"Debates in English Teaching" explores the major issues all English teachers encounter in their daily professional lives. It engages with established and contemporary debates, promotes and supports critical reflection and aims to stimulate both novice and experienced teachers to reach informed judgements and argue their point of view with deeper…

The authors, former middle and high school English teachers, review the rationale for using humor and fun in the classroom and provide detailed descriptions for teaching practices and activities that confer enjoyment and learning for language arts students. Although fun activities, these methods foster vocabulary development, grammar instruction,…

This paper discusses the extent to which both crosslinguistic and intralingual differences may be considered as factors causing errors committed by Malay learners in the acquisition of the present perfect which has been identified as an area of considerable difficulty in the learning of English grammar. Using elicitation procedures that probe into…

Describes an activity (based on a "Calvin and Hobbs" cartoon) for a college-level introductory grammar course, which asks students to work in groups to create deliberately arbitrary "grammar" rules, and then consider as a group the validity of such rules. Argues that in this way students learn the practice of bringing natural language evidence to…

Describes an educational game which helps students learn about prepositions. (DD)

This article describes two strategies for grounding grammar instruction in students' lifelong experience as users of language. Students develop their ability to analyze language in the proofreading activity. In both cases, students participate as active decision-makers in the process of analyzing conventions of language use. (Contains 1 note.)

Presents three teachers' suggestions for teaching grammar. Discusses how the first teacher suggests studying active and passive voice, the second teacher has students construct slang dictionaries, and the third teacher uses sentence combining that engages students and encourages carryover to their writing. (SG)

Describes how one foreign language teacher and two English teachers created a program that might work to improve students' control over their language. Combines their collective expertise in teaching languages, studies the research in their surprisingly separate fields, and crosses the gulf between the foreign language and English hallways.…

Describes the author's approach to teaching a required course, Applied Linguistics for Teachers of English. Presents 17 "Word Play du Jour" activities that can set the tone for meaningful and engaging lessons about language. Lists activities at the word, sentence, and "whole thing" levels. (SG)

Describes a student-created "rap" that emphasizes fifth graders' recall of basic English elements, using textual information from "Building English Skills." (MM)

Describes teaching methods and techniques found to be useful by practicing teachers, including "Using 'What Works for Me'"; and "Song Lyrics to Teach Grammar." (HB)

Presents four brief essays by teachers addressing "the cost of plagiarism,""involving students the first day,""grammar," and "learning without being taught." (SG)

Challenges some problematic issues of grammar instruction. Transforms inconsequential discussion of nouns, adverbs, and past participles to more significant discussion about writing, access, and improving the world. Explores four activities to do with student writing other than correct grammar. (SG)

Describes how the author developed her own program for teaching grammar in the context of writing. Shows how, after laying some groundwork, she lets students' needs direct her teaching to specific usage areas. Shows how she gives specific instruction, supports it with examples, and then has students apply this to their writing. (SR)

Tells how one teacher provides English instruction by simulating an atmosphere of medical internships and consultation. Notes the benefits of such a classroom game. (RL)