Teach English in Shequban - Yuncheng Shi

Since the beginning of time, man has disliked grammar. This is largely because of man’s innate, childlike instinct to have fun, and grammar is not fun. According to Webster’s English Dictionary, the relevant definition of ‘grammar’ is ‘a system of rules for speaking and writing a given language.’ And although rules many would argue are intrinsically boring, my contention is that the process of learning the rules of a language does not have to be boring at all. In my several years of first-hand language education experience (mostly as a student), I can accurately say I have nearly forgotten everything ever taught to me. Make no mistake, I was not shirking; in fact, I garnered mostly high marks. However, language, as opposed to physics or maybe geography, is an extremely ‘alive’ subject for something that is biologically not living. And teaching language out of a textbook in my mind is not dissimilar to teaching a new driver to drive in a laboratory-like closed course setting; if you prefer, knowing how to operate a car is much different than driving a car. Fortunately, during my sophomore year in high school Madame Baird delivered at least one very good lesson to her French II students in which, if only for fifty-five minutes, we at last were out of the poorly-translated instruction manual and into the damned driver’s seat. That class began as any other; we shuffled to our desks and found a piece of paper with a bunch of French words on it largely we didn’t understand. Then the teacher pressed ‘play’ on the CD player. The entire class period that day flew by and more than a few students were disappointed when it had ended. We had learned the lyrics to the 1973 French soft-rock hit ‘San Francisco’ by Maxime Le Forestier. Unfortunately, I have no way of polling my classmates from that year, but I would wager that a stark majority would recall that lesson (even if they do not remember the French we learned itself). One mark of an effective lesson is that it does not go in one ear and out the other. And in my mind, one of the marks of a skilled coach, parent, or educator is to teach a lesson in secret. What we had believed we had learned was some old, hippy French song. Years later, I recognize what we had actually learned were noun genders, adjective order, subtle turns of phrase that do not directly translate from French to our native tongue, verb negation, verb conjugation, reflexive verbs, and at least a half a dozen or so more ‘lessons’ or headings that appear under the encyclopedia article ‘English grammar.’ This may sound like hyperbole; it is not. Here is an excerpt of the just the first stanza (which I am reciting from memory): ‘C’est une maison bleue addosse a la colline on y vient a pied/ On ne frappe pas ce qui vivient la on jette la cle’. (For clarity it means something to the effect of ‘It is a blue house that backs up to a hill you show up to on foot/ You don’t knock for who lives there as they’ve thrown away the key). Depending on the intended lesson goal, any song, of course, can be chosen; for example, in a very novice class learning simple present tense ‘to be’ verb conjugation, an easy ‘I am/ you are’ song would be appropriate. In an advanced course, a more lyrically dense song, closer to prose could be selected to help teach the past perfect continuous tense in the form of a question. It should also be noted that for more proficient language learners (which we certainly were not), a simple variation on Madame Baird’s lesson would be not to provide the lyrics sheet and have each individual student attempt to transcribe the words assisted by three plays. Learning English grammar through music opens a huge number of doors for the educator. Obviously, one main advantage is that it emphasizes speaking (if not singing) and listening, the very marginalized functions at least in American language programs, a very distant second to the over-taught reading and writing functions. Another advantage is that it can be tailored easily to young and old learners as well as novice to advanced learners. Maybe most simply (and importantly) it engages ‘critical thinking’ or imagination and creativity in students. Moreover, when using American music, it instills a bridge and practical connection for the students to not only American English, but American culture. The grammar of any language, even computers or music arguably, can cause frustration; our job as educators is to give our students tools to navigate even the most difficult aspects of learning a new language. Music can be one very effective tool.