Empowering Grammar: To learn, read. To know, write. To master, teach. – Hindu Proverb

Margaret SeelieTeaching Community, FA2014

Los Medanos College

Table of Contents

Explanation of Project …3–5Purpose & FocusQuestion & Explanation

Method of Investigation …6–16ExplanationAssessmentAmendment (when necessary)

Results …16–20Student WorkRevisit Question

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Explanation of Project

I often wonder weather we, as instructors, are teaching for ourselves

or for the students. We spend a lot of time, energy, and money to access

sophisticated language, nuanced grammar rules, and complicated theories;

thus perhaps it is only natural to feel compelled to wield this highfalutin

language and ideas. But why? Who is this language benefitting, the

students, or the instructors? For instance, is it more beneficial to the

students to rattle off a grammatical term, like verbal, followed by a

definition? Instructing them to memorize it, find it in some generic

sentence, and regurgitate it on the exam. Educational theorist, Paulo Freire,

would be appalled at such a model, probably citing his banking education

theory that criticizes this antiquated way of teaching.

Instead, move beyond depositing and regurgitation information, and

empower the students to imbibe grammar in their own unique way. Give

them tools and space to make each rule their own. This may seem

impossible, but in my Engl-083: Sentence Skills for College Writing course, I

taught verbals.

I admit that I deposited some knowledge around the topic, but then I

simply asked, “Who can give me an example of this in your everyday life?”

The class fell silent for two minutes, then one student mumbled, “The

Hulk.”

I asked him to speak up and he said, “The Red Hulk, you know, the

bad version of the Hulk. He acts like the Hulk, kinda looks like the Hulk, but

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he isn’t the Hulk. Like how verbals look and act like verbs, but they’re

different.”

I believe this is what empowered grammar looks like in a composition

classroom. In my project for the teaching community this semester, I intend

to reflect on similar moments, and try to analyze more of these empowered

moments.

My question is how can instructors empower grammar through

language, lesson design, and a student-generated curriculum?

Purpose & Focus

Teaching grammar can feel overwhelming for both the students and

the instructor. Imagine finding a scaffolding process that could be applied

to all grammar lessons, from technical grammar to usage. This consistency

would relieve some of that pressure by setting clear and consistent

expectations for each lesson. The ultimate hope is that once this scaffolding

is removed, each student has imbibed the grammar lessons, made them

their own, and can go out and empower others with their unique

understanding of writing and grammar.

Question & Explanation

I am proposing that steps I. through V. can be completed within each

unit in the semester, which means this process would be done

approximately sixteen times within one semester (every week). Starting

with the first week of instruction using Chapter 1 Parts of Speech in At a

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Glance: Sentences by Lee Brandon.

I suspect this process will be too time consuming to complete every

week, but upon investigation, it may work.

Can all grammar lessons be taught with the following scaffolding that

would ensure each student imbibes, owns, and retains each lesson?

Can steps I. through V. be taught every week within an eight week

accelerated grammar course (Engl-083)? Or is this too time consuming?

Does this cycle work for both technical grammar lessons and usage lessons?

How does Professor Kate Brubeck shift the instructional lens from the

teacher to the students?

How is empowerment created in the grammar classroom?

Grammar Scaffolding (to be completed each unit / week)

0. Increase Student Confidence by Writing What They Know

I. Lesson / Learning Stage

A. Lecture

B. Exercises

C. Pass / No Pass Assessment

D. All or Nothing Assignments

II. Life Experience Lesson

III. Contextualize & Synthesize with Surrounding Grammar Landscape:

One Lesson to Rule them all

IV. Traditional Assessment

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Method of Investigation

To access the Method of Investigation, it is imperative that I share my

background in grammar instruction. I have been studying grammar

pedagogy since 2012. In the fall semester of 2012, I had the educational

opportunity to assist grammarian, Kate Brubeck, in instructing her English

20: The Fundamentals of Grammar course at Mills College. The following

semester, spring 2013, I was the teaching assistant for Tarah Demant at

Mills College for the same course. I include my work with Professor Demant

as background, but our work will not be discussed in this report. One year

after completing my second TA opportunity, I was hired at Los Medanos

College to teach an accelerated hybrid grammar course called English 083 /

EMT.

