Ed on this, but when we talk about the teaching
>of
>grammar before linguistics came along we have to recognize that
>foreign
>language instruction was a larger part of education as was etymology.
>Phonological and morphological concepts were learned as parts of
those
>disciplines.  Grammar was thought of as covering much more than
>sentence
>structure and correctness.  Of course, there was also a time, not all
>that long ago, when medicine was taught without microscopes or a germ
>theory of disease.
>
>Herb
>
>
>Subject: Re: Washington
>
>         I would agree with Bill's idea of two courses, but when push
>comes to shove, the phonology, morphology, etc. should go. Grammar
was
>actually taught very well before linguistics came along. Winston
>Churchill, whose writing style was widely praised, noted how
important
>it was for him to learn how to diagram sentences. In fact, he noted
>that
>he learned that because he was considered slow, and thus not
competent
>to study Latin and Greek as did some of his schoolmates. He did not
>study morphemes or phonemes.
>      I think I also agree with Bill, however, on the importance of
>early study of Latin. One can teach prefixes, suffixes, word roots,
>etc.
>without any theoretical understanding of morphology.
>Ed
>
>
>
>>>>  [log in to unmask] 04/08/05 12:08 PM >>>
>When I began teaching a course called Grammar for Teachers, I could
>immediately see its limitations when grammar was narrowly defined. So
>I added a brief section on phonemics/phonics so that the prospective
>teachers could teach phonics well and not have to learn everything on
>the job. (I discovered that no one had ever taught the elem ed
>students the principles of phonics even though they would be expected
>to teach phonics.)
>
>I also added a brief section on morphemics, though we could only do
>enough to demonstrate the practical uses of morphemics. There was no
>time to go into any depth. (I was shocked to discover that none of
>the students had taken Latin in high school and that they had never
>been taught anything about word analysis, or so they said.)
>
>I eventually proposed dividing Grammar for Teachers into two 3-credit
>courses, with one on syntax and another on morphemics/semantics and
>phonemics/phonics/spelling. The department approved it, but we didn't
>have enough staff to teach two courses. And the dean wouldn't approve
>additional courses.
>
>Bill
>
>
>>Sorry, Ed, you can't teach someone how language works without
>>discussing things like features and phonemes and phonological
>>processes. These are important in early language development and
>>they influence things like whether children master literacy or not;
>>they allow teachers to understand why children perform as they do in
>>school. They also give future teachers a clear understanding of how
>>English spelling works and why it is the way it is; they also learn
>>to what degree phonics instruciton is scientifically accurate. You
>>also have to teach about language acquisition, because popular myth
>>is so wrong about that. You can teach this stuff by giving students
>>examples of child language, but if they don't know
>>linguistic/grammatical terminology, they can't talk about what the
>>kids are doing, and the specifically linguistic concepts are
>>necessary to understand what is going on.
>>And again, the teaching credential standards refer to the exact
>>linguistic terminology.
>>
>>What I said they couldn't do was parse fluently after ten weeks of
>>instruction. Most of them learn to parse well enough to perform on a
>>test. Whether they retain that knowledge and expand on it or not is
>>up to them. Few of them come in with enough grammatical analysis
>>skills to independently describe the various sentence and phrase
>  >structures they would find in schoolchildren's writing, as a
course
>>term project. They would need a course that focuses fully on grammar
>>for that, and they haven't had one when they come into my classroom.
>>And they don't get in my classroom, as I pointed out in previous
>>posts.
>>
>>A linguistics course for teachers is intended, in part, to change
>>the student's mindset about language in significant ways so that
>>they have an accurate understanding of language instead of the
>>virtual nonsense that most people believe about language. It's more
>>global than helping them improve their writing. There's nothing
>>wrong with helping students improve their writing, but that is not
>  >the goal of the courses I teach.
>>
>>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>Johanna Rubba   Associate Professor, Linguistics
>>English Department, California Polytechnic State University
>>One Grand Avenue  * San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
>>Tel. (805)-756-2184  *  Fax: (805)-756-6374 * Dept. Phone.  756-2596
>>* E-mail: [log in to unmask] *      Home page:
>>http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
>>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>
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