ELT 224 TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF

GRAMMAR

DIFFERENT NOTIONS

OF ‘GRAMMAR’ FOR

ASSESSMENT

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 1 of 62

 GRAMMAR
Studying grammar has been essential to

teaching a second and foreign language for

centuries. To learn another language, an L2, it

was necessary to know the grammatical

structures of that language and cite

prescriptions for its use. Grammar was also

used to analyze a language system, making it

an essential part of language learning.

(Rutherford, 1988)

Studying grammar is essential for learning a second language and analyzing a language
system.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 2 of 62

 GRAMMAR

Grammar pedagogy has been

debated since the late 20th

century.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 3 of 62

 GRAMMAR

The primary goal of language learning is

designed to foster communicative

competence, which is the ability to

communicate effectively and

spontaneously in real-life settings

Language learning is designed to foster communicative competence in real-life settings.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 4 of 62

 GRAMMAR
·there remains a surprising lack of consensus on
what constitutes grammatical knowledge,
1. what type of assessment tasks might best allow
2. teachers and testers to infer that grammatical

knowledge has been acquired and

3. how to design tasks that elicit grammatical

knowledge from students for some specific assessment

purpose while at the same time providing reliable and

valid measures of performance

Teachers and testers should design tasks to elicit grammatical knowledge while providing
reliable and valid measures of performance.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 5 of 62

 GRAMMAR

there is a lack of information on how the

assessment of grammatical ability might be

carried out and how the choices we make in

the evaluation might influence our

inferences about our students' knowledge of

grammar and their development.

Teachers and testers should design tasks to elicit grammatical knowledge while providing
reliable and valid measures of performance.

In Other words, We lack information on how grammatical assessment is conducted and

how it affects student knowledge and development.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 6 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 7 of 62

 DEDUCTIVE APPROACH

Foreign languages are best learned

deductively, where students are asked to

memorize definitions, rules, examples, and

exceptions. Language teaching involves the

transmission of grammar rules from teacher

to student, and knowing a language requires

knowledge of its grammatical system and

rules.

Foreign languages are best learned by memorizing definitions, rules, examples, and
exceptions.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 8 of 62

 INDUCTIVE APPROACH
Language learning is best achieved

inductively by presenting examples of the

target language and discovering its

underlying organizational principles. To know

an L2, students must identify and describe

the rules of the language system based on an

analysis of texts.

Students must identify and describe the rules of the language system based on texts.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 9 of 62

 WHAT IS MEANT BY
‘GRAMMAR’ IN THEORIES

OF LANGUAGE?

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 10 of 62

 WHAT IS MEANT BY ‘GRAMMAR’ IN

THEORIES OF LANGUAGE?

Linguists have two main perspectives to

describe linguistic phenomena: syntactocentric

and communication perspectives.

Syntactocentric perspectives focus on syntax

and how words are arranged in a sentence,

while communication perspectives focus on

how language conveys meaning. (VanValin

and LaPolla, 1997)

Syntactocentric and communication perspectives focus on syntax and meaning.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 11 of 62

 SYNTACTIC VIEW OF LANGUAGE

Syntactocentric theories of language

have provided L2 educators with a

wealth of information about

grammatical forms and the rules that

govern them, which is used for syllabus

design, materials preparation, instruction,

and classroom assessment.

Syntactocentric theories of language provide information for syllabus design, materials

preparation, instruction, and classroom assessment.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 12 of 62

 SYNTACTIC VIEW OF LANGUAGE

These theories have also informed L2

teachers and testers in their efforts to

identify linguistic content for tests so

that more general inferences about

language ability can be made.

Teachers and testers use theories to identify linguistic content for tests, allowing general
inferences about language ability.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 13 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 14 of 62

 DESCRIBING LANGUAGE THROUGH

AN ANALYSIS OF COMMUNICATION

The structural description of the

language is not the primary object of

concern; language is viewed as a system

of communication where a speaker or

writer uses grammatical forms to convey

several meanings.

Language is a system of communication that uses grammatical forms to convey meanings.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 15 of 62

 DESCRIBING LANGUAGE THROUGH

AN ANALYSIS OF COMMUNICATION

From the communication perspective,

grammar is one of many resources for

accomplishing something with language.

Grammarians describe both what the

linguistic forms are for and how they are

used to create meaning within and

beyond the sentence.

