Focus on Language

VOCABU PRONUNCIA
LARY TION
GRAMM
Treasures of Grammar
 Grammar and Grammaticality

Grammar is a set of rules that explain

how words are used in a language.
Grammaticality is the conformity of a
sentence or part of sentence to the
grammatical rules.
 1. Performance Grammar- an analysis of
structure of a Language, either as in a
speech or in writing.
2. Competence Grammar- an analysis of
Kinds structure as predictive of a speaker’s
knowledge.

of 3. Descriptive Grammar- it provides the

precise account of actual usage.
4. Prescriptive Grammar- it tries to
Grammar establish rules for the correct usage of
language in society.
5. Universal Grammar- an analysis of
structural properties which define human
language.
 
 Grammar: A problematic concept
NS= Native Speakers
NNS: Non-native Speakers

Not Acceptable
Not Acceptable
Acceptable

Acceptable
NS NS NNS NNS
________________________________________________________________
______
1. The gang were plotting a take-over. 34 6 30 9
2. Everybody is ready now, aren’t they? 32 8 23 16
3. My hair needs washed. 8 32 8 31
4. What the cat did was ate the rat. 10 30 15 24__
 In linguistics, discourse refers to a unit
of language longer than a single sentence.
More broadly, discourse is the use of spoken
or written language in a social context.
Grammar The adoption of discourse perspective is
and central to our understanding of language
acquisition and use , and, without such a

Discourse perspective, our understanding of other

dimensions of language, such as
grammaticality , will be piecemeal and
incomplete, as well as any attempt at
understanding and interpreting utterances in
isolation form the contexts in which they
occur.
Grammar
and
Discourse Harris (1952) claims that grammar
provides the building blocks for
creating discourse. McCarthy also
stressed that grammar is seen to have
a direct role in welding clauses, turns
sentences into discourse.
 Celce- Murcia and Olshtain argue
that the following represents a fairly
comprehensive list of those
Grammar grammatical features
completely context-free.
that are

and • Subject-verb agreement

Discourse •
•
Determiner- noun agreement
Use of gerunds after prepositions
• Reflexive pronominalization
within the clause
• Some/any suppletion in the
environment of negation
 Three Dimensions of Grammar

1. Form 2. Meaning 3. Use

Thus, Grammar is the study of how

syntax (form), semantics (meaning), and
pragmatics (use) work together to enable
individuals to communicate through
language.
Vocabulary’s
Treasures!
What is Vocabulary?

It is a sum or stock of words employed by a

language in a field of knowledge.
Vocabulary
and
Grammar

________
_________
__________
As part of the language system, vocabulary
___________
is intimately related with grammar. In fact, it
is possible to divide the lexical system of
most languages into grammatical words such
as prepositions, articles, adverbs, and so on,
and content words.
Vocabulary
and
Grammar

________ The grammaticality of vocabulary also

_________ manifests itself in word morphology, that is,
__________ the grammatical particles that we attach to
___________ the beginning and ends of words in order to
form new words.

Prefix Examples
il, un illegal, unhelpful
post postgraduate
 THE STATUS OF VOCABULARY
WITHIN THE CURRICULUM

Proponents of Audiolingualism argued

that foreign language learning would be most
effective if learners concentrated their efforts
on mastering the basic sentence patterns of
the language.
Audio-lingualism is a method of foreign
language teaching where the emphasis is on
learning grammatical and phonological
structure, especially for speaking and
 THE STATUS OF VOCABULARY WITHIN
THE CURRICULUM

In recent years, proponents of

Comprehension-based approaches to language
acquisition argue that the early development of an
extensive vocabulary can enable learners to
“outperform their competence”. In other words, it
is possible to obtain meaning form spoken and
written texts, even though one does not know the
grammatical structure in which texts are encoded.
 THE STATUS OF VOCABULARY WITHIN
THE CURRICULUM

In a survey of student attitudes towards

vocabulary, Morgan and Rinvolucri found that:
Two thirds of (those surveyed) said that they were
not taught enough words in class, words they
needed when talking to people, watching TV, and
reading. They felt their teachers were very keen on
teaching them grammar and on improving their
pronunciation, but that learning vocabulary came
a poor third.
Pronunciation’s riches!
 The Critical Period- a biologically determined
period of life when language can be acquired
more easily and beyond which time language is
increasingly difficult to acquire.
Age
and the
A number of researchers have suggested that
Critical the inability of learners to acquire a flawless
Period pronunciation supports the notion of a
“Critical Period” for language
________ acquisition.
_______
____
SEGMENTAL AND SUPRASEGMENTAL
PHONOLOGY

Segmental Phonology has to do with the

individual sound of the language while the
Suprasemental has to do with the stress,
rhythm and intonation patterns in the
language.

A sample for teaching minimal pair sound.

classes
Her { glasses * } are too big.
 PRONUNCIATION AND LISTENING

Pronunciation and Listening are

complementary relationship. The following
tasks shows learners how different stress
and intonation patterns signal differences of
function.

Example:
1. What did you do in the summer?

(requesting information)

2. What did you do in the summer?

(checking for understanding)

In a key survey article
published in 1986,
Pennington and
Richards argue in
favor of a
suprasegmental
approach on the
grounds that “
teaching isolated
forms of sounds and
words fails to address
the fact that, in
communication, many
aspects of
pronunciation are
determined by the
positioning of
elements within long