Unit 2: Approaches to Grammar and Writing Instruction

Writing has always been a passion for me. I love to read good writing and I love to write my thoughts. When a piece has spelling or grammatical errors I will often stop reading, it almost insults my senses. So the teaching of writing in any of my classroom has always been a priority. The written form has always been a way to convey your ideas or opinions in a thoughtful way. Most often you can take your time, thinking through what you will say, to ensure that the right message is being sent. Then came Twitter.... One of the most important messages I would want to convey to my students is that you need to think before you write. This is an opportunity for you to ensure that what you write is not open to interpretation. I would use an inductive approach to demonstrate this to my students. I would provide them with many opportunities to participate in shared writes, to read good pieces of writing and to use their writing in authentic ways. Through these writing opportunities correct grammar usage can be modeled and feedback and prescriptive teaching can follow the review of a student's work. Regardless of the level of the language learner I believe that teaching writing and all the structures that it entails, is an integral part of ESL instruction.