Reformulation Method in Teaching Grammar

What is Grammar?

Grammar is the way we arrange words to make proper sentences. Word level grammar covers verbs and tenses, nouns, adverbs etc. Sentence level grammar covers phrases, clauses, reported speech etc.

What is Method?

Anthony (1963) Richards and Rodger (1986) said that a method is a practical implementation of an approach. A theory is put into practice at a level of a method. It includes decisions about:

1.- The particular skills to be taught.

2.- The roles of the teacher and the learner in language teaching and learning.

3.- The appropriate procedures and techniques.

4.- The content to be taught.

5.- The order in which the content will be presented.

What is Reformulation Method in Teaching Grammar?

Reformulation is the process by which the teacher takes the meaning the learners are attempting to express in English and ‘translates’ these into an acceptable form.

Strategies

• Use authentic writing situations every day

• Make learning visible with anchor charts and student work around grammar concepts.

• Provide students with multiple exposures to a variety of grammatical situations

• Have students create nonlinguistic representations of grammatical situations (for example, images, gestures, picture stories).

• Use engaging and relevant writing situations to engage students in grammatical exercises.

• Encourage students to read a variety of nonfiction, informational, and fiction texts to expose them to multiple texts and a variety of writing situations.

• Harness the power of digital tools for practice and review.

• Directly teach and model each grammar concept; use your writing and think-aloud to model grammar instruction.

Resources

Reformulation requires no materials preparation since the texts are created entirely by the students. All that is necessary is some stimulus, in the form, for example, of visuals, or a situation (for example, a dialogue between two friends about their health concerns), or a task (such as write a letter to the newspaper complaining about a local problem). The reformulation process requires only a board although overhead projectors are very useful for this purpose.

Results

The reformulation of learners’ text is likely to have greater relevance to learners than the study of ‘imported’ texts. Nevertheless the reformulation stage has to be handled sensitively, so that learners see it as an empowering activity rather than an exercise in humiliation.

Bibliography

♥Elizaveta Pachina. (2019). Top Strategies for Effective Teaching of Grammar. 10/02/21, de International TEFL and TESOL Training Sitio web: https://www.teflcourse.net/blog/top-strategies-for-effective-teaching-of-grammar-ittt-tefl-blog/

♥Teaching grammar through reformulation (elementary)

♥Richards, Jack C. and Theodore S. Rodgers (1986). Approaches and methods in language teaching. A description and Analysis. Cambridge University Press.