Grammar lovers and grammar haters

There are two groups among language learners, the grammar lovers and the grammar haters. I would like to run a survey to find out which group is larger, at least among the readers of this blog. I would like your help in defining the two groups. I want to have two accurate definitions of these groups. How should I describe them. Here is a start. Remember, at this point, I do not want to know which group you belong to, I just want to know if these descriptions are accurate, if we can improve on them. The survey will come in a separate post.

Grammar lovers would say:

I love grammar, and I find it necessary to have a solid grasp of grammar in order to learn a language. I want to understand the logic of the language before I start. The many grammar terms are necessary in order to explain the intricacy of the language. Once I understand how the language works, I can learn it much faster. If I encounter a problem, I want an explanation of why this structure or word is used instead of another.

Grammar haters would say:

When I read grammar explanations my eyes glaze over. I cannot remember the explanations nor the various verb or noun endings or other details of grammar. I find most grammar terms, unhelpful and confusing and I ignore them. I prefer to get on with listening and reading, and acquiring words. Once I have some familiarity with the language, then I do not mind reviewing some grammar rules and tables, just to confirm what I have discovered, and possibly to fill in some gaps. When I encounter problems in the language, I just move on. I rarely ask why?

Posted via email from Lingosteve's place

Comments

[Damian]

If the two categories are basically grammar translation vs. input/assimilation, then that should be the distinction to make. You'll also need more options in your survey when you do present it. There's the old joke about "using statistics the way a drunk uses a lightpost: for support rather than illumination". That can apply to grammar as well, but for me I find I need to go back and forth between the two in order to be effective: Study some grammar so I know what to expect. Listen to some audio and hear structures I don't fully understand. Go back to a grammar to understand why things were formed in certain ways, and so on. So, include some definition that implies some sort of holistic approach to learning.

Unfortunately, non-polarized polls might end up with everybody taking the middle ground and not actually helping to see where your viewers fall. I'd suggest a 5-option poll. My bet is that most of the responses will fall on the not-quite-extreme options (so, options 2 and 4) as people will end up happier with their choice and not felt that they were forced into a "well, I chose A but I really wanted A plus some other stuff." I think a 5 option poll solves this issue.

[Katie]

I always thought I was a grammar lover, in that it seems to come naturally to me, but based on this description, I suppose I'm really a hater, but I still disagree with that, as I don't hate it at all!

I have rarely encountered anything that doesn't make sense, but when I do, I don't worry about it. I don't sit and study grammar, either. I would say that I have a high respect for it. I'm glad it got hammered into my head so soon when learning Russian. My regret is that I didn't spend as much time as I could have learning vocabulary by listening and reading. My Russian was not as powerful as it could have been. Now it seems like such a no brainer, and I'm slowly working on that now, and I don't even have to stop to figure out the grammar. I know it already.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Damian's idea is a good one I think. We could have these two definitions as extreme and ask people to place themselves on a scale of 1 to 5 relative to these poles. What do you all think?

[Steve Kaufmann]

Here is a proposed wording for the grammar lovers from Landorien at my Posterous blog

I would adjust the first description as follows:

I love grammar, and I find that having a solid grasp of grammar makes learning a language much easier. Since the structure and the components of the language are both indispensable and equal, I want to fully understand the logic of the language as my overall knowledge grows. The many grammar terms are necessary in order to explain the intricacy of the language. Once I understand how the language works, I can learn it much faster. If I encounter a problem, I want an explanation of why this structure or word is used instead of another.

[Courtney]

I don't think all grammar lovers necessarily like the terms used to describe different structures. I'm a bit of a grammar fan myself, but I hate seeing terms like "past progressive," etc. I prefer explanations along the lines of "If you want to say this, you need to put x ending on the verb stem." (Followed by plenty of examples.) I guess because I'm learning Korean, I wouldn't be able to understand any sentence if I didn't study the grammar first. So many endings are attached to nouns and verbs to determine the meaning of a sentence that a dictionary alone would not help me.

[Ivana]

Hi Steve,

Here's my "grammar lovers" definition:

I may not 'need' to learn grammar but I do so because I like it. Dipping into my grammar book gives me a quick way of understanding features of my L2 that might otherwise take a very long time to sink in. I easily understand the concepts behind the grammatical terminology, so I simply read them and move on; they doesn't confuse me or become an obstacle between me and my L2. I treat learning grammar as a supplement to getting as much native input as possible, not as a substitute for it.

