Effective Ways to Teach Middle School Grammar
When you're preparing to teach grammar, tedious subject matter such as punctuation and the parts of speech come to mind. Rather than using the usual worksheet or reading straight from a grammar textbook, a teacher can employ some interactive games and activities to effectively teach grammar to young students.
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Dramatic Reading
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Good grammar is learned most naturally by reading well-written prose. To teach a student good grammar, have him physically feel the way good grammar sounds through his own speech. A teacher may have students pick a scene from a play, a speech from a book or a paragraph of their favorite writing by a famous author and have them read it out dramatically in front of the class. The teacher may also grade students on the flow of the speech, the student's ability to follow punctuation cues and the general grammar of the section chosen to read.
Sentence Structure
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This game will teach students how to properly structure a sentence. Instead of tediously naming each part of speech, students will compare the same sentence written in several different ways; all but one of these ways will be incorrect.
For example, the sentence "Yesterday, at about noontime, Sarah ran to the park to meet her friends" will be written "At about noontime yesterday, Sarah, ran to the park to meet her friends" and "At about noontime Sarah, yesterday, ran to the park to meet her friends," etc. Write three or four options on the board and see which student can spot the correctly structured sentence first. Reward correct guesses with small prizes as an incentive.
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Role Playing
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Letting students have a little fun will ensure that their grammar lesson stays with them. To prepare for this role-playing grammar game, assign students a part of speech; this will be their character for the day. Students must research what their part of speech does in a sentence. They must also imagine what their part of speech would look and sound like, what kind of an attitude they would have and how they would interact with the other parts of speech. Once each student has built her character, allow her five minutes in front of the class to give a short monologue that she has written up about her character. This activity should be especially useful for right-brain learners, who learn less rationally and are more intuitive and creative.
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References
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