A report of the findings

Grammar is a description of the rules for forming sentences, including an account of the
meanings that these forms convey. It is one of the most vital skills in learning English. This is
because it is an indicator on our proficiency in English. “There is no doubt that a knowledge-
implicit or explicit-of grammatical rules is essential for the mastery of a language” (Penny Ur,
1988). It underlies the fact that the grammar plays the essential role in the language learning
process, not only in the native language learning but also in the foreign language learning.
Grammar learning will help language learners have a better understanding in the knowledge of
language and then applying the language structure accurately in their language use. Some people
prefer to have fluency rather than accuracy. However, I strongly believe that fluency and
accuracy are fairly important that we can put efforts to polish the skills. In accomplishing the
task, I have to provide a report based on the analysis of student’s essays entitled “How I spent
my last school holiday.” I have analysed five essays that show their understanding on how to use
the correct tense in writing the essay. I have picked the essays randomly which were written by
four girls and one boy. The description and justification of the method will be elaborated more
in this report. At the same time, this report will consist of student’s ability to use present and past
tenses in essay writing. The justification of the grammar instruction will be elaborated as a whole
based on the analysis of all the essays.

In teaching of grammar, there are two methods that we could utilize such as explicit and
implicit in the Grammar instruction. The method that I plan to use is explicit method based on
my findings. Explicit teaching involves directing student attention toward a specific learning
objective in a highly structured environment. Topics are taught in a logical order directed by the
teacher through demonstration, explanation and practice. Explicit teaching also involved
modelling thinking patterns. This involves a teacher thinking out loud while working through a
“problem” to help students understand how they should think about accomplishing a task. The
attention of students is very important since explicit teaching is very teacher-centred. Explicit
teaching is closely related to deductive teaching, which means that rules are given before any
examples are seen. Building a culture of learning within today’s classrooms requires teachers and
students to jointly engage in teaching and learning that is purposeful, relevant and clearly
defined.
 With the formal instruction to language teaching highlighted by Ellis (1994), the
distinction of explicit and implicit instruction to grammar teaching can be identified. In addition
to the explicit instruction, learners will be provided with specific grammatical rules and then
practice how to use it in some way. Similarly, the issues about whether grammar should be
taught inductively and deductively are also related to Ellis‘s focus (Roberts, 1998). According to
these debated issues, a number of studies have been conducted to seek out which approach to
grammar teaching is the most effective one. However, most comparative studies related to these
issues in the 1960s and 1970s did not show considerable differences between the success of
explicit and implicit approach to grammar teaching (Ellis, 1994). It is worth mentioning that one
exception of the findings done by Von Elek and Oskarsson (1975). They found that many
explicit methods were better than implicit methods, but the study only showed the benefit of
explicit methods was only for adults and very intelligent teenagers. In addition, Seliger (1975)
found that adult ESL learners who studied in the United States have deepened their knowledge of
rules when they are involved in the explicit grammar instruction. Furthermore, some empirical
studies provide the evidence to support the effects of grammatical instructions with specific
target language forms (e.g. Cadierno, 1995; Doughty, 1991; Lightbown & Spada, 1990). These
studies indicate that grammatical instruction will promote foreign language learners
‘achievements in accuracy. According to these empirical studies, hence, it shows the explicit
grammar teaching would play an importance role in the foreign language classroom. There are
two main types of errors within an error analysis framework: Interlingual and intralingual. I
Interlingual errors are those that can be attributed to the L1 (they involve cross-linguistic
comparisons). I Intralingual errors are those which are due to the language being learned
independent of the L1.

