Lauren Ward says, “For this professional development webinar, we were joined by Colin Sage, an ELT author, editor and teacher-trainer who specialises in Primary and pre-Primary learning. The webinar focused on grammar, using examples from the new Super Grammar practice books, beginning with an anecdote about a student trying to understand the world of grammar used in the classroom…
Colin started the webinar by explaining the focus will be on the process of ‘practice’ which takes place in a classroom setting – and the “amazing transformation” which we hope will take place in the middle of classroom lessons. Participants were invited to take part in a poll to compare different teaching styles:
- “My students read and listen to lots of books and stories, and learn grammar without needing to be taught it”.
- “I teach grammar by first explaining it to students, then giving them activitities to practice it, then encouraging them to use it freely in a task”
- “My students mainly practice grammar by translating sentences from their first language to English.”
- “I ask students to complete tasks and I teach the grammar when they need it, or at the the end of lessons.”
This helped the audience relate to the practice stage in their teaching context and developed into a more detailed explanation of what ‘practice’ means for grammar, as the middle of a three-part ‘Presentation-Practice-Production’ teaching sequence”.