Peter,
I would echo the tone of your response, but we can also do a fairly
objective assessment of the results.
You're right. Hillocks decided that for the test to be an accurate
measure of grammar (and its effect on writing), he had to limit the
study to comparing students who had grammar with no writing to students
who did actual writing (and in some cases with grammar slipped in.) He
also wanted to make sure that the writing was evaluated on a number of
criteria and that "error" (what he understood as grammar) wasn't being
too highly rated. (He admits that many English teachers give it too
much importance. He wanted raters to be trained not to overvalue
correctness. Otherwise, he would toss the study out.) You are, in
effect, trying to determine if the teaching of grammar helps students
write better holistically assessed essays than students who are
practising those essays. This may be an interesting experiment, but it
doesn't give us the definitive conclusions that NCTE seems to have
found there. Students won't learn to write unless they write. That's
what it proves. No brainer.
I like your other point, that we may be looking for short term results
to a long term process. I'm an adult with a knowledge about language
that I find enormously valuable, but I'm not sure how the value of that
might have been assessed during the long course of its acquisition.
What are the values of math and physics in engineering? I suspect that
both are enormously important, but it might not show up in a short term
study, especially comparing students who are studying math or physics
to those who are studying engineering. Will the engineering students
show better results? I suspect so. Does that mean math study was a
hindrance? Only if you look at the short term. If engineers find a
benefit to knowledge of math, maybe that should be enough to include it
in engineering programs.
All this is made further complicated by Hillocks' view of grammar,
which is, if you read the quotes I sent on previously, very reductive.
At best, Hillocks believes, it has a role in the final stages of
composition, with no link to higher order concerns or the generation of
ideas. He seems to be reducing grammar to "usage" and usage to the
superficial; it's interesting that he doesn't argue for relieving us of
that trivial pressure, but just seems to say that it can't be taught or
doesn't follow from "parts of speech" or can only be attended to within
the context of writing. If we substitute "error" for grammar, I'm not
sure I would disagree with him. But he distorts the issue.
A different, more defensible view of grammar is that it's an essential
component of meaning. Words don't simply add up their individual
meanings, but establish meaningful relations with each other, and these
relations extend well past the boundaries of the sentence in the
creation of coherent text. To say that grammar has no role in meaning
is about as sensible as saying that words have no role or only have a
role at the final moment, when all important decisions have already
been made. Writers seem to say differently; thinking happens through
writing; it's not simply poured into the words as a done deal. The
thought forms as the writing forms. The shaping of the discourse is the
shaping of the thought. Hillocks doesn't recognize that as grammar.
We can also look at the kinds of syntactic structures that show up in
highly mature (technical) texts. There seems to be a growing
understanding that these texts make, not just cognitive demands, but
language demands that many students are simply not prepared for.
We can study how language works in effective text and begin to apply
those insights into our teaching. But it's hard to make progress on
that front when attention to the nature of language is deemed
"harmful".
In short, the studies that are supposed to have proven that grammar is
harmful are not at all conclusive or definitive and shouldn't have the
kind of hold they have on the leaders in our field.
In order to have a more productive discussion about grammar, we need to
deepen everyone's understanding, a rather daunting task when the field
is presently so woefully undertrained.
Craig
Kolln, Martha. "Closing the Books on Alchemy." CCC 32: 139-51.
>
> Martha not only read Hillocks, but she went back and read all the studies
> on
> which Hillocks based his conclusions. Her discussion demonstrates
> serious
> flaws in research procedures in almost all the studies. She also points
> out
> that what is considered "the formal teaching of grammar" is quite bizarre
> in
> some cases and what is considered "teaching writing" is not far from such
> approved techniques as sentence combining.
>
> I would add that, even if the research of Hillocks and Braddock et al were
> correct, even if the teaching of "formal grammar" could be shown to "do no
> good," that does not necessarily mean we should abandon teaching formal
> grammar.
> Another logical response would be to find ways to "teach formal grammar"
> more
> effectively, which, I take it, is what many of us are trying to do.
>
> One other point. Many of the studies divide the subjects into two
> groups:
> one is "taught grammar" while the other is focuses on writing. After a
> period
> of time, the writing of the two groups is evaluated. The result, over and
> over, is that the writing of the group that was "taught grammar" shows no
> measurable advantage over the other group. Of course, that result could
> just as
> easily be interpreted as showing that "teaching writing" does no good
> because
> that group improved no more than the group that was "taught grammar." It
> is
> certainly erroneous to claim that "teaching formal grammar" may do harm
> because
> it takes time away from other, more useful, activities. The groups that
> were
> taught writing without grammar did not improve any more than the groups
> that
> were taught grammar.
>
> One last observation. It may turn out that the real criticism should not
> be
> aimed at any of these teaching approaches. The problem may be with our
> instruments for measuring progress. We are all familiar with the many
> studies
> that show that some intervention "does not produce any measurable
> improvement."
> Class size, the use of computers, teaching grammar. None of them show
> measurable improvement. Perhaps we don't yet have a technique for
> measuring
> improvement accurately.
>
>
> In a message dated 10/30/06 2:46:57 PM, [log in to unmask] writes:
>
>
>> Peter &/or Martha -
>>
>> What are Martha's rebuttals that you mention?
>>
>
>> Geoff
>>
>> >And NCTE continues to cite only the well-worn studies condemning
>> grammar
>> >instruction without even mentioning Martha Kolln's thorough and
>> compelling
>> >rebuttal to those studies . . .
>>
>>
>
>
>
>
>
> Peter Adams
>
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>
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