Aldersgate College Teaching and Assessment of Grammar

College of Arts, Sciences, and Education Junelyn G. Villar

Teaching grammar through songs and rhymes

Songs
Since the meaning is an important device in teaching grammar, it is important to contextualize
any grammar point. Songs are one of the most enchanting and culturally rich resources that
can easily be used in language classrooms. Songs offer a change from routine classroom
activities. They are precious resources to develop student’s abilities in listening, speaking,
reading, and writing. They can also be used to teach a variety of language items such as
sentence patterns, vocabulary, pronunciation, rhythm, adjectives, and adverbs. Learning
English through songs also provides a non-threatening atmosphere for students, who usually
are tense when speaking English in a formal classroom setting.

Songs also give new insights into the target culture. They are the means through which
cultural themes are presented effectively. Since they provide authentic texts, they are
motivating. Prosodic features of the language such as stress, rhythm, intonation are presented
through songs, thus through using them the language which is cut up into a series of structural
points become a whole again.

There are many advantages of using songs in the classroom. Through using contemporary
popular songs, which are already familiar to teenagers, the teacher can meet the challenges of
the teenage needs in the classroom. Since songs are highly memorable and motivating, in
many forms they may constitute a powerful subculture with their own rituals. Furthermore,
through using traditional folk songs, the base of the learners’ knowledge of the target culture
can be broadened.

In consequence, if selected properly and adopted carefully, a teacher should benefit from
songs in all phases of teaching grammar. Songs may both be used for the presentation or the
practice phase of the grammar lesson. They may encourage extensive and intensive listening,
and inspire creativity and use of imagination in a relaxed classroom atmosphere. While
selecting a song, the teacher should take the age, interests of the learners and the language
being used in the song into consideration. To enhance learner commitment, it is also
beneficial to allow learners to take part in the selection of the songs.

Teaching Procedure
There are various ways of using songs in the classroom. The level of the students, the interests
and the age of the learners, the grammar point to be studied, and the song itself have
determinant roles on the procedure. Apart from them, it mainly depends on the creativity of
the teacher.
At the primary level of singing the song, the prosodic features of the language is emphasized.
At the higher levels, where the practice of grammar points is at the foreground, songs can be
used with several techniques. Some examples of these techniques are:
Aldersgate College Teaching and Assessment of Grammar
College of Arts, Sciences, and Education Junelyn G. Villar

• Gap fills or close texts

• Focus questions
• True-false statements
• Put these lines into the correct sequence
• Dictation
• Add a final verse
• Circle the antonyms/synonyms of the given words
• Discuss

A teacher's selection of a technique or a set of techniques should be based on his or her

objectives for the classroom. After deciding the grammar point to be studied, and the song
and the techniques to be used, the teacher should prepare an effective lesson plan. Since songs
are listening activities, it is advisable to present them as a listening lesson, but of course it is
necessary to integrate all the skills in the process in order to achieve successful teaching.
When regarding a lesson plan, as a pre-listening activity, the theme, the title, or the history of
the song can be discussed. By directing the students toward specific areas, problem
vocabulary items can be picked up in advance. Before listening to the song, it is also
beneficial to let the students know which grammar points should be studied. At this stage,
pictures may also be used to introduce the theme of the song. In the listening stage, some of
the techniques listed above can be used, but among them gap filling is the most widely used
technique. Through such gaps, the vocabulary, grammar, or pronunciation are highlighted.
This stage can be developed by the teacher according to the needs of the students and the
grammar point to be studied.

In the follow-up, integrated skills can be used to complete the overall course structure. Since
many songs are on themes for which it is easy to find related reading texts, it may lead the
learner to read a text about the singer or the theme. Besides, many songs give a chance for a
written reaction of some kind. Opinion questions may lead the learner to write about his own
thoughts or reflections. Some songs deal with a theme that can be re-exploited through role
plays. Acting may add enthusiasm to the learning process. Finally, some songs deal with
themes, which can lead to guided discussion. By leading the students into a discussion, the
grammar point could be practiced orally and, in a way, naturally.
Exploitation of songs for grammatical structures can be illustrated through several examples.
For present tense 'Let It Be' by the Beatles, for past tense 'Yesterday' by the Beatles, for
present progressive 'Sailing' by Rod Stewart, for present perfect 'Nothing Compares to You'
by Sinead Occonor, for past perfect 'Last Night I Had...' by Simon and Garfunkel, for modals
'Blowing in the Wind' by Bob Dylan, and for conditionals 'El Condor Pasa' by Simon and
Garfunkel can be used. However, it should be kept in mind that songs, which provide frequent
repetitions, or tell a story, or provide comments about life, or introduce cultural themes are the
effective ones, since they provide authentic and meaningful material.
Aldersgate College Teaching and Assessment of Grammar
College of Arts, Sciences, and Education Junelyn G. Villar

Teaching Grammar through Stories

Teaching grammar to students is tricky but by using stories we can help them associate particular
sentences with characters and, as such, make learning grammar more fun and engaging.

