You as a Subject Matter Expert
Starting this unit made me think of my beginnings of learning a second language. I don't recall every detail on how my teacher taught the grammar piece, but I can say it was done in a way we didn't notice or even being boring for that matter.
For several years I practiced my writing, paying particular attention to my punctuation and how I construct my sentences. I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the grammar rules right up until I took the Quiz. It shocked me to know how much I had forgotten about it. In other words, I fell right on my face! What an "aha moment for me, and how embarrassing too. I find interesting how an L2 learner can go through a process of learning a language through grammar rules, internalizing those rules, becoming fluent in that language, and then not knowing how to identify the grammar pieces in a sentence. I wonder if native speakers feel the same.
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, grammar is defined as (the study or use of) the rules about how words change their form and combine with other words to make sentences.
As it is explained in the video TedTalk, the English language is composed of a subject, verb, and object (subject and predicate), but this rule does not reflect on being the same in other languages. For example, in Japanese, the rule is to have the subject, the object, and then the verb; however, it seems there's consistency in most languages to have a noun and a verb no matter the order in which they are placed in a sentence. Here is what Prescriptivism and Descriptivism methods begin their arguments. In the Oxford dictionary, both methods are defined as follow: Prescriptivism is the belief that there are correct and wrong ways to use language and that books about language should give rules to follow, rather than describing how language is really used. Descriptivism is defined as the belief that books about language should describe how language is really used, rather than giving rules to follow saying what is correct and not correct. The beauty of language is that I can take a word and have an alternative meaning for the same thing like in "car" and "auto" or carry a different sense like in "river bank" and "savings bank."
In my opinion, both methods have their right side and wrong side. Grammar is an essential part of learning a language, but I also think that these rules can be bent or even tend to be changed as language develops and evolves through time. This is what makes a language rich in all aspects that conform to it.
In closing, I would like to leave you with the following quote by Owen Lee Pomeroy, "Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: you find the present tense, but the past perfect!"
For several years I practiced my writing, paying particular attention to my punctuation and how I construct my sentences. I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the grammar rules right up until I took the Quiz. It shocked me to know how much I had forgotten about it. In other words, I fell right on my face! What an "aha moment for me, and how embarrassing too. I find interesting how an L2 learner can go through a process of learning a language through grammar rules, internalizing those rules, becoming fluent in that language, and then not knowing how to identify the grammar pieces in a sentence. I wonder if native speakers feel the same.
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, grammar is defined as (the study or use of) the rules about how words change their form and combine with other words to make sentences.
As it is explained in the video TedTalk, the English language is composed of a subject, verb, and object (subject and predicate), but this rule does not reflect on being the same in other languages. For example, in Japanese, the rule is to have the subject, the object, and then the verb; however, it seems there's consistency in most languages to have a noun and a verb no matter the order in which they are placed in a sentence. Here is what Prescriptivism and Descriptivism methods begin their arguments. In the Oxford dictionary, both methods are defined as follow: Prescriptivism is the belief that there are correct and wrong ways to use language and that books about language should give rules to follow, rather than describing how language is really used. Descriptivism is defined as the belief that books about language should describe how language is really used, rather than giving rules to follow saying what is correct and not correct. The beauty of language is that I can take a word and have an alternative meaning for the same thing like in "car" and "auto" or carry a different sense like in "river bank" and "savings bank."
In my opinion, both methods have their right side and wrong side. Grammar is an essential part of learning a language, but I also think that these rules can be bent or even tend to be changed as language develops and evolves through time. This is what makes a language rich in all aspects that conform to it.
In closing, I would like to leave you with the following quote by Owen Lee Pomeroy, "Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: you find the present tense, but the past perfect!"
Sources:
Cambridge Dictionary: Grammar definition
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/grammar
LSA (Linguistic Society of America)
https://www.linguisticsociety.org/resource/what-correct-language
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