Ok, that's it. :-)

[Els Withers]

I'm sure I fall into the "grammar lover" category, but I don't find your description completely apt as applied to myself. It might describe the majority of grammar lovers, though.

I would never attempt to absorb a big hunk of grammar unleavened by vocabulary, conversation, etc. My ultimate goal in studying a language is to be able to use it "unconsciously" so to speak--to "feel" what is correct and incorrect without deliberate analysis. However, I firmly believe some deliberate, artificial, analytic thinking can greatly hasten the process of absorbing the language into one's gut.

For example, in French class, I immediately and effortlessly mastered the distinction between "qui" and "que", whereas I think most of the other students never got it. My advantage was understanding on an analytic level the difference between relative and interrogative pronouns. It's hopeless to remember, "sometimes what is que and sometimes it's qui; sometimes whom is qui and sometimes it's que; but who is always qui."

Another issue I would take with your description is the implicit assumption that grammar only has value as a means to proficiency in the language--which might be true for some, but not for me. Even though English is my native language, I still find it interesting and valuable to ponder why it is correct to speak of a "long black stick" and incorrect to speak of a "black long stick."

[Laura]

Do you mean prescriptive grammar or descriptive grammar?

Prescriptive grammar gives you rules on how the ideal speaker ought to talk, but descriptive grammar tells you the reality of how native speakers actually talk without judging it as good or bad. I think you are talking about grammar in the prescriptive sense, but I think it would be useful to make the distinction.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Laura, I do not think that this distinction is important. I am referring to grammar as a theoretical explanation of how the language works, and whether that explanation refers to the "correct" norm, or to more common colloquial varieties does not really matter to me. The question is whether we prefer to learn by first exposing ourselves to the language (whatever variant we prefer) or by first understanding the terms and rules.

[Jonathan]

Steve,

Your last point made the most sense to me: you are trying to pinpoint where people prefer to "start" learning a language. If I try to fit myself into one of your two categories, I find that I just don't fit (as is often the case with these kinds of things, probably for most people). If you ask me though what my starting philosophy is, then it's the input/assimilation method, with graded input to begin with.

[Robert B]

I think I would fall into the 'lover' category, and I would suggest you need to add 'you enjoy learning about grammar and thinking about the differences between how languages work'. Also perhaps 'you feel frustrated when you know words and phrases but aren't sure of how they relate to each other gramatically'.

[Yousef]

I think this part in the grammar hater section:

"I prefer to get on with listening and reading, and acquiring words."

...is kind of loaded. It kind of gives the impression that grammar lovers don't read and listen to their target language? Grammar is still input,IMO, so the input-output dichotomy doesn't apply.

[Steve Kaufmann]

How would you describe the fact that I, for example, skip lightly over the grammar explanations and focus on listening and reading when I pick up a starter book in a language. I do not try to understand or remember the rules. I have a strong aversion to the grammar terms that are used to describe the language, and just look at some of the examples of how they say "this" in the language. How should this approach be described?

[Jonathan]

"I have a strong aversion to the grammar terms that are used to describe the language, and just look at some of the examples of how they say "this" in the language. How should this approach be described?"

Grammar with the curtains pulled back! But it's still focusing on how something works. For example, I kept seeing the pattern 越X越Y in my Chinese studies. I looked up a number of phrases using that pattern, and pieced together what it meant. I understand the grammar, I learned the grammar, but I can't tell you what it means in the language of grammar. Because I can't stand the terminology.

I guess it just depends on how you define grammar.

[Jean-Paul Setlak]

We all is learning the grammars from first one day. The question are: "do you prefer is the explicit or implicit approach come come in."

I remember having to deduce the grammar of medieval Punjabi from written texts. There were no books or oral teachings available on the topic anywhere (and was in the Punjab at the time). Medieval Punjabi for example has multiple case endings. Modern Punjabi only has two(kind of like the relationship of French and Latin). Punjabi speakers would always tell me those extra letters at the end of words had no meaning. It was great fun to figure it out. The insight would come: "oh that vowel is just a masculine singular ablative case ending!" But as a grammar lover I would always turn it into explicit explanations.

[Steve Kaufmann]

I can see that this subject is a little tricky, since grammar awareness can be achieved in many ways, through observation of patterns, through corrections, through explanations such as "this is how this is said" and using full blown grammatical terminology.

How about if we organize a "clinch" following the example of Echo Moskvi. Two people are invited to defend two different positions. The objective is to disagree. There is a moderator. Sometimes it turns out that the differences are not so great, and at other times the argument is very heated. A moderator makes sure both sides have equal time.

