‘It is a truth universally acknowledged’ that some structures are more trouble to acquire than others. A classic example is the Present Simple, which, according to morpheme acquisition research is one of the last grammar structures to be acquired fully by foreign language learners.

In this article, written a very long time ago but recently updated, I have attempted to explore some of the possible causes of difficulty and offer some suggestions for an approach to introducing ‘difficult’ grammatical areas to foreign language learners. In order to do this, I have selected one such area and will use it in the discussion as a means to illustrate some of the issues involved in teaching and learning the grammar of English. The points I make should apply to other similarly ‘heavy’ areas of grammar.

Focus on the Present Perfect Simple

One of these ‘difficult’ grammatical areas that have caused language learners and teachers around the world quite a few headaches is the Present Perfect. Generations have sweated over it and yet, it still looms over the horizon like an ugly monster – a monster, moreover, not with one, but with quite a few heads!

The problems with this ‘tense’, it seems, are not in the area of understanding the rules of form or use. On the contrary, if you ask, say a group of intermediate students, who have been introduced to the different aspects and uses of the Present Perfect about rules, they will probably be quite capable of verbalizing them.

The same students will also be, in most cases, quite capable of dealing successfully with choices when they are given written exercises of the gap-fill type, or multiple choice type. Where things generally tend to break down is in the learners’ spoken as well as in their written production, in letters, summaries, reports and essays. It is with special emphasis on student free, unscripted production that I would like to re-examine a number of issues and offer some suggestions for classmates practices. 

Let us first look at a number of student errors (collected from intermediate and post intermediate classes in Greece and compare them to the way the same meanings would be expressed in Greek. Teachers of learners of other nationalities need to list the equivalent in their learners’ language(s) and compare their error in a similar way to see if the learners are using their L1 (mother tongue) equivalent.

Mother Tongue Interference

At first glance, mother tongue interference seems to be responsible for quite a few of them. If we contrast English with Greek, we can see that for most of the concepts/meanings expressed through the Present Perfect in English, in Greek there is a choice of three tenses – the Present Simple for utterances 2 and 3, and the Past Simple or Present for the rest of the examples, use of either of which in Greek is perfectly acceptable in spoken contexts. Apart, then for the morphological errors of utterances 1 and 5, the choice of tenses in most of the utterances indicates direct translation of concept and tense from the mother tongue, what linguists call mother tongue interference or negative transfer.

Moreover, when the choice of tense lies between Past and Present Perfect in Greek, learners seem to prefer the past. I do not think they do this in order to exasperate their teachers. The explanation may perhaps be that this is a tense more frequently used in spoken Greek and students, operating a simplification strategy to get their meaning across in English, use the same tense in English.

However, the mother tongue cannot always be held responsible as the only cause of learner difficulties. It often comes to the rescue of the learner when the forms , meanings, concepts and use have not been made clear to the student, have not been assimilated to the extent that the learner can retrieve and use them effortlessly and naturally.

We must also remember that, other things being equal, not all students learn when we want them to. Teaching does not equate with learning and the rate of assimilation varies from student to student.

Traditional teaching and its effects

The samples of student language displayed above were collected from a variety of classes taught by teachers faithful to the old rule and exercise teaching method, a method that still prevails even in many contemporary published materials. Having said this, there will be learners who will acquire no matter what. This post is not about this type of learner but for the rest of the student population
which is, sadly, the majority.

The following checklist of questions may point out possible weaknesses in the way the various aspects and uses of this particular area of grammar were introduced and practiced.

• Was the target language presented only through rules and abstract explanations?
• Was it presented in context? (of a text or conversation)?
• Was the context of the situation outlined clearly to the students?
• Were the contexts natural and authentic, i.e. would native speakers have used the target language orally or in writing if placed in the same situation?
• Were the students engaged in any activities where they were asked to notice the target language and work out the rules of use?
• Were the concepts/meaning checked through questioning techniques that would reveal possible misunderstandings?
• Was the structure contrasted meaningfully with others with which it might be easily confused?
• Were the students ‘told’ about it or were they actively involved in discovering rules of meaning, form and use for themselves?
• Were there enough opportunities for meaningful and personalized oral practice?
• Did the students have the chance to use the structure in situations where they needed to communicate their own ideas, opinions, or feelings?
• Were they involved in written tasks where native speakers would also use this language naturally?
• Was the target language revised and reused in other contexts and situations?
• Was the target language meaningfully contrasted with similar Greek/Italian/Chinese, etc., expressions to point out pitfalls?
• Were there clear distinctions between forms usually encountered in spoken English vs. forms normally encountered in writing?

