Chat with us, powered by LiveChat teaching philosophy about writing while answering reflect on three questions What do you value in the teaching of writing? How do you reflect those values as you teach? How does res | Wridemy

teaching philosophy about writing while answering reflect on three questions What do you value in the teaching of writing? How do you reflect those values as you teach? How does res

teaching philosophy about writing while answering reflect on three questions

What do you value in the teaching of writing? How do you reflect those values as you teach? How does research on social equity support both your values and your teaching methods (often referred to as “pedagogy”)?

Grammar for writing? An investigation of the effects of contextualised grammar teaching on students’ writing

Susan Jones • Debra Myhill • Trevor Bailey

Published online: 14 September 2012

� Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012

Abstract The role of grammar instruction in the teaching of writing is contested in

most Anglophone countries, with several robust meta-analyses finding no evidence

of any beneficial effect. However, existing research is limited in that it only con-

siders isolated grammar instruction and offers no theorisation of an instructional

relationship between grammar and writing. This study, drawing on a theorised

understanding of grammar as a meaning-making resource for writing development,

set out to investigate the impact of contextualised grammar instruction on students’

writing performance. The study adopted a mixed-methods approach, with a ran-

domised controlled trial and a complementary qualitative study. The statistical

analyses indicate a positive effect on writing performance for the intervention group

(e = 0.21; p 0.001); but the study also indicates that the intervention impact

differentially on different sub-groups, benefiting able writers more than weaker

writers. The study is significant in being the first to supply rigorous, theorised

evidence for the potential benefits of teaching grammar to support development in

writing.

Keywords Grammar � Linguistics � Writing � Subject knowledge

Introduction

The instructional benefit of teaching of grammar in first language English curricula

is contested in both research and professional literature in Anglophone countries

(Gordon, 2005; Wyse, 2004) and in the Netherlands (van Gelderen & Oostdam,

S. Jones � D. Myhill (&) � T. Bailey

Graduate School of Education, University of Exeter, Heavitree Road, Exeter EX1 2LU, UK

e-mail: [email protected]

D. Myhill

University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia

123

Read Writ (2013) 26:1241–1263

DOI 10.1007/s11145-012-9416-1

2005; van Gelderen, 2006). Indeed, in the 1960s and 1970s, following the

Dartmouth Conference (Dixon, 1975), most Anglophone countries (for example,

England, Australia, New Zealand and the USA) abandoned grammar instruction on

the grounds that it was ineffectual in supporting language development, particularly

writing development (Locke, 2009). More recently, driven principally by policy

imperatives, grammar has been re-introduced into the English curriculum in

England, and a parallel process is currently occurring in Australia. However, there is

no clarity or agreement about the role of grammar in the English curriculum and it

remains a strongly contested issue (Myhill, 2011; Myhill & Jones, 2011; Myhill

et al., 2011). The uncertain role of grammar in the language curriculum is set within

an international context, in Anglophone countries particularly, expressing concerns

about the writing attainment of children (NCW, 2003; OFSTED, 2009; Salahu-Din,

Persky, & Miller, 2008). In England, for example, in 2011, 32 % of boys and 19 %

of girls entering secondary education had not achieved the baseline standard in

writing expected for their age group, compared with 20 % of boys and 13 % of girls

who had not achieved the baseline in reading (DfE, 2011). However, there have

been no systematic studies of whether making meaningful connections between

particular linguistic structures and particular writing tasks supports the development

of students’ writing. This paper reports on the outcomes of a randomised controlled

trial (RCT), funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, which

investigated the impact of contextualised grammar teaching on students’ writing

performance.

The effectiveness of grammar teaching

Empirical studies investigating the efficacy of grammar teaching provide little

evidence of any beneficial impact upon students’ competence in writing. Robust

meta-analyses by Braddock, Lloyd-Jones, and Schoer (1963), Hillocks (1986) and

most recently, by the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Co-

ordinating Centre (EPPI) (Andrews et al., 2006; EPPI, 2004) have concluded that

there is no evidence that teaching grammar is of benefit in supporting writing

development. Indeed, Hillocks and Smith (1991, 602) argue that ‘‘research over a

period of nearly 90 years has consistently shown that the teaching of school

grammar has little or no effect on students’’.