Is there anyone out there prepared to defend the grammar lovers' position? I will defend the grammar haters' position. We would also need a moderator. We would do this via skype and I would record it and post it.

[Steve Kaufmann]

I forgot to add the most important point. There is then a vote "Is your point of view closer to that of A or B?"

[Mark E]

I love grammar and find it interesting but I get that you have to acquire languages through comprehensible input primarily but I still enjoy the study of grammar for it's own sake and once I have an intuitive grasp of the language and how it works.

[Ben Shearon]

Grammar hater, I think. I learn by swimming in a language, not studying it...

[Mark]

I would classify myself as a grammar lover in that I'm interested in how languages work and how they are contstructed. I would say that I'm interested in Language, rather than grammar. I'm interested in the range of things that are possible in human language.

What I try to do now in my study, for grammar anyway, is to find sentences exemplifying different "patterns" or "points of grammar" and then I enter them into my SRS with a little note about what the phrase or pattern or whatever means. Sometimes my note is the English version of the sentence, sometimes it's just the meaning of a particular word in the sentence, sometimes it's a short explanation. I, personally, don't find anything confusing in the grammatical guides I've consulted. They don't seem to use a lot of jargon.

I think it would be helpful if Steve could post an example of what he means by a grammtical explanation that he finds confusing and unhelpful. I'm studying Japanese and most grammatical stuff I've come across gives a sentence in the target language, a sentence in the native language, and a short explanation of what it means and when it's used.

Now, I also like to consult technical linguistics resources and those would definitely be confusing to someone not familiar with the terminology and concepts, but I don't think that's what Steve is talking about.

I find that by doing a little dedicated "grammar" study regularly I get the following experiences: 1) I study something or see a new pattern explicitly, and then pretty soon I read it or hear it and am able to recognize it, 2) I "study" a new pattern and realize that I've read or heard it before, but didn't understand it at the time.

I think that what Steve is talking about is "grammar" in the sense of the grammar-translation approach. In that approach, grammar is a complex set of rules for changing one language into another one. They don't just say, this sentence means this. Or, this foreign sentence is equivalent to this native one. They try to give a "code" to transform one language into the other. I can't imagine anybody liking that.

I'll give the example of people studying English in Japanese schools. You want to see some fantastically confusing examples of grammar, it's a good place to look.

[David Hamberlin]

I know that I for one consider myself a grammar lover and a vocabulary hater. Obviously both must be acquired somehow to learn to speak a language at any sort of higher level - either through the explicit stating of rules and memorization of vocab, or through the gradual acquisition of both through repeated input. But for me, wrapping my mind around some new grammatical pattern, particularly on not present in my native language, is a joy. Memorizing vocabulary on the other hand feels like a chore.

[Steve Kaufmann]

David,
You represent the polar opposite of my predilections. I am hungry for words, and happily accept any new pattern in the language, however strange it seems, do not worry about why, nor the exceptions, nor whether I can reproduce or remember it, and just expect it to sink and become natural at some point in the future, while I continue to pursue the acquisition of words through interesting content.

[Jonathan]

I will say that in my personal experiences lots of grammar knowledge does not make up for a small vocabulary. Given the choice I would rather have tons of vocab knowledge at the expense of grammatical understanding.

[Valina]

I know a lot of grammarholics here in Japan. They are the ones who know everything about english grammar, but they tend to produce a lot of unnatural expressions. While they can make a grammatically correct sentence, what they say is really strange and unnatural because they don't spend the time in the language, picking up the natural nuances of native and developing a feel for the language.

they need more input, and less study of English grammar rules in Japanese

I would rather talk to somebody who has input, has a feel for the language and makes grammatical errors, than somebody who has perfect grammar but with no feel for how the language is suppose to be

[Mark]

I guess I would say too that I don't see a huge difference between grammar and vocab. Words have meanings, as do grammatical constructions. I don't include a lot of jargon in my grammar study. I just don't make a big difference between grammar and vocab.

[Street-Smart Language Learning]

@Damian: "Study some grammar so I know what to expect. Listen to some audio and hear structures I don't fully understand. Go back to a grammar to understand why things were formed in certain ways, and so on." Your approach sounds like mine.

@Steve: A few points...

