How to teach grammar?

Grammar is an important tool to learn a second language, you have to take into account a sequence of specific contest and skill, grammar and pronunciation are friends and they cannot be separed, grammar is not easy to learn but there are specific techniques or strategies for teaching grammar.

Section Contents:

1.-Goals and Techniques for Teaching Grammar .

2.-Strategies for Learning Grammar.

3.-Developing Grammar Activities.

4.-Using Textbook Grammar Activities.

5.- Assessing Grammar Proficiency.

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/grindex.htm

1.-Goals and Techniques for Teaching Grammar
The goal of grammar instruction is to enable students to carry out their communication purposes. This goal has three implications:
-Students need overt instruction that connects grammar points with larger communication contexts.
-Students do not need to master every aspect of each grammar point, only those that are relevant to the immediate communication task.

-Error correction is not always the instructor's first responsibility.

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/goalsgram.htm

2.-Strategies for Learning Grammar:

Language teachers and language learners are often frustrated by the disconnect between knowing the rules of grammar and being able to apply those rules automatically in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. This disconnect reflects a separation between declarative knowledge and procedural knowledge.
http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/stratgram.htm

3.-Developing Grammar Activities:

For curricula that introduce grammatical forms in a specified sequence, instructors need to develop activities that relate form to meaning and use.
Describe the grammar point, including form, meaning, and use, and give examples (structured input)
Ask students to practice the grammar point in communicative drills (structured output)
Have students do a communicative task that provides opportunities to use the grammar point (communicative output)
For curricula that follow a sequence of topics, instructors need to develop activities that relate the topical discourse (use) to meaning and form.
Provide oral or written input (audiotape, reading selection) that addresses the topic (structured input)
Review the point of grammar, using examples from the material (structured input)
Ask students to practice the grammar point in communicative drills that focus on the topic (structured output)
Have students do a communicative task on the topic (communicative output)

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/developgram.htm

4.- Using Textbook Grammar Activities:

Textbooks usually provide one or more of the following three types of grammar exercises.
Mechanical drills: Each prompt has only one correct response, and students can complete the exercise without attending to meaning. For example:George waited for the bus this morning. He will wait for the bus tomorrow morning, too.
Meaningful drills: Each prompt has only one correct response, and students must attend to meaning to complete the exercise. For example:Where are George’s papers? They are in his notebook.(Students must understand the meaning of the question in order to answer, but only one correct answer is possible because they all know where George’s papers are.)
Communicative drills, described in Strategies for Learning Grammar

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/textgram.htm

5.- Assessing Grammar Proficiency:

1.- Authentic Assessment.

2.- Mechanical Tests.

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/assessgram.htm