Firstly, I would like to describe about the best essay that I have marked based on all the
essays that I obtained from Year 6 pupils (refer to appendix 1) . I assume she has written less
error compared to the others. Some of the mistakes that I have identified were word choice,
sentence structure, subject verb agreement, plural nouns, preposition and not consistent use of
past tense in the essay. The essay should be in past tense but she could not indicate the subject
verb agreement like “were” and “had” in the essay. In overall, I would say that she made her best
effort to write this essay. Insufficient of vocabulary could be one of the problems for the writer
as she should write the “car boot” as “but”. In fact, she has problem in sentence structure where
she should write “can also” instead of “also can”. The word “check” should be in past tense form
which “checked” when all the verbs are in past tense form. In fact, direct translation was also
written in this essay where I spotted the sentence of “rest ourselves” which is not appropriate.
The major error that I could see from the essay is the use of verb to be “is” which I can conclude
that the writer has confused about the tense in the essay. I have also encounter the problem of
preposition in the essay which the writer has written unnecessary preposition like “at” to mention
the time. As general, the major part of the essay that I want to highlight is about the tense used.
The error analysis would be descriptive which it highlights the verb phrase of simple past tense.
The pupil is able to write well despite of minor errors in the essay but still she could not be
consistent in the use of present and past tenses. As the first word of the essay is “last”, the pupils
should be able to know that all the verbs must be in past tense form as the title itself is “How I
spent my last holiday”. The word “spent” has clearly indicates that the essay should be written in
past tense form. In general, this is my findings on the first essay that I remark as appendix 1 in
the attachment part.

Secondly, the essay is written quite well based on the sentence structure (appendix 2). In
overall, she could write well as in line with the first essay. Likewise, she has the problems on
how to choose the correct tense, word choice, verb to be and irregular verb. Some of the
sentences have been written in sequence despite of minor errors. For example, the subject forgets
to put “verb to be” of “was” to show her father is driving on that time. She started the essay by
writing the phrase “last holiday”. The sentence “My family was enjoyed” showed her
understanding that she could not differentiate the proper verb instead of using it redundantly. She
should know the correct way to write it is by using only one verb to show past tense. “My family
enjoyed” will be the correct sentence to show past tense form. In fact, the word of “going” is
evidence that the writer could not write past tense form consistently. She should write, “Before
we went in” instead of “before going in”. At the same time, insufficient of vocabulary
knowledge seems to be one of the problems why the essay could not portray the good form of
past tense essay. The words like “buy” and “am” should be replaced to “bought” and “was”. The
verb to be is really vital as it is one of the elements in showing past tense form for an action. Last
but not least, the writer should know where the best place to put the correct verb is and how to
use the best word choice. All in all, I should compliment the pupils for her good try in writing
this essay. The error analysis is also descriptive whereby it focuses on verb phrase.
 Other than that, I have analysed an essay written by a boy (appendix 3). The problems
that he encounters in writing the essay are about subject verb agreement, sentence structure and
mainly about the tense used which is past tense. The major problem that I could see is about he
tends to make all the verbs to be past tense which is unnecessary. For example, in the third
paragraph, the pupils wrote the word “liked” as he wanted to indicate it as past tense. The error
analysis is about surface structure where it highlighted the error analysis of addition. However,
that is not the right way to write. At the same time, lack of vocabulary in past tense form
encourages him to write the present tense for some verbs in the essay. The words such as “go”,
“is” and “feel” should not be written as the title itself clearly stated that the essay should be in
past tense form. The writer somehow confuse on which tense to be used as it mix with the use of
present tense. Other than that, the pupil does not able to write the sentences in correct word
structure when he wrote “I and my family”. The word structure should be “My family and I” and
he tends to repeat the same mistake in the next paragraph (paragraph 3). The major problem that
I can conclude is about the use of “is” as verb to be in the essay. The pupil should not write it in
a way that “is” is the auxiliary verb for present tense. Meanwhile, I have identified the spelling
error of “scrumptious” food but it is a good try to write something rare compared to the other
candidates. All in all, the pupil is able to write the essay in past tense form despite of some
mistakes in the verb used.

Next, the essay is written by the next respondent (appendix 4). The same title is given.
The major problem that I have identified in the essay is about the usage of wrong auxiliary verb
to indicate past tense form. Again, the pupil likes to use the verb “is” instead of “was” and most
of the verbs written are in present tense form. Lack of vocabulary exposure may be a reason why
she could not write some verbs in past tense. In fact, she had added some words into past tense
form which is not in the right context. For example, she has written the verb like “waked” and
“exited”. She disobeys the rule of grammar which we should not change any verb when we use
“to”. The following verb must be root word which is present tense. However, she could not
understand that some verbs must be added “ed” to show its past tense form. She just write in a
way that “is” is used as past tense essay. Other than that, I could see that the writer is having
problem in sentence structure when she writes “things important” as she should write “important
things”. In general, the use of past tense verb must be emphasised in order to improve her writing
in the essay. The major problem would be the verb to be in past tense where the verbs like “was”
and “were” should be added in subject verb agreement. I would advise the writer to be more
careful in writing sentences and she must obey to the rules of capitalization, punctuation and
spelling. In spite of her weaknesses, the teacher could plan a better lesson in future so that all the
problems could be solved eventually.

