Watch Your Language Blog

I want to learn a language, but...

I don't want to learn any grammar. If someone were to say to you, "I want to learn how to swim, but I don't want to get wet," what would you think? That's exactly what I think when someone says "I want to learn a new language, but I don't want to learn any grammar." For a language learner, grammar is, to push the metaphor a bit, like water for a swimmer. It's all around you, you can't avoid it, sometimes you struggle through it, but it holds you up and makes it possible to swim in the first place. But while swimmers are universally grateful for water, grammar gets a bad rap from a lot of language learners.

So a question that we ask around here is, why do so many people hate "grammar" so much? (Since, honestly, we're language dorks who enjoy looking at a nice verb conjugation or noun declension; we love grammar.) It probably all comes down to three points: a mistaken belief that language can somehow be separated from grammar, negative associations that people have with the word grammar, and a disconnect between learning rules and memorizing forms on the one hand, and actually using them in real, live speech on the other.

On the first point, just as the swimmer needs to get wet, the language learner needs to deal with grammar. Setting aside the swimming metaphor, you can't use a language without using grammar. Every time you string two words together, you're using grammar. (Grammar is present even when you say a single word, but we don't need to get that esoteric here.) Everything down to the simple order of words in a language is determined by the grammar of that language. So, put simply, you can't learn a language without learning grammar, and even if you think you're not learning grammar, trust me, you really are. Unless you're a parrot, and it's unlikely that parrots are really learning languages...

On the second point, many people form negative associations with the word grammar because they've had bad experiences with it, or at least with one possible way of addressing it. What people probably mean when they say "I don't want to learn grammar" is really: "Please for the love of God do not make me go back to my high school Spanish class and sit there memorizing the pretérito of irregular verbs until I've lost the will to live." Which, I think, is a perfectly reasonable request. But it's not so much a request not to learn grammar as it's a plea not to learn grammar in a particular way. Like it or not, if you're learning Spanish, at some point you're going to have to learn that the third person singular preterit of ir is fue. Just like learners of English have to learn went instead of goed. Sure, that's going to involve memorizing an irregular form, but it doesn't mean that the form has to be memorized outside of a meaningful and practical context. Or that it has to be dull, painful, and disconnected.

Which brings us to the third point. We try very hard in our courses to add a spoonful of sugar to what for many learners is the bitter taste of grammar. We believe strongly that it's possible - no, essential - to teach grammar in a kind and gentle way, and to meaningfully integrate it into the practical language skills that people are interested in. Kind and gentle means avoiding unnecessary grammatical terminology, or, in those cases where terminology makes it easier to talk about a particular point, explaining in plain English what the terminology means. Learners will find that they already know a concept perfectly well, even possibly from their native language, but they just haven't learned the jargon used by language teachers to talk about that concept. So we draw a connection between what language learners already know in their native language, and what they're trying to learn in their new language. We explain each point clearly and concisely, and we give plenty of simple examples to illustrate. But it's important not to stop there. Grammar is often presented a system of rules to plod through outside of any practical context. In our courses, though, the grammar is immediately plugged into a practical and meaningful context. Grammar is presented as a starting point - a means to an end that helps the learner digest the "rules" and put them to good use right away.

For example, there's a whole battery of grammatical points that come in handy at a restaurant: command forms like "please pass the salt," quantity expressions like "I'd like some water"; and pronouns like "bring me the check." Of course there are plenty of others, but the trick is to isolate a few of the really useful points, and present them in a context where the grammar seems to take a back seat. Instead of focusing on labels like "the imperative," "partitives," and "indirect object pronouns," along with the relevant rules and paradigms, the more meaningful and enjoyable focus is how to order food in a restaurant. We do cover the relevant grammar, rules and paradigms and all, but it's immediately connected to real life use of language. Not only does this context take away some of the pain of learning grammar, but it also makes it much easier for the learner to practice and assimilate the relevant constructions.

We can't take all the credit for making it easy to learn grammar, though. The truth is that people are actually very well equipped to learn grammar. Grammar is (for the most part) a nice and (sort of) logical system. It's not logical in the mathematical sense, and there are pretty much always exceptions and irregularities that have to be memorized, but it's a system, and human beings are good at learning systems. If you're a baby human being, learning a language system is simply a case of hard-wiring. Hear a language, map it onto the innate language faculty you're born with, and presto! Out comes a fully formed grammar, within a few years at least. For people who aren't babies or young children, the process isn't quite so automated, but adults and teenagers have experience learning things, and they can bring that experience to bear in the task of learning the grammar of a new language. They can compare a new grammar to the one that they know already, they can memorize irregularities with only a little bit of heartache, and with practice they can get enough of a hold on a new grammar so that it becomes fluid, even if not quite native fluent.

So if you're tempted to say "I want to learn a language, but I don't want to learn any grammar," first try to swim in an empty pool. Then assure yourself that grammar isn't an optional add-on or some kind of lumbering beast that holds you back as you learn a new language. Better yet, remember that grammar doesn't have to be painful or abstract, and as a speaker of one language, you're perfectly equipped to understand and learn the grammar of other languages. (CHRIS)

Tags: learning grammar
June 10, 2008