There are, however, several major difficulties with almost all of the research that

these reviews represent. The first is that studies repeatedly investigate whether

various forms of grammar teaching, such as learning transformational grammar,

grammar exercises and drills, or parsing sentences, improve writing. The emphasis

is on teaching grammar in the hope that it might have an impact on writing

outcomes. In many of the studies (for example, Bateman & Zidonis, 1966; Elley,

Barham, Lamb, & Wylie, 1975, 1979; Robinson, 1959) isolated grammar lessons

are taught as part of a curriculum programme in grammar, and the writing measures

used to draw empirical conclusions are produced in a different teaching context.

Robinson (1959) tested grammatical knowledge and compared this with the quality

of their composition—she correlated a grammar test with impression marking, and

looked only at word classes. Bateman and Zidonis (1966) taught a transformational

1242 S. Jones et al.

123

grammar course, with the purpose of ‘‘determining the effects of a study of

transformational-generative grammar on the language growth of secondary school

pupils’’ (Elley et al., 1979, 98). The Elley et al. study (1975, 1979) had three

treatment groups: the first was a course typical of English classes at that time in

New Zealand using a textbook addressing grammar, comprehension, and writing;

the second was a reading-writing course where students spent 40 % of their time

free reading, 40 % sharing a class reader, and 20 % writing; and the final treatment

group was a transformational grammar course with the intention of helping students

‘‘see how they can discover facts about their language and how they use it’’ (1975,

28). Students in this group were taught about such things as sentence combining,

subordination, participial modifiers, and deep and surface structures. A second

difficulty with the few existing studies is that many are small -scale. The Bateman

and Zidonis study, for example, had a sample of 41 students.

A further difficulty is that none of the studies theorise an instructional

relationship between grammar and writing, which might inform the design of an

appropriate pedagogical approach. The studies are all located in very different

educational jurisdictions, with differing pre-existing curricular emphases on

grammar. In New Zealand, for example (Elley et al., 1975, 1979) there was

growing unease about the efficacy of traditional grammar teaching amongst

educational professionals, but also a back-to-basics call at policy level which

appeared to advocate ‘‘strong doses of English grammar as a cure for some of our

educational ills’’ (Elley et al., 1975, 3). But none directly address the inter-

relationship of grammar and writing, or offer a theoretical account of such an inter-

relationship.

Contextualised grammar teaching

Thus, there are, to date, no large-scale studies which investigate the benefits or

otherwise of teaching grammar in the context of writing lessons, in which

connections are forged for the student writer between the grammar under focus and

the learning focus for the writing. However, Hudson (2001) draws attention to a

Finnish doctoral study (Laurinen, 1955) which reports improved punctuation scores

for primary students who have been taught clause structures. Hudson argues that the

benefits accrued are because the particular area of grammar taught correlates with

the learning focus for writing, punctuation. Effective punctuation is underpinned by

grammatical understanding and the teaching helped the students to make

connections between the two.

This synergistic relationship between writing and grammatical understanding is

also evident in Fogel and Ehri’s (2000) study. This is unusual in taking as its starting

point an identified writing problem, the tendency of some ethnic minority children

to use non-standard Black English vernacular (BEV) in their writing. The study set

out to ‘‘examine how to structure dialect instruction so that it is effective in teaching

SE forms to students who use BEV in their writing’’ (Fogel & Ehri, 2000, 215) and

found a significant improvement in avoidance of BEV in the group who were given

both strategies and guided support. They argue that their results demonstrated that

the approach used had ‘‘clarified for students the link between features in their own

Grammar for writing? 1243

123

nonstandard writing and features in SE’’ (2000, 231). The Fogel and Ehri study

moves the field forward by beginning to look at the pedagogical conditions which

support or hinder the transfer of grammatical knowledge into written outputs.