- I agree with Courtney on the grammar terms. They're totally unnecessary, and I'm perfectly content to avoid them. Whether you like to get into the grammar terms is probably a separate question to be decided among the pro-grammar folks, so I'd drop that from this discussion altogether. So it's not "terms and rules", it's just "rules".
- I'd drop the subjectivity of "love/hate" as well. What you're asking is how we objectively approach grammar, so there's no need to cloud the waters with something subjective like that. To take myself as an example, I don't feel like I love grammar at all but besides that I largely fall into your "grammar lover" box. The crux of the issue is from where do you primarily learn the grammar at the outset: materials that seek to directly explain grammar rules, or from input.
- I also like Damian's gradation approach. The most extreme position would be from 100% grammar-explaining materials until the grammar's satisfactorily understood, and then and only then moving on to other things. The other extreme would be 100% exposure, never looking at anything that tries to explain the grammar. So you might set up the poll as 100:0, 75:25, 50:50, 25:75, 0:100. Perhaps it'd be more interesting to just let everyone set their own division and then plot that on a chart.

And I'd be happy to defend the pro-grammar position in a "clinch".

@David Hamberlin: I'm definitely on the pro-grammar side of things, but I'm strongly with Steve in that vocabulary is king. As I've noted before, if you tally up all of the individual pieces of information that comprise a language into a pie chart, vocabulary is going to have by far the biggest slice of the pie. So even if you tackle a good chunk of grammar up front as I prefer to do, grammar is still just a short prelude to the real work of learning vocabulary and phrases.

[Mark]

Another way to think of it maybe is that a grammar reference book is to grammar basically as a dictionary is to words. You consult a dictionary to clarify a word, and you use a grammar reference to clarify a grammatical construction.

I honestly don't see much of a difference between the two. You consult them as you need/want to.

I think the mistake in the past was that people tried to commit a grammar reference book to memory. And we now know that this is not only impossible, but not helpful.

[victor]

I have a spade. Do I love it? No.I neve kiss it, I never hug it or whisper sweet nothing in its ear. It doesn't have ears at all. Do I hate my spate or despise it? Why should I hate a spade? It stay peacefully in a corner of a shed. Why I need it? It is good to dig a hole in the ground with. Do I prefer to use a spade to dig up a bed for carrots or I like to do it with bare hands? I better will use a spade. Even if Echo Moskvi tells me that all evil things happennig in the world are due to using of spades I would hardly believe them. I am astonished at people who have such strong feeling about spades. In my view it's a bad idea to divide ouselves into two armies and start a warfare on the issue of spades. And I agree with most of you that I am a wicked troll.

[FluentCzech]

I think I love grammar, but I hate my poor memory. Whenever I try to cram grammar from books, I am excited at first, but the memories fade quickly. I feel disappointed, but try again a day or two later with the same dismal result. It ends up being a series of one night stands with the grammar that leave me exhausted and disillusioned.

I want to be able to embrace the grammar, in a long term relationship, that I can depend on for life. No more short term flings for me. Instead, I prefer a deeper and longer lasting intimacy with grammar that comes from a slow seduction of the language through literature.

[Tamara]

"We are what we repeatedly do.Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit" Aristotle
P.S. Once one of my students said : I was koshmared (nightmared)-Russian кошмар with grammar in my childhood .Now I am not…"

[Tamara]

25 years ago a psychologist from Vladivostok -his name was Vladislav Milashevitch - made an uforgettable present to us here. It was his revolutionary LOGICAL GRAMMAR METHOD which spread all over the USSR and is still rather popular and effective for the scientists who want to read the scientific papers ASAP, as they are lack of time for studying the language to that end.The LGM training takes 3 days , then three days of practice, after which the trainee could read his articles easily even if he began "from zero" This was a kind of . "urgent help", the first step for the beginners and for those who played fool at E.lessons at schools. Unfortunately, V.Milashevich died suddenly in 1991 but there are HIS some followers and disciples to whom I dare think I belong; I worked out some additional grammar stuff for schools and then continued with vocabulary and listening to put all these together, so that with the use of Steve's and A.J.'s blogs I'm " well armed"

[Steve Kaufmann]

Vince, you are on, but I have two reservations

1) You are a lawyer
2) You seem to disagree more on input versus output than on the grammar issue.

But name your weapons (and time and place)!

[Steve Kaufmann]

Mark,

I see a big difference between vocabulary and grammar. Words are the building blocks of the language, each one necessary to express a concept in the language. Grammar consists of rules and definitions that attempt to explain relationships between words, or rules on how these words change. A set of rules for explaining the cross word puzzle. I prefer to just get at the cross word puzzle.

