Insider or outsider?
Grammar, usage show who belongs

Fairly or not, people stereotype others by their "grammar usage" at least as much as by their appearance.

In fact, when English teachers talk about correct grammar and usage, they really mean "the way the English teachers' favorite students talk and write."

The unstated message is, "If you want to fit in to the English teachers' world, these are grammar rules and usage you must follow."

The problem for English teachers, of course, is that most students don't want to fit into a world that includes English teachers.

The kinds of issues that get lumped in the catch-all bag of "grammar usage" are typically far more usage than grammar. See the definition of grammar for some help with sorting out the two issues.

The importance of usage

If we care about kids, we must make them see how correct English usage could be important to them outside school.

Scenario 1. Suppose two teens are stopped by police at 2 a.m. One teen speaks the idiom of the drug culture, the other's speech sounds more like an English text book. Which do you think the police are more likely to suspect of using drugs?

Scenario 2. Suppose two students are interviewing for a waiter's job in an upscale restaurant where a single night's tips could be more than a week's pay at McDonald's. Who do you suppose is more likely to get the job: the one who speaks like a rap artist or the one who talks more like a PBS announcer?

Stereotyping is not fair, but it happens. Fortunately, students can influence how others view them by changing the way they speak and write.

Talk trips up writers

For people whose native language is English, usage problems often stem from the difficulties of translating oral language into written language.

Increasingly:

• Students do little reading.

• The little reading they do is not sustained reading.

• Students read while other media compete for their attention.

As a result, students may be unfamiliar with:

• The spelling of words and phrases they hear in conversation.

• Standard English usages that are clear from the context of conversation but must be specified in writing.

• The specific situations in which certain usages are appropriate.

Use multiple approaches

Since usage problems have multiple causes, solutions require multiple approaches. Here are approaches you can use:

• Give writing prompts about the impact of substandard English usage.

• Give writing prompts about appropriate and inappropriate English usage.

• Encourage students to do more sustained reading.

• Teach reading literacy along with writing literacy.

• Draw attention to the difference between the sound of words in conversation and the sound of words in isolation.

• Have students track their personal usage errors.

• Focus on issues that hamper communication or that stereotype students as ignorant; ignore issues that matter only to pedants.

• Restrict grammar-usage study to a few problems a year.

Helping students see value in expanding their knowledge of usage is mainly a matter of being alert to opportunities for drawing students' attention to the effects of different types of usage.