What is grammar?
Grammar is a profound area of knowledge. It is therefore beneficial for beginning teachers to familiarize themselves with an array of grammar definitions so to acquire a combination of meanings across various viewpoints. Here is a list of go-to definitions from various scholars for teachers to call upon. |
1. Beverly Derewianka (2011) describes grammar as ”…a way of describing how a language works to make meaning” ( p.1).
2. Margaret Zeegers (2013) in her book 'Grammar Matters' believes the purpose of grammar as “… to describe the way sentences are constructed, in particular regarding the patterns of words they contain, using language about language” (p.111). 3. Humphrey, Droga & Feez (2013) in their book 'Grammar and Meaning' describe grammar as “the system of patterns and structures, a set of resources used to organize words into sentences that make the meanings in a text” (p.1). They use a representation of a ‘toolkit’, whereby similarly to other professions such as doctors or builders, “speakers and writers choose combinations of language resources from their grammar toolkit in order to interpret and compose meaningful sentences” (Humphrey, Droga & Feez, 2013, p.2). 4. Derewianka (2011) refers to grammar as a resource, stating grammar is “an array of possibilities from which we can choose” (p.1). |
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