'Rules and Reasons' in the Language Classroom - Virtual Session

A virtual session presented by the Daegu-Gyeongbuk Chapter of KOTESOL

'Rules and Reasons' in the Language Classroom - Virtual Session
Dr. Crayton Walker
Tuesday Sept 13th
7pm KST
 
FREE TO ATTEND

Join via Zoom
Meeting ID: 898 5677 0043
Passcode: 196803

Grammar Rules and Grammar Reasons

In this workshop we will be looking at Grammar Rules and Grammar Reasons.

McDonald’s uses the slogan ‘I’m lovin it’. Don’t they realise that you can’t use a stative verb like ‘love’ in the continuous tense? Or is it that they have deliberately used ‘I’m lovin it’ instead of ‘I love it’?

Either way, ‘you can’t use a stative verb in the continuous tense’ is the rule and the company’s rationale for using a stative verb in the slogan ‘I’m lovin it’ is the reason.

Many of the grammar rules we teach are over a hundred years old and were created to reflect the written form of the language. The English which surrounds us contains many examples where the rule has either been ignored or deliberately broken. Or could it be that the experienced users of English are unaware of the rules and simply have their own reasons for using English in the way they do? May be we are teaching too many rules and not encouraging our learners to understand more about the reasons behind these ‘exceptions’ to the rule. Come along and find out more.

Dr Crayton Walker has been working in the English Department at the University of Birmingham since 2006 as a Senior Lecturer in Applied Linguistics. He is a Corpus Linguist whose research interests are associated with the study of collocation and other phraseological aspects of English. He is particularly interested in collocation and pattern grammar.
Before joining the University Crayton had a career in English language teaching. He taught English for Specific Purposes in London, Riyadh and Stuttgart and was in charge of the English department of a large language school in Germany for over 10 years. He has worked as a teacher, teacher trainer and materials developer and has over 25 years of experience in EFL/ESL.