Nick Gibb fluffs a SPAG question!

The NLS strategy was developed by a head teacher who never used it in her own school. She was a close friend of the late Chris Woodhead (nuff said!).
The idea that strategies were carefully considered by professional bodies might be true, but knowing the right people must have helped!

Good heavens, trisher I nearly choked on my muesli when I read that. Fancy that innaccurate and unappetizing little bit of gossip turning up on Gransnet!

Firstly, the lady in question did not develop the NLS. If you had been reading mine and Mamie's posts you would understand that the NLS, like everything else, was developed by a team which she was a member of.

I know for a fact that one aspect of the NLS, reading instruction, in which she had considerable expertise as a practising teacher and Headteacher, was completely disapproved of by her as it simply promulgated the methods of reading instruction which had been causing a severe decline in reading standards over previous decades. Far from having any influence her advice was completely ignored in this area. I have no idea what input she might have had in other areas of the NLS; it is quite likely to have been none as she was probably on the advisory team as a reading instruction expert.

As for being a close friend of Chris Woodhead, you must be incredibly naive if you think that people completely unknown to anybody get onto these things. Not only do you have to have made some sort of name for yourself in the field (so let me remind you that, at a time when the national average for English L4 in KS2 SATs was in the 70%s, this Head Teacher was in charge of a school in which her practically 100% EAL pupils were achieving 90%+ gaining English L4*) but also someone has to 'know' you or at least 'know of' you.

I do think the poor woman must very much regret her brief 'friendship' with Chris Woodhead as it has followed her around for years and is constantly used as an attempt to blind people to her undoubted ability as an educator and communicator.

What I find very laughable is the fact that the same lady is now being credited with 'imposing' the teaching of synthetic phonics on the English Curriculum as the only method of initial reading instruction. This mehodology being completely different from that outlined in the NLS!

If you would like to repeat further malicious gossip about her, feel free, but please understand that I am acquainted with the lady in question and so am more likely to know the truth.

*Note: I knew of schools in my area who couldn't get more than 60% of their 100% native English speaking pupils to L4 in the KS2 English SAT and that was after 10 yrs of the NLS

To get back to the thread topic, an interesting blog post here, from 2012 , by a secondary teacher explaining how she would teach grammar at secondary school:

We have to start with the basics. There is no point starting a lesson explaining to pupil M above the punctuation needed when using ‘however’ or ‘nevertheless’. They might start to use the correct punctuation for these words, but they will still not be constructing proper sentences. We need to get them to appreciate, first of all, what a sentence is. And to understand what a sentence is, you have to know what a verb is and what a subject is. How do we get pupils to know what a verb and a subject are? These are not simple concepts. We could get pupils to memorise that a verb is a doing word, of course, and I do think it is helpful for pupils to know that. But that definition is slightly misleading. Look at these two sentences:

I went for a run.

I run to the shops.

Give those two sentences to most pupils who have learnt that a verb is a doing word and they will tell you that ‘run’ is a verb in both of them. etc.

tinyurl.com/zs4bbm5

My thoughts

1) It's quite surprising as you would have thought that children would have learned all that in Primary school

2) It's the sort of thing I was envisaging when it was first announced that the teaching of grammar at Primary was to be tightened up and tested

3) Not a fronted adverbial in sight

I was a secondary Modern Foreign Languages teacher and I have fairly good knowledge of grammar. Pearson invited MFL GCSE examiners to mark KS2 SPaG tests, because it was considered that we had the skills needed. MFL teachers often boast that they have a better knowledge of grammar than English teachers, but even they would have been pushed to achieve full marks.

It is very useful for pupils to arrive in secondary school having a firm grasp of the basic parts of speech and to know, for example, that 'run' can be a verb and a noun. However, some of the terminology used in the KS2 tests isn't even the same as secondary MFL teachers use. Either pupils will have to be retaught or secondary teachers will have to change the terminology they've been using for decades.

I hadn't a clue what a frontal adverbial is, so I looked it up. In my opinion, the DfE is misleading. Some of the examples given are indeed adverbial phrases, which have been place at the beginning of the sentence. In some cases they sound very unnatural and I wonder why on earth anybody would want to use that word order. More importantly, some of the examples given aren't adverbial phrases, but subordinate clauses.