Significantly, too, their study begins with a specific linguistic learning need around

which teaching is designed. Fearn and Farnan (2007) have also investigated

teaching grammar in the context of teaching writing, seeking to examine if there is

‘‘a way to teach grammatical structures that will satisfy high-stakes tests and

teachers’ needs, and at the same time, positively affect writing performance?’’

(Fearn & Farnan, 2007, 2). Their experimental study encouraged a problem-solving

approach, using oral language, and appears to be focused on the use of particular

linguistic structures or word class: there is no evident attempt to talk about the

construction of meaning or effect through form. Nonetheless, their study did find

positive impact of their intervention and their conclusion is that it is beneficial for

learners when ‘‘grammar and writing share one instructional context’’ (Fearn &

Farnan, 2007, 16). A recent meta-analysis by Graham and Perin (2007) looking at

effective strategies to teach writing did find that teaching sentence-combining,

helping students to construct more structurally complex sentences, had a positive

effect. In general, however, there is a dearth of studies which address contextualised

grammar teaching probably because ‘‘grammar has traditionally been taught and

learned in an environment that is devoid of context’’ (Mulder, 2010, 73) or not

taught at all.

Theorising grammar-writing connections

As noted above, a limitation in much of the existing research on grammar teaching

is that there is no clear conceptualisation of a theoretical rationale for why grammar

might support writing development (indeed much of the research is framed by

polemic and ideology). Educational linguists (Carter, 1990; Denham & Lobeck,

2005; Hancock, 2009) contend that a better understanding of how language works in

a variety of contexts supports learning in literacy. They draw particularly on the

principles of contemporary linguistic theories which are descriptive and socio-

cultural in emphasis, or as Carter describes them, ‘‘functionally oriented, related to

the study of texts and responsive to social purposes’’ (Carter, 1990, 104). This is in

contrast to the more prescriptive approach to grammar which traditional grammars

espoused (Hudson, 2004). In the US, there has been some emphasis on the notion of

grammar in context (Weaver, 1996, for example), but a theoretical relationship

between grammar and writing has never been adequately articulated, and the idea of

‘in context’ is problematic, often meaning in practice an isolated ‘mini-grammar

lesson’ within an English lesson (for a critique of this, see Myhill, 2010a).

The difference between prescriptive and descriptive views of grammar is central to

a consideration of a theoretical rationale for attention to grammar in the teaching of

writing. Prescriptive grammar sets out how language should be used, the rules of

language use; whilst descriptive grammar looks at language in use. Denham and

Lobeck (2010, 3) contrast linguists who ‘‘have sought to build a grammar that would

be adequate for describing the language’ with English teachers who ‘have sought to

apply a grammar that is already constructed’’. Public and political views of grammar

1244 S. Jones et al.

123

tend strongly towards the prescriptive view, maintaining that the role of the teacher is

to address grammatical accuracy in writing and eradicate error (Myhill, 2011; Myhill

& Jones, 2011; Myhill et al., 2011). Hancock, reflecting on the US educational

context, observed that ‘‘grammar is error and error is grammar in the public mind’’

(Hancock, 2009, 175). In England, the same tendency at public and policy level is

evident—grammar is frequently presented as a remediation tool, a language

corrective. The Queen’s English Society, whose remit is the preservation of the

English language, maintain that grammar is important for the ‘‘diagnosing of faults or

problems in one’s own writing and in that of others’’ (QES, 2011). Traditional school

grammar is prescriptive and is critiqued by Hudson for having ‘‘no roots in modern

linguistics’’ and for being ‘‘fragmentary, dogmatic and prescriptive’’ (Hudson, 2004,

116). Descriptive theories of grammar counterpoint the normative emphasis on

correctness, characteristic of prescriptive grammar, with a more socially-oriented

analysis of how language is used, including in different social, linguistic and cultural

contexts. A prescriptivist theory of a grammar-writing relationship would argue for

the importance of grammar in securing correctness in written expression; a

descriptivist theory of a grammar writing relationship would argue for the importance

of grammar in illuminating how written text generates meaning in different contexts.