My checklist of questions implies a certain approach to teaching grammar for productive and communicative use. This does not mean that traditional ways of providing explanations when students are confused are to be avoided. It simply means that explanation is only one of the many tools available to the professional teacher but that it should not be the only way through which grammar is presented.

This checklist may also, hopefully, serve teachers as a reminder of creating the best possible conditions for learning and a tool for self-evaluation. Having fulfilled those conditions, however, does not ensure that all your students will learn, acquire or assimilate new material equally well at the same moment in time. Allowances must be made for those different learning rates as well as for different levels of ability within the same group of students. Frequent revision using a variety of activities and methods may be the best possible approach.

Selection & Grading Issues

One other reason why learners may be finding it difficult to use this tense correctly as part of their free oral or written production may also lie in the way teachers anxious and pressurized by the syllabus, very often push the whole thing together into one huge unpalatable and indigestible lump.

‘Today I’m going to teach the Present Perfect/ Passive Voice/ Conditionals’ is a statement I have often heard in teachers’ rooms. But which aspect? Which meaning? Which use? These are questions that are often ignored and many teachers attempt to present the sum total of the structure concentrating mainly on rules of formation and giving some general (but often vague) guidelines about meanings and uses.

Any of the ‘heavy’ structures mentioned in the previous paragraph would need to be spread over a number of lessons, and some uses/aspects would not even be introduced during the same year, but would be covered at a later stage or level.

It is not hard to see why students come away from grammar lessons of such ambitious aims with heads spinning with rules but not much else…

A sample lesson plan

To illustrate the points made through the questions checklist, I have included a lesson outline of an initial presentation of the Present Perfect Simple used with YET and ALREADY which is for use with elementary classes. This is not intended to portray the ideal lesson; it is simply a lesson that worked with a particular class. The context and activities included may have to be modified or replaced with others for different groups. This plan follows a simple PPP sequence – Presentation, Practice, Production – but a more experienced teacher could begin by getting the learners to produce the first conversation given some prompts and the context and follow a TBLT sequence.

You might like to check this lesson outline against the questions checklist presented earlier to see how far a different attitude to the teaching and learning og grammar makes a difference to materials and procedures we adopt in the classroom.

Comments on the lesson

What this 50 minute lesson includes that a ‘rules’ lesson does not:

• Exposure to the new language item in a natural context which illustrates meaning, form and function.
• Related skills development work; listening to spoken language in order to pick out information and the new language item as well as speaking skills development, both during the transfer stage where students have the opportunity to ‘apply’ and use the new items in an activity designed to promote fluency.
• Attention to appropriacy, i.e. forms that are appropriate for use in the spoken medium. In the example given, question forms and short answers are those most frequently use by native speakers. Insistence on students’ producing full forms, fully completed sentences may result in a style of speaking which sounds bookish and ‘odd’ to the ears of the native speaker with whom our students will be eventually communicating.
• Increased motivation: learning grammar ceases to be a dry and boring learning activity and becomes more interesting to the learner.
• Active engagement of the learner’s cognitive abilities in a situation where s/he is involved in discovering meanings for her/himself and not ‘told’.

Conclusion

Mastery of a language implies mastery of the language systems. Many teachers, however, feel that this can only be done through teacher presentation and explanation of the rules that govern this language system. Research and classroom experience have shown the opposite. Knowing the rule, i.e. knowledge about the language, does not mean having the ability to use it fluently and appropriately when the time pressure of communicating with native speakers is on…

 Reference

Dulay, Heidi & Burt, Marina. (1974). Natural Sequence in Child Second Language Acquisition. Language Learning. 24. 37 – 53. 10.1111/j.1467-1770.1974.tb00234.x.

About the Author

Marisa Constantinides is the Director of CELT Athens, a centre for teacher development. This is her main area of interest and apart from teaching on a variety of short courses, she is the supervisor for all Cambridge courses, CELTA and DELTA. She has written grammar practice materials for the young learner (Basic Grammar Workbooks 1, 2 & 3, English Schoolbook Publications) as well as activity material for literary texts in preparation for the FCE and CPE exams (Activity Books for ‘Selected Tales’ by D. H. Lawrence and for ‘The Go-between’ by L. P. Hartley). You can read more about her experience and publications  here