© crown copyright 2003 developments in approaches to grammar in the key stage 3 national strategy...

© Crown Copyright 2003

Developments in approaches to grammar in the Key Stage 3 National Strategy

© Crown copyright 2004

Key Stage 3 National Strategy English © Crown copyright 2004

or…

Touching the Void


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Pre-Strategy

• The Grammar Papers : not whether but how (QCA 1998)

• Improving Writing at Key Stages 3 and 4 (QCA 1998)

• Grammar for Writing (NLS 1999)


2001

‘Tools, not rules’ – optional module in training materials for English departments

- 3 x 75 minute training modules:

• 10.1 Modification

• 10.2 Coordination and subordination

Cohesion: pronouns

• 10.3 Cohesion: tense

Cohesion: connectives

Teaching grammar


Sentence level: grammar for writing

Aims

• To review and consolidate knowledge about grammar

• To connect grammar to speaking, reading and writing

• To establish some consistency in the use of terms

• To develop knowledge of word choice and modification and apply it to pupils’ writing


Sentence level: grammar for writing

A teaching sequence

• Explore the objective

• Define the convention

• Demonstrate how it is written

• Share the composition

• Scaffold the first attempts


2001

Literacy Progress units includes unit on Sentences (revised 2003)

- 17 x 20 minute scripted catch-up sessions to build a repertoire of sentence structures and use them effectively

- Pupils at level 3:• make limited use of complex sentences;

• struggle with commas to mark boundaries within sentences;

• use pronouns and verb tenses inaccurately;

• are uncertain over speech punctuation.


2001/2

Year 7 Sentence Level Bank

‘It is important to realise that grammatical choices stem from the context in which they are used. Writers shape their expression to suit the audience and purpose of the text. While grammar is rule-governed, and texts themselves determined largely by convention, we make innumerable small decisions about the sequence, register, form, degree of formality, vocabulary and expression to suit the context. There is no suggestion in this booklet that grammatical conventions can float free of their context. The conventions have been brought into sharp relief so that they can be studied, described, and then used.’


Anti-creative?

• Freedom from constraint?

or

• Freedom through the discipline of structure, technique and form?

Defining thought and crystallising expression

‘Conscious manipulation of syntax deepens engagement and releases invention’

(Ted Hughes)


2002/3

• Approaches to grammar incorporated into core training

- Guided writing (year 7)

- Shared reading (year 9)

‘The meaning of a text is not separate from its grammar, but is defined, and, precisely, created by it.’


2002/3

Key Objectives Banks (Years 7,8,9)

• Framework Objectives for Sentence level grammar:

- About this objective

- What to Teach

- Teaching approaches

- Assessment


2003

Grammar for Reading

• Modular, optional training materials:

- to expand teachers’ explicit knowledge and understanding of grammar;

- to explore ways in which this knowledge and understanding can be used to inform shared reading and writing in the classroom;

- pre-course reading; 2 hour taught module; materials to trial in the classroom.

She should have died hereafter:

There would have been a time for such a word.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day

To the last syllable of recorded time;

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life’s but a walking shadow; a poor player,

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is heard no more: it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing. Act 5, scene 5, lines 9–

28


MFL Pilot

‘In the MFL Framework, grammar is not a separate

heading…not presented as a separate issue but

rather as a system or set of underlying operational

principles that support learning about words,

sentences, texts and communication.’


MFL Pilot

7S2:

How to work out the gist of a sentence by picking out the main words and seeing how the sentence is constructed compared to English

He gives Maria a present

Il donne un cadeau à Marie

Er gibt Maria ein Geschenk


2003/4

Improving Writing

• Core training for every English department

- Designing writing

- Text structure and organisation

- Sentences within paragraphs

- Key messages leaflets


Improving Writing

Video: Year 8 in Southampton

• What makes an effective paragraph

• The use of complex sentences to convey their argument

• Organising sentences into an effective sequence

• Links between and across sentences within and between paragraphs

• Using connectives to strengthen an argument in writing


Impact: English

‘Pupils demonstrate more effective skills of inference and interpretation in reading literary and non-literary texts. They have a better grasp of terminology to describe and analyse language. Many pupils now write more confidently in a wider range of genres, with greater awareness of audience and purpose. The Strategy is contributing to improvement in the accuracy of pupils’ writing. This improvement is greatest among higher-attaining pupils and, in some schools, significant problems with the presentation, accuracy and detail of the writing of lower-attaining pupils remain and form a major barrier to achievement generally.’

(HMI 2004)


Impact: LAC

‘In almost all schools teachers are aware of the importance of promoting understanding and accuracy in the use of key subject terms. In many lessons, displays form part of the teacher’s focus on learning objectives and link key words with subject knowledge and relevant work produced by pupils. A focus on the significance of individual words is commonly observed in lessons other than English. Teachers regularly offer models of language use to pupils and use varied forms of support, most commonly writing ‘frames’, to provide a structure on which pupils can build their work.’

(HMI 2004)


Impact: MFL

‘The impact on pupils’ attitudes and learning has been positive. Generally, pupils enjoy applying their knowledge of form and structure to be more creative and write at greater length and with more spontaneity. Some pupils are also writing with greater accuracy. In several schools the motivation of boys has been increased because they enjoy the clear structure to lessons, lively delivery and finding out how language works.’

(HMI 2004)


Impact: MFL

‘The increased emphasis in the framework on teaching grammar, while at the same time giving due attention to the development of pupils’ listening and speaking skills, clearly creates pressure on the use of time. Some departments have reviewed the content of their lessons with a view to finding ways of saving time, for example by eschewing lengthy and ineffective listening comprehension exercises.’

(HMI 2004)


The challenge – how are we doing?

‘The big challenge for teachers is to make the teaching of grammar at the word and sentence level relevant, and part of a larger purpose. If, for example, the teaching of prepositions and the analysis of post-modifying relative clauses is linked to the texts children read, and to authentic writing tasks in which children have something meaningful to communicate, then the study of grammar can achieve its goal of being a powerful medium for teaching writing.’

Colin Harrison: ‘Key Stage 3 English:Roots and Research’ (DfES 2002)

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