The theoretical approach adopted in this study builds on descriptivist views of

grammar. Understanding and analysing how language works in different purposes

and contexts makes connections for learners between language as an object of study

and language in use, as realised in the act of writing. This is, in effect, a theory of

grammar centred upon rhetorical understanding. As a theoretical perspective, this

has at its heart the discussion and analysis of how meaning is crafted and created

through shaping language to achieve the writer’s rhetorical intentions (Kolln, 2002;

Locke, 2005; Micciche, 2004; Paraskevas, 2006). It aims to foster explicit

understanding and ‘‘conscious control and conscious choice over language which

enables both to see through language in a systematic way and to use language more

discriminatingly’’ (Carter, 1990, 119).

A theorised view of grammar teaching in the context of writing which builds on the

understandings outlined above, and which focuses on the teaching of writing rather

than the teaching of grammar, incorporates the following principles (Myhill, 2010a).

Firstly, writing is a communicative act supporting writers in understanding the social

purposes and audiences of texts and how language creates meanings and effects;

secondly, grammar is a meaning-making resource: supporting writers in making

appropriate linguistic choices which help them to shape and craft text to satisfy their

rhetorical intentions; and finally, connectivity, supporting writers in making

connections between their various language experiences as readers, writers and

speakers, and in making connections between what they write and how they write it.

Teachers’ grammatical subject knowledge

The absence of explicit grammar teaching in the English curriculum in Anglophone

countries for nearly 50 years has resulted in many present English teachers not

having the grammatical subject knowledge (GSK) needed to teach grammar

confidently. A survey of teachers in England in 1998 (QCA, 1998) revealed

Grammar for writing? 1245

123

considerable lack of confidence, in particular with clause structures and syntax. The

report noted a ‘‘significant gap … in teachers’ knowledge and confidence in

sentence grammar and this has implications for … the teaching of language and

style in texts and pupils’ own writing’’ (QCA, 1998, 35). In the US context, Vavra

(1996) observed the gap between modern linguistics and the prescriptive, rule-

bound grammar taught by most English teachers. Cameron (1997) argued that the

literature degree qualifications of most English teachers not only leaves them ill-

equipped to cope with grammar teaching, but also generates anxiety, hostility, and

lack of confidence towards grammar.

This lack of confidence plays out in English classrooms through inaccurate

teaching of grammar points (Myhill, 2000, 2003) and insecurity in dealing with

students’ questions (Burgess, Turvey, & Quarshie, 2000). In two studies investi-

gating pre-service teachers’ engagement with grammar, Cajkler and Hislam (2002,

2004) demonstrate how they struggle with GSK and how to use it appropriately in

the classroom. Hudson (2004) argued that without adequate grammatical knowledge

teachers cannot make the analysis of texts explicit, nor can they structure the

teaching context effectively.

Research questions

The over-arching research question that this study set out to investigate was: what

impact does contextualised grammar teaching have upon students’ writing and

students’ metalinguistic understanding? The qualitative study, not reported here,

provides evidence concerning students’ metalinguistic understanding, as well as

complementary evidence about the implementation of the intervention. The RCT

provides evidence concerning the impact of the intervention. Consequently, the

following hypotheses were formulated: (a) that contextualised grammar teaching

will be positively related to students’ writing performance, (b) that the quality of

teachers’ GSK will mediate the impact of contextualised grammar instruction.

Methodology

Participants

The participants were teachers (n = 32) and students (n = 855) of English in 32

different mixed comprehensive schools in the South-West and the Midlands regions

of England. In each school, a class of Year 8 students, aged 12–13, formed the

sample for the RCT. In order to avoid selection bias (Cook & Wei, 2002), the school

sample was secured by using local authority data to compile a numbered list of all

mixed comprehensive schools in the South-West and the Midlands. A random

number generator was used to determine a rank order, and each school was

approached in rank order until the desired sample of 32 was reached.

Baseline data about participants were collected at school, teacher and student

level. At school level, data were compiled on national examination performance,

school inspection outcomes, ethnic diversity, Special educational needs (SEN) and

1246 S. Jones et al.

123

number of students entitled to free school meals (FSM) (as a proxy for socio-

economic status). At teacher level, data were collected on years of teaching

experience, degree subject studied and gender. In addition, teacher participants

undertook a test of GSK at the start of the study and the scores were used as further

baseline data. Student data comprised gender, whether they were students with

English as an additional language (EAL) or entitled to FSM. Attainment data in

English were also collated, drawing on standard national test results in English at

age eleven (including both a writing raw score and writing level) and school

predictions of English results in national tests at age fourteen.