Kate Brubeck is a Visiting Professor at Mills College who teaches The

Fundamentals of Grammar, Grammar and Style for Writers, and Teaching

English as a Second Language. She is an expert grammarian who has been

honing her knowledge of language as an ESL instructor and college

professor for over a decade. According to the Mills College website,

Kate Brubeck has taught and coordinated programs in language

diversity and acquisition at Mills and throughout the Bay Area. She is

interested in language—in the rules that bind and the ways we break

those bonds; in the junctions and schisms, in both academic and

creative writing, between voice and culture, between our private and

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public senses of self.

Her pedagogical approach is one of empowerment. She opens each

semester with her syllabus for the course and a “stupid questions coupons.”

Brubeck is a master at shifting the instructional lens from the teacher to the

students. This shift slowly empowers the students with a genuine sense of

authority on the subject of grammar. We will examine more closely how she

creates this empowered classroom in the Methods of Investigation sections

of this report.

As Brubeck’s teaching assistant, I attended her classes and met with

each student for thirty-minute sessions weekly. In those meetings and in

class I came to understand how her pedagogical approaches either

facilitated or stifled student learning. I also occasionally taught grammar

lessons where I aimed to create my own empowered classroom.

I, Margaret Seelie, taught English 083: Sentence Skills for College

Writers / EMT Course in the spring 2014 semester at Los Medanos College.

This unique grammar course was taught as part of the Career Advancement

Academy, which is a program designed to “target low income young adults,

18 to 30 years old, who face academic and personal barriers to employment

and training.” I was hired to teach sentence level writing to Emergency

Medical Technicians in training. Instead of they typical sixteen-week

semester, our grammar course was taught in eight weeks.

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In the following section I will dissect my proposed grammar

scaffolding mentioned above by explaining what each section means,

discussing ways in which Professor Brubeck and myself manifest these

approaches, and assess what worked and didn’t work within each section.

Samples of assignments and student work will appear where necessary.

Let us start by considering one instructor approach that did not work.

As instructors, we know that courses, lessons, and exams are designed with

an end goal in mind; for instance, when teaching prepositions we approach

the lesson planning from a place of hoping all students can identify what a

preposition is and how to find it in a piece of writing. It is important to

strike a balance between instructor goals and students’ goals when

designing these structures and assignments. My instructor set irrelevant

goals in her grammar classroom in grade school. All I remember about my

grade school English teacher was her turtleneck covered in turtles, and how

much I disliked the word participle. This instructor was only interested in

meeting the bare requirements or the course; thus she aimed to deposit the

grammar rules into her students so that they could regurgitate them when

tested. In my opinion, this is exactly how to not teach grammar.

Grammar is a tricky topic within writing because it is like the math of

language. Unlike learning how to write a well-developed paragraph or

organizing ones ideas, grammar can technically be taught as a series of

rules. But, these rules are useless if they cannot be wielded within a

sentence, paragraph, essay, or report.

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Grammar Scaffolding

0. Increase Student Confidence by Writing What They Know

This step in the scaffolding is listed as “0” because this is a part of the

learning process that is invisible to the students, but it is imperative to their

success in all courses, but especially in the grammar classroom.

Increase Student Confidence

When I entered Kate Brubeck’s grammar course as her teaching

assistant in 2012, it became immediately apparent that she was interested

in teaching to the whole student. The course goals are listed on her syllabus

as,

You will leave this class with clearer academic writing, increased

confidence, improved proofreading skills, greater awareness of your

common areas of strength and weakness in academic writing,

and a frame of reference within which to think about the role of

academic language in your life and its relevance to any other forms of

language you may use.

After working with students for over ten years, Kate doesn’t seem to

question weather confidence is the key to unlocking grammar for her

students, she knows it is. I have not read many syllabi that discuss “your

life” and “increased confidence,” but after working with her student for a

semester, these became the pivotal points that lead to their success. It was

strange, even the few students who came into her course with an error of

confidence seemed to benefit from this unintimidating zeitgeist that was

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built into the course.

Her confidence scaffolding begins on the first day when she asks her

students to write a simple on-page paper about their names. I worked with

students on these pieces of writing in our tutorials and found that they were

able to access the grammar elements much more easily when working with

such a familiar topic as their name.

Write What You Know

On the first day of my English 083: Sentence Skills for College

Writing, I asked each student to take out a sheet of paper and write one

sentence about themselves. I proceeded with the lesson on what a sentence

is (subject and verb), then we defined these two elements. At first, most of

the students rolled their eyes as they repeated the age-old definition of a

noun, verb, and subject. I imagine they thought, great here we go again

with some boring grammar class. But then, I asked them to take out their

sentences. I told them to find the nouns and verbs. Then I asked them to

determine whether they had written a complete sentence or not.