Grammar is used to create meaning within and beyond a sentence.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 16 of 62

 DESCRIBING LANGUAGE THROUGH

AN ANALYSIS OF COMMUNICATION

while the choice of the correct

grammatical form and the most

appropriate lexical item is essential, this

perspective focuses more on the overall

message being communicated and the

interpretations that this message might

invoke.

The most important idea is to focus on the overall message and interpretation of the
message.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 17 of 62

EXAMPLES:

(1.1) Reggio and Messina were taken to the vet’s this morning [by

someone].

(1.2) [someone] took Reggio and Messina to the vet’s this

morning

Some formal grammarians would explain this passive voice sentence by comparing it with
its active voice counterpart – [someone] took Reggio and Messina to the vet’s this
morning. They would then derive a number of rules – for changing the past to the past
passive (took→were taken), for moving the patient of the action (Reggio and Messina) to
the subject position, and for deleting the agent (by someone)

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 18 of 62

 FORM-BASED PERSPECTIVES OF

LANGUAGE

Several syntactocentric, or form-based,

theories of language have provided

grammatical insights to L2 teachers,

namely traditional grammar, structural

linguistics, and transformational-

generative grammar.

Traditional grammar, structural linguistics, and transformational-generative grammar

provide grammatical insights.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 19 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 20 of 62

 TRADITIONAL GRAMMAR

Revealed the linguistic meanings of these

forms and provided information on their

usage in a sentence (Celce-Murcia and

Larsen-Freeman, 1999)

Traditional grammar provided prescriptive rules and exceptions.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 21 of 62

 TRADITIONAL GRAMMAR

A typical rule in traditional English grammar

might be:
The first-person singular of the present

tense verb 'to be' is 'I am', except in

negative tags and yes/no questions,

where 'are' is used instead.

For example, ‘I’m in a real bind, aren’t I?’

or ‘Aren’t I trying my best?’

The first-person singular of the present tense verb 'to be' is 'I am', except in negative tags
and yes/no questions.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 22 of 62

 STRUCTURAL LINGUISTICS

Structural grammar, associated with linguists

such as Bloomfield (1933) and Fries (1940),

offered a rigorous method for describing a

language's structure in terms of its

morphology and syntax. In these grammars,

each word in a given sentence is categorized

according to how it is used, and the ‘patterns’

or ‘structures’ constitute a unique system for

that language.

Structural grammar categorizes words according to how they are used, creating a unique
system for each language.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 23 of 62

 STRUCTURAL LINGUISTICS

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 24 of 62

 STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

, Unlike traditional grammar, structural

grammar is not based on prescriptive rules.

Instead, they seek to describe the language as

it appears with a strict focus on grammatical

form.
it downplayed the semantic aspects of

grammar and provided little information on

how linguistic forms are used in context.

Syllabus design, grammar teaching, and

assessment

Structural grammar emphasizes grammatical form over semantic aspects, simplifying

syllabus design, teaching, and assessment.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 25 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 26 of 62

 STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

Both semantics and pragmatics, together with

phonology, morphology, and syntax, are critical

for assessing the communicative success of an

utterance within a given context.

Although the semantic information and/or

contextual inference related to ‘it’ is essential for

understanding these two utterances, UG fails to

account for the referential information in this

analysis

Semantics and pragmatics are essential for assessing communicative success, but UG fails
to account for referential information.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 27 of 62

 STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

As a model for communicative teaching

and testing, the syntactocentric

perspective has much to contribute;

however, used alone, it may not be

appropriate for all situations, and must,

therefore, be adopted judiciously.

Syntactocentric perspective should be used judiciously for communicative teaching and

testing.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 28 of 62

 THEORETICAL LIMITATIONS OF APPLYING

SYNTACTIC APPROACH TO L2 EDUCATIONAL

CONTEXT:

LATER, NOTICING THAT JOE HAS NOT STOPPED SPEAKING ENGLISH, SUE REPEATS:

IDENTICAL IN SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE BUT CONVEY DIFFERENT PRAGMATIC

INFORMATION.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 29 of 62

 SUBSTANTIATION:

In order for Joe to respond accurately,

meaningfully and appropriately in each exchange,

Joe had to understand the grammatical form

(yes/no question) of the utterance; he had to

understand the literal meaning of the words in

syntax and their intended meaning in context

(Speak French!), and he had to understand any

additional pragmatic meanings being

communicated without actually being said

(criticism, annoyance).