Lastly, (refer to appendix 5), the pupil could not write the correct verb of paste tense
(descriptive) when she always repeat the same mistake by writing present tense form of verb. At
the same time, subject verb agreement tends to be the main problem as she still writes the verb to
be like “is” and “are”. The person has also facing another problem which related to spelling error
in writing the word “youngest”. She has written the word as “youngest” and same goes to the
word “problems” as she has written it as “promblems”. Other than that, the writer has the
problem of writing the sentences in using dialogue format such as “don’t” and also “it’s”. The
pupil should write it in full sentence such as “do not” and “it is”. All in all, I assume that the
essay should be improved by polishing student’s knowledge about the tense especially in past
tense. This is because most of the errors made are from the tense used. The pupil is not consistent
in writing the essay in past tense form as she gets confused with the subject verb agreement as
well as the verb to be. The plot of the story is well plotted and I would agree that the writer
should be consistent in writing the past tense so that it will be a better essay. The confusion of
writing future tense has been proved as she could not use the correct past tense in the essay. The
phrase like “will brought” should not happen if the student has the strong knowledge of writing
past tense essay.

The method that I have chosen is explicit way whereby grammar is taught inductively.
An inductive approach starts with some examples from which a rule is inferred. In solving all the
pupils’ problems, I would suggest to plan a lesson where I introduce the basic rules on how a
verb is formed to past tense. This is because some of the pupils might confuse which particular
rule need to be modified and which are not. In the lesson, I should explain that past tense verb is
used to show past action whereby some of the verbs will be changed to another form. For
example, I will show a table and explain about the rules. Some of the verbs could be changed
into past tense form by adding “ed”, “d”, “ied” and also total change. These are the rules that
they need to obey and I will give them an example on how to construct sentences correctly. The
pupils must be exposed to the correct word structure so that they know how to form sentences
correctly. Before that, I will introduce the lesson by showing some verb using flashcards even
though they are in Year 6 class. Some of them love to guess and I could integrate meaningful
learning for the lesson. They have to guess the past tense form of the shown verb so that I could
know their level of understanding as overall.

In the next stage, I could proceed to explain some of the rules as I mentioned earlier.
After that, the pupils will have to accomplish a worksheet whereby they have to answer three
sections of the question. The sections will be included with objective, subjective and essay
question so that they could practise more o the exercises. Practise makes perfect. I would suggest
that pupils could be given a task whereby they have to write an essay based on the words given
as well as the visuals. This is because it will give them a better understanding on how to create
sentences correctly. The word structures are given and they could simply refer to it. The teacher
can play his or her part by giving more examples on the explanation given so that pupils will
have a better understanding regarding the rule. I prefer to write an essay so that the pupils will
know how to write step by step. The teacher could demonstrate on how to write by asking all the
pupils’ ideas. They have to brainstorm their ideas so that they know how to write correctly. The
teacher can also ask a particular pupil to give ideas on how to write the sentence. Indirectly, the
teacher can explain more and uses ripple effect action where the other pupils will learn as well.
These are all the methods that I plan to use as I strongly agree that explicit approach is rather
better because it gets straight to the point and can therefore be time-saving. In completing the
task they have to be in pairs as they will have to discuss to each other. In Malaysian context,
pupils get few opportunities to communicate in English. They will converse in English only
when they are asked to do so. Furthermore, as what Faith Hsiao (2005) said, from the theoretical
perspective which supports communicative tasks, language is best learned through interaction.
This statement is supported by Cheon (2003) “Activities are structured so that all learners will
talk as a means of sharing ideas and opinions, collaborating toward a single goal, or completing
to achieve individual goals”.
 In conclusion, I believe that assorted teachers have numerous approaches to execute the
teaching of grammar and I would recommend using explicit approach whereby students will be
able to acquire accuracy in writing the essay using past tense form. In grammar context, they will
be able to construct sentences correctly and eventually knowing the rules in English. Some
problems are clearly stated based on my analysis as it will be a food for thought especially for
my self reflection as a teacher. As a teacher, I need to delve more on teaching methods and get
ready to gain knowledge as many as I can.

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