Some students blurted out, “I don’t even have a subject, do I,

Professor Seelie?”

At that moment I encouraged them to turn to the person next to them

to confirm whether they did in fact have a complete sentence or not.

Assessment

This was the moment when the grammar lesson moved from

depositing to imbibing. This was a particularly significant moment because

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it was the first time these seemingly isolated rules began to lean out of the

boundaries of the classroom and into their lives. I would not change this

structure, and I continued to use it throughout the semester.

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I. Lesson / Learning Stage: Deposit, but not too much

A. Lecture

Explanation

Educational theorist, Paulo Freire, is responsible for coming up with

the banking education theory. To paraphrase his theory, he describes the

students as reciprocals for information and the instructor as the one

responsible for filling these vessels with valuable knowledge. Freire sets up

the banking theory not as a model for teaching, but as an antiquated

method of instruction that does not yield lasting results. He found that

students who experienced the banking method of education forgot much of

what they were taught within weeks, months, or the years that followed. I

am proof that the banking theory does not work; I studied his work as part

of a graduate course called Theories and Strategies of Teaching Writing. I

was tasked with reading Freire’s theories and then teaching his work to the

class. I created a lesson plan and a one-page summary of his work.

Reflecting back upon that semester, I realize that I read many pedagogical

theorists in that class, but I only taught one theorist’s work, and as you can

see his work is what I recall today, three years later. Teaching is truly the

way to master a subject and make it your own.

The banking process is vital within a grammar classroom, but it must

be done with care and intention to retain confidence in the students and to

create empowerment. To maintain a confident ecosystem within each

student, I treat the depositing stage in the learning process as a time that is

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open to mistakes. Students are assessed based on completion rather than

content via a grading scale that is pass / no pass, rather than a numeric

assessment.

The depositing of knowledge begins with the lecture or lesson in the

classroom. I feel that it is important to tap into synapses that are already

formed when introducing new materials to the brain, which is why I begin

with a very short writing assignment to acquaint the students with the

forthcoming materials. Next, I move into the lecture for the day that is

based on the unit in At a Glance: Sentences by Lee Brandon. Within these

lectures I aim to give the students a reduced form of the lesson by giving

the notes on the board. I also seek out all opportunities to let the students

make the lesson personal by asking for examples or tricks to remember the

grammar rule at hand.

B. Exercises

Outside of the classroom, I rely on the text and exercises to continue

with the depositing of information. For instance, the students are

responsible to complete the exercises pertaining to the lecture on their own.

This is when the process shifts from depositing to empowerment in three

ways:

1) All students have access to the answer key. Why? Well, this gives

the student the power to decide; they can either copy the answers and learn

nothing, or struggle through the exercises the best they can. Then they

check their answers so they immediately know what aspects of the lesson

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needs further attention.

2) They take this self-assessment they have gleaned from checking

their answers to a tutor. This is an important part of the empowerment

process because not only can they use new grammar language to discuss

their needs with the tutor, they also experience how asking for help can

build confidence.

Assessment

At the beginning of the semester, most of my Engl-083 students

complained about the six tutorials they had to complete before the end of

the semester. They believed that tutors were for dumb students. They saw

the need for tutoring as a service for students with learning deficits. By the

end of the semester, many of these same students were going to see a tutor

twice a week and excelling at their ability to ask for help.

C. Pass / No Pass Assessment

3) Grading during the learning process as pass / no pass is vital to

student success. The infrastructure of this depositing into empowerment

stage would fail if the students were graded on a numeric scale (content).

For instance, if the student received credit for every answer they got right

in their exercises they most likely would copy from the answer key; thus

avoiding the self assessment and lowing the productivity of the tutorials.

Instead, the students receive a pass if they complete the exercise and show

evidence of struggling through the answer key, and a no pass if the exercise

are partially completed or there is no evidence of checking their answers.

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This communicates to the students, if you tried, you succeeded;

consequently, creating confidence and empowerment.

Amendment D. All or Nothing Assignments

One amendment needed to be made to the grading process. I found

that students were coming in with half of their exercises done, one exercise

from each section of the unit, or no evidence of checking their answers. To

remedy this, I created the “all or nothing” assignment model. This model

ensures that the students at least try because if they do not have an attempt

down for each question in the unit, they receive a “no pass” grade. This

system is not perfect because I noticed a few students frantically filling in

exercises just before class started, or checking the answer key as I went

around checking the exercises.