Joe must understand the grammatical form, literal meaning, and pragmatic meanings of
words to respond accurately and appropriately.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 30 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 31 of 62

 SUBSTANTIATION:

An analysis of the syntax alone

would not have been able to

account for the differences in the

two sentences with regard to

meaning.

An analysis of syntax alone cannot explain the differences in meaning between two
sentences.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 32 of 62

 TO ACCOUNT MEANING ON A

LEXICOGRAMMATICAL LEVEL:

Modal auxiliary ‘can’ have the same basic syntax but the
semantic representation changes.
• Grammatical form alone may not be enough in L2
educational contexts to determine if L2 learners have
sufficiently acquired a structure to communicate effectively.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 33 of 62

 NOTE:

Many of the traditional, multiple-

choice tests of grammar are

heavily influenced by a

syntactocentric approach to
language.

Syntactocentric approach to language influences grammar tests.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 34 of 62

 NOTE:
While the syntactocentric theories of

language continue to inform our

understanding of language structures and

the principles underlying them, these

theories have fallen short on issues of

meaningfulness, appropriateness,

acceptability and naturalness – for that

we might turn to corpus linguistics and to

functional grammar.

Syntactocentric theories of language lack meaningfulness, appropriateness, acceptability

and naturalness, leading to the need for corpus linguistics and functional grammar.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 35 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 36 of 62

 ELT 224 TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF

GRAMMAR

FORM-AND USE-

BASED

PERSPECTIVES OF

LANGUAGE

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 37 of 62

 FORM-AND USE-BASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE:

Examine how speakers and writers

actually exploit linguistic forms

during language use.

Speakers and writers exploit linguistic forms during language use.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 38 of 62

 FORM-AND USE-BASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE:

This would address question such as:

Why does a language need two or more

structures that are similar in meaning?

Are similar forms used to convey different

specialized meanings?
To what degree are similar forms a function

of written versus spoken language, or to what

degree are these forms characteristic of a

particular social group or a specific situation?

Language needs two or more structures to convey specialized meanings, and to what
degree are similar forms a function of written versus spoken language or of a particular
social group or situation.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 39 of 62

 FORM-AND USE-BASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE:

Katz and Fodor (1963) – connections

between lexical forms and grammatical

forms by examining the features of

words that encode grammar.

Katz and Fodor (1963) explored the connections between lexical and grammatical forms.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 40 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 41 of 62

 FORM-AND USE-BASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE:
In addition to encoding semantic features and

restrictions, a word also contains a number of

syntactic features including the part of speech (noun,

verb, adjective), countability (singular, plural), gender

(masculine, feminine), and it can mark prepositional

co-occurrence restrictions such as when the word think

is followed by a preposition (about, of, over) or is

followed by that-clause. It is called as ‘the

grammatical dimension of lexis’ or referred to as

lexical forms, as opposed to lexical meaning (Purpura,

2004)

Word contains syntactic features such as part of speech, countability, gender, and
prepositional co-occurrence restrictions.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 42 of 62

 ELT 224 TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF

GRAMMAR

COMMUNICATIONBA

SED PERSPECTIVES

OF LANGUAGE

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 43 of 62

 COMMUNICATIONBASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE

A communication-based perspective views

grammar as a set of linguistic norms,

preferences, and expectations that an

individual invokes to convey a host of

pragmatic meanings appropriate,

acceptable, and natural depending on the

situation.

Grammar is a set of linguistic norms, preferences, and expectations used to convey

pragmatic meanings depending on the situation.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 44 of 62

 COMMUNICATIONBASED

PERSPECTIVES OF LANGUAGE

The assumption here is that linguistic form

has no absolute, fixed meaning in

language use but is mutable and open to

interpretation by those who use it in a

given circumstance. Hence, grammar

stands not only for form, but also for

meaningfulness, pragmatic appropriacy,

acceptability or naturalness.

Grammar stands for meaningfulness, pragmatic appropriacy, acceptability, and

naturalness.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 45 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 46 of 62

 SPEECH ACT THEORY (AUSTIN,1962)

-utterances are said to ‘do’ things in a

language context and has language

function.
Illocutionary Acts
Speech act theory did not address how

interlocutors jointly construct meaning as

they seek to communicate with each other;

instead, it focuses on the effect of

utterance on an interlocutor

-utterances act in a language context and have a language function.