I would love to know the background of whoever devised these tests, because it doesn't appear to have been on Planet Earth. Ten and eleven year olds are being forced to learn terminology which probably won't improve their English. When they arrive at secondary school, the teachers of the subject for which grammar is most useful, will just sigh and teach them the terminology they've always used.

MaizieD- Keep your hair on!
If someone doesn't want to be identified with something they shouldn't make promotional films in which they actively encourage the use of that thing. If someone wants to keep a low profile in education it is perfectly possible to do so. I didn't comment on her abilities as an educator at all. Only on the process of cronyism and nepotism in the education system, which you admit exists. There are hundreds of educators doing excellent work who don't feel the need to make a fuss about what they are doing. Why is it malicious if it's true? She probably does regret it but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
To get back to the subject one of the problems with teaching grammar in primary schools is that there are children who simply can't cope and need much more support. Personally i would like to see less emphasis on it altogether, but then I happen to believe in creativity. It's swings and roundabouts anyway. I just feel sorry for the children being educated now. Just as today's adults are going "we were never taught any grammar" this generation will be complaining "we were never allowed to be creative".

Trisher I am no defender of the SPaG test but my GD in Year 5 is producing some fabulous creative writing alongside the grammar and spelling stuff.
daphnedill I am not sure that you can tie the teaching of English grammar to the needs of MFL teachers. Terminaisons, agreement of adjectives and verb endings to the preceding direct object? Not much use in English really.
I agree that much of the grammar required for the SPaG test is irrelevant and open to different interpretation.
I would love to know who dreamt it up, but I can't find out.....

But there are probably hundreds, if not thousands, of children who are bogged down in the grammar and spelling process and have given up, thinking they are 'no good' at writing, when actually the reverse is often true. Those who struggle with the mechanics have a different attitude and approach which enables them to use language creatively. Those who write sentences using the taught format actually produce mundane, boring stuff. (Not your GD of course).

Mamie, I'm afraid I disagree with you totally. You seem to have a very superficial understanding of the grammar needed for MFL teaching, presumably limited to French. (I think you mean past participle, by the way.) 'Direct object' is not a difficult concept and is one of the terms I would teach. If it were breakfast time, I would be the one spitting on my muesli. Grammar and structures are at the heart of MFL teaching and much of English grammar is transferable to any of the indo-European languages. One of the exciting things about learning a new language is just how many similarities there are - and, of course, exploring the differences.

Secondary MFL teachers have become used to teaching grammar from scratch and it's really not going to help that this new scheme is using different terminology, because it's all going to have to be re-taught. I wonder if there were any MFL teachers in the team. My guess is there weren't, because all the MFL teachers on the sites I frequent are tearing their hair out. By the way, maybe you could let Pearson know that the secondary MFL teachers they've employed to mark the SPaG tests don't know about English grammar.

Whoever devised this scheme needs to go back to the drawing board and ask him/herself WHY ten and eleven year olds need to know this stuff, if it's not to improve their English, not to act as support for learning a foreign language and not because children of primary age are interested in linguistics.

I hold true to the National Writing Project mantra that you learn to write by writing. I think we were taught very formally (well I was) with lots of grammar up front and very little creative writing. I still learnt to write for different audiences eventually.
I don't get into lots of classrooms like I used to, but I do know that in my GD's school there are still plenty of opportunities for writing across the curriculum, for all of the children. Are you seeing something different in the schools that you visit?
If you want to see children whose ability to write is crushed by over-emphasis on grammar, you should see what it is like here in France!

Well yes daphnedill I failed to specify precisely that I meant the past participle of the verb. Mea culpa .
I have taught French in England and English in France and am currently learning Spanish in French, so I do know a bit.
I still maintain that the grammar taught should be relevant first and foremost to the teaching of English. Some of it will be useful to teachers of MFL, but that imo, should never be the primary objective.

If someone doesn't want to be identified with something they shouldn't make promotional films in which they actively encourage the use of that thing

What on earth are you talking about?

Only on the process of cronyism and nepotism in the education system, which you admit exists.

I was not admitting that cronyism and nepotism existed at all. Do you really think that the Dfe is going to commission completely unknown people to be on advisory and executive teams? They look for people who are well known as experts in their field.

