Grammatically Correct

Mary Ehrenworth and Vicki Vinton offer a well-documented, research-based approach to the teaching of writing, and the inclusion of fundamental principles of grammar therein. They begin with an analysis of the power of writing, and language in general, based on the discourse perceptions of (primarily) Lisa Delpit. Language holds power, claims Delpit, and those who master the nuances of the primary discourse of a society have access to all of that culture’s advantages. Communication that falls outside of that sphere of influence has, according to Delpit, less chance of being perceived as effective.
Ehrenworth and Vinton acknowledge that reality, but counter with an affirmation of individual students’ voices – which come from diverse cultural origins. The discussion becomes one of style, manifested in the mechanics of grammar, an analysis of what “proper” means, and further how to achieve it without stripping away the depth and beauty of individual students’ perceptions and insights, which are based on life experiences rather than a gentrified, abstruse and arbitrary code. Students who encounter this rejection of their realities counter with resistance, either overt or covert, and disengage from the learning environment.  Ehrenworth and Vinton acknowledge the resistance and suggest strategies to overcome it.

One of these is story – the students’ own or others – woven into the discourse in a non-threatening way to introduce elements of comprehension without confrontation. By coming in through the backdoor, teachers approach their students with respect for who they are, including their primary discourses, and offer them choices in communication, illustrated in ways they may choose to assimilate rather than resist. They then delve into some strategies for accomplishing this, including some very specific approaches to introduction and assimilation of basic grammar structures. “These are our goals for teaching grammar: to teach knowledge of conventional usage in order to increase power, opportunity, and voice; to teach habits of fluency, inquiry, and experimentation; and to engage students in such a way that this knowledge and these habits are sustaining and flexible (15).” They also include the teaching strategies of direct instruction, inquiry and apprenticeship, and offer concrete examples of implementation.

Laura Micciche’s conclusions echo the awareness of the political implications of grammar, but her analysis dives more deeply into both the historical foundations of dominant discourse “proper” grammar and the means with which to both counter and utilize those realities. She also deals with the ramifications of a “fix it, it’s broken” approach to grammar rather than an animated, organic inclusion of grammar onto all stages of writing. She uses examples from literature to help her (older) students assess the power of grammar when it is used in a variety of ways. Her terms of “emancipatory teaching” and “liberatory principles” are compatible with Ehrenworth and Vinton’s, but her discourse in general is highly politicized and seeks to empower students to use the techniques and realities of empowering grammar to strengthen not only their writing but also their perceptions in life. She advocates conceptual grammar rather than corrective grammar, a proactive rather than punitive approach. She advocates use of a commonplace book in the classroom (and life) for analysis and observations of discourse in a variety of forms. She also discusses audience “This balancing act, which requires careful consideration of self/other relations, is relevant to grammatical choices that writers make because it is part of the conceptual work that we do as writers. We envision and construct an audience through diction, tone, and the selection of examples; and as writers we seek to reach across the space that separates us from our audience, using techniques that engender trust, establish credibility, and sometimes build connection (729).”

Discussion of the “liberatory pedagogy” of the 1960’s and 70’s that removed the direct/prescriptive approach from the teaching of grammar has moved from a strictly educational dialectic to a highly charged political one, and Micciche dissects some of the realities associated with that as well. The dominant leftist perspective which states that emphasizing rudimentary grammar in teaching is wrong is countered with a conservative demand for it.  Both approaches ignore the practical applications of grammar to discourse. An ability to utilize grammar effectively both in analysis and praxis enhances student skills in rhetoric in general – no matter what their political perspectives. Micchiche is very clear about her perspective, and wants students to have the tools they need through rhetorical grammar:

Rhetorical grammar analysis encourages students to view writing as a material social practice in which meaning is actively made, rather than passively relayed or effortlessly produced. The study of rhetorical grammar can demonstrate to students that language does purposeful, consequential work in the world—work that can be learned and applied (716).

Micciche applies this rhetorical approach to literary analysis and composition, building stronger communication and interpretive skills in her students.


Both of these sources offer depth and variety in approach to grammar, but both have in common an important assumption that is likely to be the foundation of the thesis of my research paper:

Grammar is a symbiotic component of effective writing, a structured means by which all writing is created, revised and finally presented in ways that fluently convey the writer’s intent to his or her readers. Grammar does not exist in isolation from the written form, and thus should not be taught that way.

Ehrenworth and Vinton offer essentially a workbook on how to accomplish effective teaching of grammar, so there are definitely skills to be gleaned from and applied from their work. Micciche too offers practical applications, as well as (to me) a highly palatable political perspective. She also uses two of my very favorite authors in her examples, so naturally I assume all of her suggestions are brilliant. The use of literary analysis coupled with meaningful writing exercises provides some immediately practical applications of grammar instruction.

As to how will I use these techniques in the future – that future already began. It so happens that I am a UWM grammar tutor, and I worked with two students today. Little did they know, but they were my (very kind and compliant) guinea pigs. They are studying grammar in isolation through ENG 212. We had a white board and a list of mechanical definitions and derivatives, trying to make concepts click. It was a struggle UNTIL I dropped the sentences we were constructing into context. I had them tell me a story using the subjects, verbs, objects and more that they had chosen to use on our chart. Immediately, they started saying things like “Oh, no, that’s not right,” as they made errors in construction. They could HEAR it in the context of a few interconnected sentences. I could practically see light bulbs going off in their heads. I sent them off later with instructions to play with their grammar, make fun and silly sentences containing an element or two from their unit, and combine them into a few-sentence story. They weren’t elaborate – one was using her dog and the other a pink-spotted giraffe – but they were more real than perfect progressive to them, and they owned them. Hopefully they will start to see the connections and get their rudimentary grammar (verbs, in this case) running on automatic.

Since I am not a real teacher yet, I don’t know which parts of grammar need to stay and which to go (does anyone really need to know the label “perfect progressive”?), but I do know that teaching pure mechanics only works for a select few grammar geeks like me, while most students need contextual clues to grow their grammar skills. I also know that I will be using and citing both of these resources in the paper I am about to write.

(a somewhat unrelated observation: I really have trouble with Lisa Delpit, based on an article of hers from Literacy: A Critical Sourcebook that I analyzed last semester as part of a study of discourse. It is from the Delpit book referenced in Ehrenworth and Vinton's article, Other People's Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom, and in it the author enthusiastically relates that students of color were taught to overcome their outsider status when "teachers put in overtime to ensure that the students were able to live up to their [the teachers'] expectations (549)." Delpit maintains that in order to join the dominant discourse, "teachers...insisted that they must achieve because 'you must do twice as well as white people to be considered half as good' (549)." That assertion may indeed (sadly) be true, but the choice to actively work to change students from who they were into a homogeneous, white version of themselves to fit the dominant discourse rankled me irreparably with its racism. I struggle to forgive Delpit for using it as a teaching model, and it tempers my acceptance of anything she espouses.)