-Speech act theory focuses on the effect of utterance on an interlocutor.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 47 of 62

 LINGUISTIC AND COMMUNICATIVE

COMPETENCE

Moving beyond the speech act,

Hymes(1972) proposed a much more

complete theory of communication, where

communication was not simply perceived

as a function of linguistic accuracy or

acceptable grammar to convey the literal

and intended meaning. Rather, utterances

must be appropriate for the context.

Hymes proposed a more complete theory of communication, where utterances must be

appropriate for the context.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 48 of 62

 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LINGUISTIC COMPETENCE

AND COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE

Samira did not know how to address a teacher appropriately; nor did she know how to
make a polite request. Her English was grammatically accurate and propositionally
meaningful, but lacking in sociocultural and sociolinguistic appropriacy
-Samira lacked sociocultural and sociolinguistic appropriacy.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 49 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 50 of 62

 HYMES (1967) APPROPRIACY OF CONTEXT TO

SITUATIONAL FACTOR INVOLVING THE

FOLLOWING:
participants and their roles, the setting

(i.e., time and space)

the actual form of the message (i.e.,

the grammatical form of the message)

the topic (i.e., what the message is

about),
the purpose (i.e., its goal or intention),

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 51 of 62

 HYMES (1967) APPROPRIACY OF CONTEXT TO

SITUATIONAL FACTOR INVOLVING THE

FOLLOWING:
the key (i.e., serious, sarcastic),
the channel (i.e., oral),
the norms of interaction (i.e., loudness,

interruptions),
the norms of interpretation (i.e., how

violations of the norms of interaction are

viewed) and
the genre (i.e., informal letter, speech, lab

report)

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 52 of 62

 HALLIDAY’S (1994) COMMUNICATION PERPECTIVE

although language can be used to express

meaning for a number of social purposes, the

language system itself can be reduced to a small

set of language functions that allow us to ‘do’

things with language

Among these are experiential functions used to

express experience, interpersonal functions used

to establish and maintain social ties, and textual

functions used to structure information in oral

and written texts

Language is used to express meaning, express experience, establish and maintain social
ties, and structure information.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 53 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 54 of 62

 POINTS: ASSESSMENT OF GRAMMATICAL ABILITY

grammatical ability was typically assessed

from a purely syntactocentric perspective,

emphasizing grammatical form- mcq or

blankcompletion tasks of grammatical

structure, ignoring the meanings.

Language teachers and testers should

approach the assessment of grammatical

ability from a communication-based

perspective

Grammatical ability should be assessed from a communication-based perspective.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 55 of 62

 WHAT IS PEDAGOGICAL GRAMMAR?

Teachers rarely teach

phrase structure rules,

parameter-setting

conditions, or abstract

notions of time and space.

Teachers rarely teach phrase structure rules, parameter-setting conditions, or abstract

notions of time and space.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 56 of 62

 WHAT IS PEDAGOGICAL GRAMMAR?

Teachers use target-language

forms to help teachers understand

language resources, provide

information, and provide accessible

ways to describe complex linguistic

phenomena for pedagogical

purposes.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 57 of 62

 NEXT REPORTER

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 58 of 62

 WHAT IS PEDAGOGICAL GRAMMAR?

The more L2 teachers understand how

the grammatical system works, the

better they will be able to tailor this

information to their specific

instructional contexts.

L2 teachers should understand the grammatical system to tailor instruction to their

specific contexts.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 59 of 62

 IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHING AND

ASSESSING GRAMMAR:

teaching and learning on

grammatical

performance present a
number of challenges for

language assessment

Given the many purposes of assessment, we might wish to test explicit knowledge of
grammar, implicit knowledge of grammar or both- from explicit grammatical forms to
automatic language use.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 60 of 62

 IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHING AND

ASSESSING GRAMMAR:

Ellis (2001b) suggests that we also

need to utilize time pressure as a

means of ensuring that implicit

knowledge is being tested

Ellis (2001b) suggests using time pressure to test implicit knowledge.

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 61 of 62

 THANK YOU
FOR Do you have any questions?
LISTENING!

Minimalist White and Gray Parts of Speech Page 62 of 62