Two grammars (traditional and transformational) and two methods of teaching (direct and indirect) were measured to determine their effects upon the writing performance of students of low socioeconomic backgrounds. While the direct teaching of grammar was concerned with the correction of specific errors, the indirect teaching was concerned with a…

This study assesses an analytical process which seeks to describe the writing style of a student in terms of the four basic transformational operations: addition, deletion, combining, and reordering. Application of the process to writing skills of low achievers in English is evaluated. All ninth and eleventh grade students in the Falls Church,…

The purpose of this study was to determine if syntactic maturity, as measured by T-unit length, clause length, and clauses per T-unit, and if the level of reading comprehension, as measured by cloze tests and a standardized reading test, of one group each of selected fifth, seventh, and ninth graders could be influenced by the students completing…

When ninth-grade students are searching for help in expressing their newly discovered ideas, the principles of transformational grammar can be brought to their aid in the following ways: (1) Assign a provocative topic to the students which they are to discuss as fully as possible in one sentence. (2) Present only the kernel sentences of a…

This unit is intended to give ninth-grade students a brief survey of the changes in the study of language from the time of the Greeks to the present. Organized to proceed from the teacher's introduction of a subject to class examination and discussion of an excerpt from a grammarian's work, the unit focuses on the belief that a grammarian's…

The language program and the six thematic literature units outlined in this oral-aural-visual guide for grade 9 were developed by the Indianapolis Public Schools under Title III, Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The literature units--"Excitement at Your Elbow,""Worlds of the Weird and the Wayout,""Close-Ups,""War and the Individual,""A…