Some of these examples may not be level-appropriate for your students but, in this post, it is the concept
that is important; not the material. All activities can be adapted to more appropriate target language.

Teaching Grammar Through A Whole Class Story

First of all, show a picture on the board such as the one above
Have the students name the character and come up with a backstory for him. For example:
Mark went to prison yesterday
He robbed a bank
He needed money for his family
Notice that, so far, we have not mentioned grammar but that the students have connected with the
character because it is their story, not yours.
Now ask the students questions about the grammar in the sentences e.g. Are the sentences in the past,
present or future? Elicit past.
Then make a simple sentence such as “Mark robbed a bank ____________he needed money for his
family” Have the students fill in the missing word ‘because’.

Now it’s time to get the students even further engaged. Kids hate being told that other, younger kids could
do the same thing as them. Therefore, ask the students if the sentence is good and when they say yes, tell
them that a student two years younger could make that sentence. Then ask them if they want to learn how
to make a better sentence. Their competitive nature will likely make them say yes.
At this point, introduce the third conditional. I won’t cover how to teach this here but your marker sentence
could be “If Mark hadn’t needed money, he wouldn’t have robbed a bank”
At the end of the lesson, your board could look like this
In the future, if students make a mistake with the 3rd conditional, you can refer to Mark instead of telling
them to remember the 3rd conditional.

Teaching Grammar by Having Students Create Characters

The previous activity had the students create a story as a class while the following is a little more personal.
Show the students a number of pictures like so and have each group choose a character and name them:
The students then create a biography for their character based on anything they have currently studied
(name, age, nationality, job, family, pets, etc.)
Afterwards, have them make a simple sentence like “Stephen is 50 and he is a doctor” and repeat the
process above related to challenging them to be better than younger students. Then model the non-
defining relative clause “Stephen, who is 50, is a doctor.”
Students then make sentences about their characters.
Aldersgate College Teaching and Assessment of Grammar
College of Arts, Sciences, and Education Junelyn G. Villar

In future, if students make a mistake with relative clauses, you can refer to their characters instead of using
grammar terminology like the words relative clause.

Teaching Grammar Tenses Through Comparative Characters

In this activity, students learn to differentiate between two tense by having each tense represented by a
different character. In this example, we will focus on the difference between the past simple and the present
perfect. I show the students two photos and have them name them.
Tell the students that Jack and Megane both like to travel. Ask where they like to travel.
For example, Jack likes to travel to Spain and Australia while Megane likes to travel to Egypt and Japan.
Then give the students timelines to help demonstrate the target grammar.
Ask the students what is different and elicit that we know when Jack went on holiday but we don’t know
when Megane went. You can then build the marker sentences
“Jack went to Spain in 2005” and “Megane has been to Egypt”
At the end of the lesson, your board could look something like this
The students now associate Jack with Past Simple and Megane with Present Perfect. In the future, you can
now refer to Jack instead of past simple and Megane instead of present perfect.

Teaching Comparatives Through Comparative Characters

Finally, let’s take a look at teaching comparatives by comparing characters. Firstly, introduce, two
characters and have the students name them. In this case, I’ve named them Jack and George
Then tell the students that the two men had three competitions and that they should say who they think
won.
They took an exam. (The students tell you that Jack won)
They had a weight-lifting competition. (The students tell you that Jack won)
They were asked who has more money (The students tell you that George won)
Ask them which adjectives could be used to describe the two men and elicit
Smart
Strong
Rich
Use all of this information to build the three marker sentences:
Jack is smarter than George
Jack is stronger than George
George is richer than Jack
Here is the board containing the marker sentences

Conclusion
I am aware that these are far from complete explanations of the grammar. You would need to teach the
negative and question forms of each and provide the students with the opportunity to complete structured
and freer practice.
This post is intended to provide you with ideas for introducing new grammar to the students. I hope it has
helped and that it will help to motivate students to have fun with grammar.