There are hundreds of educators doing excellent work who don't feel the need to make a fuss about what they are doing.

You really are baffling me now. WTF has that got to do with anything?

What I am finding difficult to accept is the notion that somehow teaching some grammar and spelling will destroy creativity. If that were the case then there should have been no adult creative writers emerging until after the inception of the progressive curriculum, after Plowden, perhaps, (progressive = never mind the grammar and spelling, it's the content that matters). Yet somehow every generation has managed to produce its novelists and playwrights, even after the most rigid of educational regimes.

I don't think it should be the primary objective either, but it really would help if there were some coordination about the terminology used. MFL teachers have been teaching grammar for ages and it's just tiresome to have to 'unteach' what pupils have been taught. I must admit I'm relieved that the latest scheme has abolished 'connectives' and reverted to 'conjunctions'.

With all due respect to primary teachers, most of them don't seem to have a clue about grammar. They weren't taught it themselves, there was no money available for training and even the commercial materials available have mistakes.

Apparently, the Department of Linguistics at UCL was influential in devising the curriculum. Even they didn't want the subjunctive to be included in the appendix, but Gove insisted.

I am really surprised that you can't see the connections between generic grammar terminology and teaching MFL, as you teach foreign languages yourself. Whenever I taught any grammar, I would always establish how much learners understood about the theory and adapt my teaching accordingly.

I agree MaizieD. I think we taught creative writing well in the seventies, but we didn't spend nearly enough time on grammar and spelling.
I thought the NLS eventually got the balance about right (and it was a long journey), especially after the implementation of the changes that opened up writing across the curriculum again. In the many lesson observations that I made, I found that the best teachers were combining the formal and the creative very well.
As I have said many times, I think the SPaG requirements are ridiculous. I don't have enough evidence to know what the long-term implications will be - I can only judge by my GCs these days!

I don't know the parts of a sentence. I know the basics such as verbs and nouns because I had to teach them but tbh I would be pushed to achieve the old level 4A. This hasn't held me back. I don't know the terminology and can't break a sentence into it's parts but I can write. How has this come to be? Well I was encouraged to read for the sheer enjoyment of reading so saw a huge amount of text. I was taught to speak properly which meant I formed my sentences correctly. I did lots of creative writing. Apparently, (according to a grammar pedant friend), I split a lot of infinitives....sounds painful lol.

Why do we write? Surely it's to share information and to entertain.

I think that's perfectly possible without being able to break each sentence into it's constituent parts.

DD I don't think I said that I couldn't see the connections between grammar terminology and MFL did I? I was simply pointing out that some of the things that are very important to French children learning French are not particularly helpful when it comes to English and vice versa.
Learning Spanish in French with French people has really made my brain hurt, but it has also made me understand more about the complexities of language learning and the underlying assumptions that come from our understanding of our first language. I hadn't realised just how important it was to my French colleagues to be able to recite the imperfect subjunctive.
Just out of interest, did the English department work with the MFL department in your school to teach grammar terminology consistently? I know my secondary MFL inspector colleague used to encourage this, but I don't know how widespread it was.
Interesting about the Department of Linguistics. doesn't surprise me.

Yes, I was head of faculty (English and MFL) and we had a co-ordinated policy, which also included humanities. The MFL staff did the bulk of the formal grammar teaching and English and humanities staff knew what we had been doing and the terminology pupils should know, which they reinforced. We ran a Language Awareness course in Year 7, to which both MFL and English staff contributed.

I had a tough introduction to the KS2 SPaG curriculum because at very much the last minute I was asked to tutor a young girlswho was getting over anxious about the test. I did have to find out about 'new' grammatical terminology which, in my opinion would not be useful in MFL teaching. Nor, I believe, would it be much use in TESOL which has to concentrate, in the early stages at least, on functional, day-to-day English usage, many of the students being barely educated in their own languages. However, my younger son, having taken GCSE Spanish, decided not to do it at A level, but took it up as a minor subject at Uni. I got a plaintive phone call from him to tell me that there was all that grammar that he'd never heard of (at GCSE level for goodness' sake?), so I sent him the (idiot -proof) grammar unit I'd written for my mature students. Luckily he has an aptitude for languages and became a reasonably fluent and - I hope - grammatical Spanish speaker.

