BRING GRAMMAR FROM TEXTBOOKS TO LEARNERS’ LIVES JAYA VERMA Research Scholar The English and Foreign Languages University, Lucknow. Jayaverma007@gmail.com 9044445706 After Macaulay’s Minute (1835), education system of India assimilated English so profoundly that all the state and national boards made it one of the ‘subjects’ of their curriculum. This is the area where all the problems of English ‘language’ teaching lie. Elizabeth (2007) says that the teacher as well learners consider it as “knowledge subject” and not as “skill subject”. The objective of the present paper is to explain that English, a medium of communication, has remained mere a ‘subject’ in the classrooms rather than a ‘language’. Ignoring its role as a language is tantamount to ignoring its importance as a medium of communication. Language is a system used as a means of communication. As a system language is made up of some basic units such as words, phrases, sentences; it has a particular structure. To learn to use this system or to know how this system functions we need to acquire certain language skills. The basic language skills are: listening, speaking, reading and writing. At one point of time, grammar was taught as a subject and sentence analysis was more important. The focus first and foremost was on the forms of language. Today, the functional use of language has acquired importance. That is, we have started looking at language teaching in socio-cultural settings, and not only at language form. We focus on language primarily as a medium for communication. Tiwari (2008) supports communicative aspect of teaching and mentions Thompson’s four specific aims of teaching: To understand spoken English To speak English To understand written English To write English METHODOLOGY: Evaluation process of language learning consolidates the fact that examiners do not evaluate communication skill but test learners’ knowledge of grammatical structure as it is taught as a knowledge-subject like Science or History. To justify the argument examination papers of National Board (ISC) and State Board (U.P.) were analysed on the principles of Communicative Teaching Approach( Morrow: 1981) FINDINGS: Format of question papers (2012) National Board (ISC) State Board (U.P.) Reading comprehension passage Reading comprehension passage Composition Composition Letter-writing Letter-writing Report writing _ Structure –based exercises on parts of speech Structure –based exercises on parts of speech Vocabulary Vocabulary _ Translation ANALYSIS and RESULT: Testing communication skills or language skills should be paramount aim of evaluation process. The following result shows although boards have made efforts towards it, they could not achieve it fully. Comprehension (reading skill) - The objective of syllabus behind including reading comprehension passage is to monitor reading skill of the learners. This objective fairly meets with objective of language teaching pedagogical principles but the way this type of question is attempted by learners does reflect learners’ reading comprehension ability. Richard, Platt and Weber (1985) provides following level of comprehension: Speed Purpose Good reader Slow Study reading, used when material is difficult and or/high comprehension 200-300 words per minute 80%-90% comprehension Average Used for everyday reading of magazines, newspapers etc. 250-500 wpm 70% comprehension Fast Skimming, used when highest speed is required, comprehension intentionally lower. 800+ wpm 50% comprehension. During the examination, examiners do not monitor the time taken by student in attempting reading comprehension rather students are given marks on the basis of answer they give. Thus, it does not prove a good test to evaluate reading skill during summative evaluation. So, students never get to know ‘what they are doing’ and the purpose of communicative approach is not achieved. Composition & Letter writing – A well-composed essay is a good example of learners’ writing skill but during examination it is mugged up by students ignoring general principles of writing skill as: unity, coherence, topic sentence, logical sequence etc. Practically, at the time of evaluation, it is not possible for an evaluator to check all these due to limitation of time allotted for evaluation. Teachers teach letter writing by teaching salutation and greeting. There is no emphasis on formal/informal words and sentence structure. This is the reason, evaluator finds most of the letters full of cliché, over-polite conventional sentence structures. Structure-based exercises (Grammar) – Structure-based exercises prove very good in improving accuracy but they do not help learners in achieving fluency. Teachers should use functional grammar for this purpose. Brumfit’s (1984) “fluency-based model” of language teaching suggests that there should be a gradual shift from accuracy-based activity to fluency-based activities. Vocabulary- Prof. V. K. Gokak; famous Kannada writer and English scholar says, (in Elizabeth: 2007; 40) “It has been estimated that students hardly know 1500 words by the time they join a university. This means that they have hardly been able to learn English words at the rate of one word per period. They do not know how to use the commonest structures of English” In both the boards students are asked antonyms, synonyms, homophones, homonyms etc. but it does not help them in real life situation to communicate using these words. Words are governed by morpho-syntactic rules for example, word ‘big’ has synonyms large, vast, and huge but large, vast, huge can be collocated with place and building but not with person while ‘big’ can be collocated with person. Johnson (1976) advocated “task-oriented” language teaching would be in state of readiness to select word for particular situation unless they are put into situation with the scope to make such selection. Translation- In U.P. board translation passages are given to translate. A successful practice of translation is dependent on all the different aspects underlying any language use, such as: the polysemous character of words; the diversity of registers, styles, and idioms and the variety of language forms and uses. The wrong use of any of these will lead miscommunication. Both the boards totally ignored speaking and listening skills, in spite of the fact that students learn language to communicate. The skills which are tested even they cannot be justified on the principle of Communicative Language Teaching. Language teaching requires well-organized integration of language skills as well as functional grammar in methodology and evaluation process. This paper draws conclusion that language teachers not only need to explore grammar of forms but grammar of functions. Controlled exercises and patterned drill do not allow students to practice skills required to communicate. So, English language classroom and evaluation process should be based on ‘task-based’ activity rather on ‘form-based’ exercises. Bibliography Brumfit, C.J. Communicative Methodology in Language Teaching-the Role of Fluency and Accuracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1984. Elizabeth, M. E. S. & D. B. Rao. Methods of Teaching English. Discovery Publishing House: New Delhi. 2007. Johnson, K. ‘The Production of Fundamental Materials and Their Interpretation within Existing Language Teaching Programmes’ ELT Documents, 76/1:16-25 Morrow, K., Johnson, K. Communication in the Classroom. Longman.1981. Richard, Platt and Weber. Longman Dictinary of Applied Linguistics. Bungay: Longman.1985. Tiwari, S. R. Teaching of English. APH Publishing Corporation: New Delhi. 2008. 5