II. Life Experience Lesson

Explanation

Upon completing the learning process discussed above, confidence and

empowerment are reinforced by linking each grammar lesson to the

students’ life outside the grammar classroom. Professor Brubeck shifts the

instructional lens back onto the students by giving them small assignments

to accompany their grammar exercises. For instance, when the students are

completing Chapter 5: Correcting Sentence Fragments, Comma Splices,

and Run-Ons in At a Glance: Sentences, they are also instructed: “In your

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reading for other classes this week, find the lo-o-o-o-ngest sentence you can,

make 4 copies, and bring to class.”

Assessment: Brubeck Chapter 5 Life Experience Lesson

Some students brought in sentences from their biology texts that were

quite long. In small groups they discussed their sentences on a grammatical

level, but they also discussed the content of the writing, which allowed their

expertise as biology majors to shine. These conversations helped pull the

grammar rules out of the writing vacuum and into each student’s actual

academic life; thus making inextricable connections between grammar, life,

and future success. One student even told me in tutorials that these

grammar lessons were helping her understand the readings for other

classes better.

I taught an English course in China, where I saw a similar experience

of empowerment through the life experience lesson. While teaching at

Suzhou University in China, I struggled to access the students, especially

when teaching grammar rules. When faced with the task of teaching

prepositions, I created a life experience lesson where the students drew a

map of their hometown, labeled it with as many prepositions as they could,

and then wrote directions down in complete sentences.

Assessment: Seelie Prepositions Lesson

This lesson was successful because it diffused the instructor depositing

dynamic and put the students in a situation where we could learn from each

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other; I learned more about rural China and they learned how to give

directions in English. This lesson created a bridge from depositing

(preposition rules), to personal experience (hometown knowledge), and

ultimately to real life use (ability to give directions).

III. Contextualize & Synthesize with Surrounding Grammar

Landscape: One Lesson to Rule Them All

Explanation

The student has learned the material, linked it to their lives, and now

it is time to make the final connection to the rest of the grammar devices

they have learned thus far. Since these lessons build on previous lessons,

they cannot be introduced until about halfway through the semester. Giving

the students a few days to complete these synthesis assignments is advised

because they must refer back to all of the grammar tools they have acquired

throughout the semester, and you don’t want them to rush.

You may be wondering, how is this different from an exam?, since

typically exams work to test the over all knowledge of a student. Well, these

assignments are different in that they have days or weeks to complete them,

which allows them to spend time and review. Plus, often these assignments

are set up as a personal challenge or class competition. As mentioned

before, these assignments are given later in the semester, which implies

that the student has gained confidence and now wants to test their skills.

It’s like learning how to swim in a pool and then finally getting to take your

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first dip in the ocean with waves. It’s exciting, exhilarating, and the

students want to see if you can do it.

Assessment

I found the students comparing their answers before class or bragging

about how quickly they completed the assignment.

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IV. Traditional Assessment

Explanation

This is where Professor Brubeck and I went our separate ways in the

grammar classroom. I gave bi-weekly quizzes to ensure students were

retaining the technical grammar information. Conversely, Brubeck assigned

one-page writing assignments on a bi-weekly basis. Based on the schedule,

the entire classroom read each student’s writing and they received

feedback. Each student had her work read twice within the fifteen-week

semester.

Perhaps our differing pedagogical practices are a symptom of a

community college classroom versus a four-year college. Having worked

with students from both collegiate structures, I found that the community

college students were motivated by numbers, grades and points, rather than

the content of their assignments. The students at Mills College seemed to

find great value in instructor feedback, self-assessments, and their abilities

to use the grammar rather than identify the rules.

Assessment

Based on the demographics of the students Brubeck and I were

working with, I believe we both chose the proper form of assessment.

Amendment

Grammars, even the rules, are quite subjective. This fact made

crafting and grading technical grammar quizzes very difficult. As you will

see from the student work in the Results section, some students were given

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two grades at the bottom of their exams. Often I would grade half of the

exams only to realize that there were multiple correct answers for some

questions. Given the opportunity to rewrite these quizzes and exams, I

would attempt to rewrite many of the questions to eliminate the possibility

of multiple correct answers. Or create an answer key with multiple correct

answers, like I ended up doing I the Engl-083 course. Finally, I would send

the exam to Brubeck for feedback. Or discuss with her if it is even possible

to ask a technical grammar question with one correct answer.