Nouns can be categorised as:

proper or common

and

abstract or concrete.

It's possible to have a proper abstract noun.

Other examples are names of religions or philosophies.

Why wouldn't it be useful in MFL teaching? The reason I scored 100% in the sample test is because I've been teaching this stuff for half my life.

If any Year 7 pupil turned up really understanding concepts such as 'adverbial phrase', 'subordinating conjunction', passive', 'finite verb', etc, it would make MFL teachers' jobs a heck of a lot easier.

Are you a MFL teacher, ad?

This is the vocabulary, grammar and punctuation appendix:

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/335190/English_Appendix_2_-_Vocabulary_grammar_and_punctuation.pdf

There is hardly anything on there which isn't included in the headings at the back of a German GCSE textbook.

I said less emphasis not none at all-try reading the post. The problem is although there may be writers etc it is difficult to know how many slipped away. I do know that much of the writing described as 'creative' isn't. It is often a collection of sentences written to a taught formula with little or no real feeling because the child has been taught to write what the teacher wants to see and what will improve the level they reach in the tests. You only have to read the papers from a class of children to see this.
As for WTF the educators working quietly and not making a fuss has to do with this, they are not all trying become personalities or to make money from a reading scheme that is being promoted in schools through some very dodgy connections. That's cronyism for you.

I agree with you, trisher. I realise who you're talking about now. I don't know about the dodgy connections, but I'm very suspicious of zealots for one methodology, especially as her 'method' is nothing new. I don't believe there are any univversal magic wands in teaching. I don't know this particular lady, but I've known a few national 'experts' personally and I'm afraid I don't have much time for them. They tend to be charismatic personalities, who could probably sell anything.

Oh dear. I expect the lady was getting on quietly doing what she was extremely good at until she was asked to join the team developing the National Literacy Strategy in the late 1990s. At which point we could have used her expertise to develop effective guidance on teaching children to read and not had another decade of 20% of children each year failing to learn. And there would probably have been no 'commercial' programme and no selling as a consequence.

That this 20% represents a figure of over 100,000 children a year might not seem terribly important to some people but, if the children I worked with were anything to go by, it had very sad consequences for them as individuals. It's hardly 'zealotry' to wish to improve the life chances of children by using and promoting an approach to the teaching of reading which has been proven over and over again to work for the greatest number of children and which has the weight of decades of reading research findings to support it. Cognitive scientists (you know, the ones who spend their time researching how the mind works and how people learn) have no doubts but somehow many teachers will uncritically embrace ludicrous 'magic bullets' such a Brain Gym while resolutely shutting their eyes to anything which has a whiff of scientific validity about it.

Yes, I'm a zealot.

Are you seriously saying that she had no other choice than to benefit financially?
That she has been forced into charging £3000+ for schools because no one else was able to do it? There is zealotry and there is blind ignorance.
Her success has actually been questioned by a lot of experts. As always there are opposing factions on the subject. I really stopped getting involved in the reading argument years ago having seen some methods work well with some children and prove completely useless with others. I am much more interested in how we enable children to use language and be creative. And before you insist that reading is the only way this can be achieved can I tell you that that is completely inaccurate. There are many people working in the creative industries whose reading skills are limited. They have been supported and encouraged to develop their skills in spite of their difficulties. We should be doing this for all children. This idea that if you can't read you can't do anything creates a culture of failure which is why children become disillusioned and stop trying.

MaizieD,

I'm not an expert on reading for young children. However, I do not accept that there is only one way to teach reading and that one reading scheme is the ONLY way. My daughter could read quite well before she started primary school and was assessed, at age 7, as having a reading age of 14. She just picked up words and spelling patterns. My son could hardly read anything when he was 6, but almost overnight was able to read 'real books' and has never looked back. His primary school at the time used synthetic phonics, but they didn't work for him.

I'm a zealot about pupil achievement, but not revering one method as the only answer.

I have studied linguistics at postgraduate level and cognitive scientists are not all in agreement about how children acquire language and learn how to read. My own interest is in second language acquisition, but there is an overlap with first language learning.

In any case, the current SPaG tests have little to do with learning to read. They don't even test pupils' ability to use language. They test the ability to KNOW about language.