Once we get beyond the most basic description of how the words work in a language, dealing with the words directly, through massive input, is, to me at least, more effective than using the filter known as grammar.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Victor,

Grammar is only a spade if we find it a useful tool. Unlike a spade, what is useful in learning is very much a function of our emotions, our likes and dislikes. For whatever reason I find the deliberate study of grammar not very useful. The occasional review of grammar helps a little, I think, but my retention of the rules and declension tables is very short lived.

[victor]

Steve, it seems you are the only one who notices my posts. A sad fact to reflect upon. If I only had a miracle to sell!

[Steve Kaufmann]

Victor,

We have to assume that many people lurk and only read, and only a few comment. ( The elite -:))

[Mark]

Ok, well, I can only speak for my Japanese study at the moment, but I find most of the grammar is just explaining the meaning of phrases or constructions. To give a really simple example

できるようになる If I saw an explanation that says "to become able to to do something" and a couple example sentences and maybe a note about when it's used or how it's similar or different to some other expression, then that's grammar, isn't it?

So, I guess I think of that as a language "chunk" and just remember it that way, kind of like vocabulary. I just remember that phrase. Now I can say ひらがなを読めるようになった or anything I want with that expression.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Mark,

Words and phrases, including phrases that embody specific patterns are, in my view, a part of vocabulary. The rules and terminology used to describe these patterns are not part of vocabulary, but part of grammar. I save lots of phrases at LingQ for their specific grammatical patterns, but avoid the explanations and terminology. Good luck.

[Mark]

Well, I suppose a book could try to get into exactly what ように means or make it complicated somehow.

I guess the books I have just don't have a lot of rules and terminology. It's mostly just phrases and then what they mean.

Maybe when I get back to European langauge, I'll see more of what you're talking about.

I think I understand now what you mean by grammar study, and I can say that I don't do any of that at all.

I study grammar the way I said above, by understanding phrases. What does 行くことになった mean and how does it differ from 行くことにした. I don't worry about the internal parts, and none of the books I have really try to get into explaining the internal stuff.

[Mark]

Or like, 行ったことがある versus 行くことがある. The tense of the verb completely changes the meaning of the phrase, so it's valid to say that with a past tense verb it means this, and with a present tense verb it means that.

[john]

How about the master himself helping us with the categories?
From Krashen's book "Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition"

The first would be what grammar haters believe to be the best method:
"Language acquisition is a subconscious process; language acquirers are not usually aware of the fact that they are acquiring language, but are only aware of the fact that they are using the language for communication. The result of language acquisition, acquired competence, is also subconscious. We are generally not consciously aware of the rules of the languages we have acquired. Instead, we have a "feel" for correctness. Grammatical sentences "sound" right, or "feel" right, and errors feel wrong, even if we do not consciously know what rule was violated. Other ways of describing acquisition include implicit learning, informal learning, and natural learning. In non-technical language, acquisition is "picking-up" a language."

And the grammar lover believes this method is best:
"The second way to develop competence in a second language is by language learning. We will use the term "learning" henceforth to refer to conscious knowledge of a second language, knowing the rules, being aware of them, and being able to talk about them. In non-technical terms, learning is "knowing about" a language, known to most people as "grammar", or "rules". Some synonyms include formal knowledge of a language, or explicit learning."

[Street-Smart Language Learning]

Next week is Golden Week here in Japan, so (barring work unexpectedly popping up, which it's known to do) I'm pretty flexible through next Wednesday. Place has gotta be Skype, I suppose, unless you're coming to Tokyo.

But I have one reservation:

1) You are a savvy businessman who knows how to handle lawyers.

I'd say we have enough of a difference in opinion on grammar that it'll be interesting. The input/output thing ties in to some degree, but there's enough meat in grammar alone for a fun debate.

[Steve Kaufmann]

OK Vince, you are on. I am also flexible. My evenings are your mornings, so we could go Monday evening my time which is Tuesday morning your time. How about 9.00 am Tuesday morning your time. I am lingosteve on skype and will call you or you can call me. I will record it. I think we do not need a moderator. If you talk too much I will hang up.

[Street-Smart Language Learning]

Haha, I was thinking the same thing about you talking too much, so I guess the threat of mutually assured (debate) destruction means we don't need a moderator.

Argh, 9 a.m. on a holiday? You're killing me!

I'm gonna drop you an email as that'll probably be quicker to set up a time.