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3. Should I teach grammar? If yes, how?
For the cognitivists, teaching grammar is not a high priority. In a sense, they, like many other people, believe that grammar should not be stressed. Richard Braddock, Richard Lloyd-Jones, and Lowell Schoer suggest why grammar should not be taught: "'The teaching of formal grammar has a negligible or, because it usually displaces some instruction and practice in composition, even a harmful effect on improvement in writing'" (qtd. in Hartwell 193). Linda Flower and John Hayes also point out a negative aspect of teaching grammar when they suggest that when we do teach grammar, students may focus too much on it. And "if the writer must devote conscious attention to demands such as spelling and grammar, the task of [writing] . . . can interfere with the more global process of planning what one wants to say" (Flower and Hayes 260).Although teaching grammar is not a high priority, cognitivists do not necessarily discount it. Cognitivists want students to write clearly and efficiently, and grammar may help them write in this manner. The best way to teach grammar is by using exercises and drills. For example, we could teach sentence combining by using an exercise that allows students to practice this act. We could give students a set of six or seven short, related sentences and have them combine them into one sentence. Having students work in groups, rather than isolation, when working on exercises/drills is also good. By working in groups, students "will be engaged in inferential problem-solving rather than in isolated drill or memorization" (Lunsford 283).
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