Учебное пособие: The English grammar

- nouns (such as horse, Syria )

- verbs (such as swim, remain )

- adjectives (such as black, serious )

- adverbs (such as quickly, perhaps )

- pronouns (such as he, those )

- auxiliary verbs (such as is, do before a main verb)

- modal verbs (such as can, must )

- determiners (such as the, some )

- prepositions (such as in, before )

Question Open a newspaper. Can you find and underline examples of some or all of the categories?

Unit four: Presenting and explaining grammar

Task Classroom or peer-teaching

Stage 1: Presentation

Present and explain a grammatical structure to a class; the presentation should not take longer than five minutes.

The presentation should be recorded in some way; you might tape-record it or ask another participant to observe and take notes. If neither of these is possible, then write down as accurate an account as possible immediately after the lesson.

Stage 2 (optional)

If you did not do so before, look up a grammar book to check your explanation: was there anything important you omitted or misrepresented?

Stage 3: Feedback.

Ask another participant or student to tell you immediately afterwards how clear they thought your presentation was, and if they have any particular comments.

You may find it useful to use the questions in Box 2 as points of reference.

Stage 4

In the light of critical discussion of your presentation, write out for yourself a set of guidelines for presenting and explaining grammar.

Box 2. Questions on grammar presentations.

1. The structure itself . Was the structure presented in both speech and writing, both form and meaning?

2. Examples . Were enough examples provided of the structure in a meaningful context? Are you sure the students understood their meanings?

3. Terminology . Did you call the structure by its (grammar-book) name? If so, was this helpful? If not, would it have helped if you had? What other grammatical terminology was (would have been) useful?

4. Language . Was the structure explained in the students’ mother tongue, or in the target language, or in a combination of the two? Was this effective?

5. Explanation . Was the information given about the structure at the right level: reasonably accurate but not too detailed? Did you use comparison with the students’ mother tongue (if known)? Was this/would this have been useful?

6. Delivery . Were you speaking (and writing) clearly and at an appropriate speed?