What is a sentence anyway?
"Make sure you have a capital letter at the beginning of your sentence, and a full stop at the end". We've all been there, we've probably all either said it or had it said to us.
I think most people who have ever paid any attention to a child's early composition will have seen a neat row of dots at the end of every line of writing, regardless of it's grammatical position.
Those educated in the dim and distant 1980's, like myself, will remember very little formal grammar. It simply wasn't taught beyond nouns, verbs and adjectives.
It's not that I don't use grammar, it is just very difficult to understand the terminology. I know when it's there and can spot when it isn't, but I couldn't explain a past participle if my life depended upon it.
My understanding of grammar is implicit. It has never been explicit.
My understanding of grammar is implicit. It has never been explicit.
With the new curriculum focus on SPAG, grammar is hot again. It is even tested in year 6. Eek!
To clarify: In order to be a sentence, a group of words must have a subject and a predicate (which could be an action). 'The dog is sitting' is a simple sentence. It can be made more complex with the addition of adjectives or subordinate clauses, but the subject and the predicate must remain.
To clarify: In order to be a sentence, a group of words must have a subject and a predicate (which could be an action). 'The dog is sitting' is a simple sentence. It can be made more complex with the addition of adjectives or subordinate clauses, but the subject and the predicate must remain.
So, how on Earth can we make grammar accessible to children in the early stages of formal language acquisition or with language impairment, for those children for whom grammar is not being picked up naturally?
In practise, these are the children who find it difficult to answer simple questions with more than a single word, or use basic statements to express wants and needs.
"Miss, need toilet."
In practise, these are the children who find it difficult to answer simple questions with more than a single word, or use basic statements to express wants and needs.
"Miss, need toilet."
I was lucky enough to spend some time with a very talented Speech and Language Therapist who was supporting a child in my class. She introduced me to Shape Coding, designed and introduced by Susan Ebbels, which you can learn about here.
As a teacher, I need to help children speak in sentences in order for them to write in sentences.
Shape coding makes this possible in a simple, visual format.
What is learned naturally for most people, has to be taught explicitly to children with Language Disorders.
What I have found is that the large majority of children in our current world of moving on very quickly from skill to skill, also benefit from a bit of explicit teaching. I have seen that taking Shape Coding a little farther and using it to support children's writing, can have dramatic positive effects. Importantly, children can see their own success and begin to self-assess.
A shape for each part of the sentence means we can help children to see how to improve their sentence composition and consequently, their writing. I have seen children write a relevant string of sentences with nouns, verbs, adjectives and conjunctions correctly, wheras they may have previously struggled to write a few words or indeed form a complete sentence verbally.
I love it when something works.
What is learned naturally for most people, has to be taught explicitly to children with Language Disorders.
What I have found is that the large majority of children in our current world of moving on very quickly from skill to skill, also benefit from a bit of explicit teaching. I have seen that taking Shape Coding a little farther and using it to support children's writing, can have dramatic positive effects. Importantly, children can see their own success and begin to self-assess.
A shape for each part of the sentence means we can help children to see how to improve their sentence composition and consequently, their writing. I have seen children write a relevant string of sentences with nouns, verbs, adjectives and conjunctions correctly, wheras they may have previously struggled to write a few words or indeed form a complete sentence verbally.
I love it when something works.