Design

The study sought to investigate whether the use of teaching materials which

embedded grammar teaching within teaching units for writing improved students’

performance in writing. Additionally, the study sought to examine whether teachers’

GSK was a factor upon the efficacy or otherwise of the intervention.

The sample was first stratified at teacher level according to their GSK scores to

ensure that the two groups were matched, given that GSK is known to be a factor in

the teaching of grammar. The classes were then randomly assigned, using a random

number generator, to either a comparison or an intervention group. Because it is not

possible in a naturalistic educational setting to prevent any teaching of grammar

naturally occurring, we have consistently used the term ‘comparison’ rather than

‘control’ group. The study was blind as participant teachers were not told the

research focus was grammar; instead they were told the focus was on the teaching of

writing (see also ‘‘Ethical considerations’’ section). Full details of the intervention

and comparison group teaching are provided further below.

Because causal relationships are rarely deterministic, ‘‘to different degrees, all

causal relationships are context dependent’’ (Shadish, Cook & Campbell, 2002, 5), a

complementary qualitative data set was collated alongside the experimental study to

provide in-depth understanding of the theoretical, pedagogical and contextual

implications of the statistical data. This mixed method approach is important for

RCTs conducted in educational contexts. Indeed, Moore, Graham, and Diamond

(2003) argue that ‘‘to undertake a trial of an educational or social intervention without

an embedded qualitative process evaluation would be to treat the intervention as a

black box, with no information on how it worked, how it could be improved, or what

the crucial components of the intervention were’’. Likewise, Shadish et al. (2002, 71)

recommend ‘‘the addition of qualitative methodologies to experiments’’ to provide

better interpretation and avoid errors in applying research outcomes to practice. In this

study, the data comprised lesson observations, teacher and student interviews, and

writing samples. This paper reports principally from the statistical analysis of the RCT

(for an overview report of the full study, see Myhill et al., 2012).

Procedure

Three members of the research team (all former secondary English teachers) devised

three teaching units on writing, each addressing a different genre: fictional narrative,

Grammar for writing? 1247

123

argument, and poetry. These teaching units were in harmony with the requirements of

the National Curriculum for English (DCSF, 2007), a statutory instrument, and

addressed teaching objectives for Writing as set out in the Framework for Teaching

English (DfES, 2001), the recommended policy document guiding English teaching.

Three learning objectives which specifically addressed linguistic knowledge were

common to all three teaching units, giving the opportunity to explore, for example,

how sentence variety may fulfil different purposes in the three genres; the remaining

objectives were chosen for their relevance to the genre under study. Each teaching unit

was designed to take approximately 3 weeks of timetabled English lessons, and the

study period spanned a school year. In this respect, the intervention was wholly

aligned with curriculum and teaching norms and designed for implementation in a

naturalistic setting. The teaching units adopted many of the pedagogic practices

common in secondary English classrooms, such as the use of text models, group work

and discussion, opportunities for planning and drafting, peer assessment. To that

extent, they reflected typical practice in the teaching of writing. However, in addition,

within each unit, grammar teaching was embedded, making connections between a

linguistic feature and its effect in writing. Some of these were genre-specific. For

example, the fictional narrative unit looked at how first or third person are used to

create different voice or viewpoint. Others were more generically related to

improving writing: for example, varying sentence lengths to create textual rhythm

(For more detailed explanation of the teaching activities, see Myhill, 2010b, 2011;

Myhill & Jones, 2011; Myhill et al., 2011 in professional journals). There was no

focus on grammatical error or accuracy: rather the focus was to help writers to

recognise how making grammatical choices could shape their texts for communi-

cative purposes. Table 1 below provides an overview of the learning objectives and

written outcomes for each scheme and provides examples of the embedded grammar

focus.

Both the intervention and compari

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