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Results

Revisiting the original questions, I see that the overlooked aspect of

my original inquiries is timing. I realize now that all of these steps cannot

be completed on a weekly basis and in relationship to every grammar

lesson. Rather, they must be masterfully paced to give the students space

and time to imbibe lessons, explore their writing, and pursue improvement.

Consequently, in examining student work and revisiting the question I

will focus on the aspect of timeframe.

Revisiting Question: How can these steps be spread throughout a

semester to yield student success?

0. Increase Student Confidence by Writing What They Know

Increase Student Confidence

Student Work

Samples: Reading_Name Assignment from Kate Brubeck

Samples_Name Assignment from Kate Brubeck

Revisit Question

In revisiting the question, I find that student confidence is easiest to

build in the beginning, and the best way to do this is by giving a personal

writing assignment to begin with, as Professor Brubeck did (see student

work above). In discussions with students about Brubeck’s name

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assignment, the students opened up and I could see them already making

connections to the grammar lessons even with only one lecture.

With this foundation, confidence can continue to build with smaller

personal assignements throughout the semester; for instance, in Engl-083 I

opened most lectures by asking the students to write one type of sentence

(see “Write What You Know” 10). As mentioned before, this is a great way

to build on synapses that already exist within the students and it establishes

their voice and connection to the upcoming lesson.

In conclusion, confidence building is an abundant part of lesson

planning in the beginning of the semester, but it tapers off as the semester

continues.

Write What You Know

Student Work

“Stress of Being an E.M.T.” English 83 Report. May 19, 2014

To maintain the confidence levels of each student while pulling in

larger writing assignments, I worked with the EMT instructors at Los

Medanos College to come up with topics the students would feel proficient

writing in. For instance, their first topic was an essay about performing

CPR, which was a topic they were all familiar with. Their essays required

some extra reading, which was provided for them, so no research was

required. As you will see from the file, they outlined their ideas, work

shopped a draft with peers, and rewrote their drafts.

Revisit Question

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This cycle proved to be successful because their final drafts were

always better than their first drafts. Also, it empowered the feedback loop

because they were not relying completely on the instructor, rather they

needed their peers for feedback. I would not change this writing cycle I

developed and assessed in the Teaching Community last semester.

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I. Lesson / Learning Stage

Student Work

Chapter 10: At a Glance: Sentences, Chapter 10: Punctuation &

Capitalization Exercises 1-7

I chose this student’s work because it exemplifies the empowerment

of students. You will notice comments like, “great work,” “awesome,” and

“good job on this long paragraph” along with corrective marks through

various answers; all marks that one would expect an instructor to make on a

student’s work. In this case, the student’s classmate wrote these comments

and made these marks, which puts the student in the roll of instructor. This

is significant because creating that shift from depositing to imbibing,

turning the instructional lens onto the students, and empowering them to

take their education into their own hands.

The student whose work you are seeing here struggled in Engl-083.

The classmate that graded this assignment stepped up as a supporter and

confidence builder, which resulted in his ultimate success in this course.

The struggling student started getting more comfortable with feedback,

seeing its strengths and merits, and showing up to my office hours. The

student is one of the ones who started out despising tutorials, and ended up

going more than the required amount.

Revisit Question

I would not make any further amendments to the Learning Stage,

aside from the amendment mentioned in Method of Investigation.

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II. Life Experience Lesson

Revisit Question

In considering the timeframe necessary for the Life Experience

Lesson, Professor Brubeck’s assignment of brining in a sentence from

another class and my technical grammar lesson on prepositions could be

taught at any time during the semester. Perhaps waiting until the second or

third week is recommended though because pushing these lessons beyond

the boarders of the classroom can overwhelm some students.

III. Contextualize & Synthesize with Surrounding Grammar

Landscape: One Lesson to Rule them all

Revisit Question

An amendment to my original belief that this step could be taught at

all points in the semester is necessary. Without a grammar landscape the

students cannot be successful in completing these assignments. Plus, as

mentioned before, these assignments are designed to boost confidence,

create comradery among classmates, and offer a challenge; thus I would not

give an assignment like this until mid-semester.

IV. Traditional Assessment

Student Work

Grammar Exam. Engl-083 / EMT Course.

Revisit Question

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Please see assessment and amendments in section IV. of Methods of

Investigation, page 15.

Thank You.

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