How to Learn Grammar Perfectly: One Man's Opinion

Grammar is hard. Grammar is confusing. Grammar is tricky. Grammar is frustrating. Grammar is terrifying. Grammar is a headache. Grammar is a nightmare. Grammar is thought-provoking. Grammar is challenging. Grammar is interesting. Grammar is fun. Grammar is a game. Grammar is a puzzle. Grammar is the core of language. Grammar is the core of culture. Grammar is the core of our identities. Grammar is friggin' AWESOME!

I was like every other kid in elementary school, junior high school and high school who said, "Why do I need to learn grammar? I already know how to speak English!" This is proof that God in whatever form he or she may take has a wicked sense of humor. I was a terrible student in language classes, English or World. I failed Spanish. I failed Latin. I failed Chinese. I ignored grammar. I never studied. I must have been my teachers' worst nightmare. So God made me a language teacher. (It took every ounce of willpower not to explode on a ninth grader I overheard say "Why do I need to study vocabulary? I already know all the English I need to know." Payback is a bitch, ain't it?)

A wise man once said, "All you need to be happy in life is two things: something you love and something you are good at. And if God has truly blessed you, they will be the same thing." Grammar is my blessing.

Somewhere along the line, I really began to understand grammar. I began to see things differently. Things slowly came into focus. A piece of the puzzle came to me every now and then, mostly thanks to my students. Without their constant questions, which pushed the limits of my own understanding, I would never have caught the grammar virus. The more I learned, the more I wanted to learn. Every time I thought I had something figured out, some weirdness of English would pop up and make me question and refine my theories and hypotheses.

But it was also a second blessing from God that made this possible. God didn't just give me a talent and curiosity for languages. God also made me lazy. I hate to do research. I hate to read grammar books. They are dry and boring and I don't understand them. (At least the ones I've read and used in the classroom.) So I just used logic and little bits of research here and there, mostly to confirm my hypotheses. Along the way, I think I have come up with something a little bit different that works, at least for me and some (most?) of my students. I don't claim to have all the answers and I don't claim that everything I say is absolutely correct. I'm fallible. I'm human. I have a lot to learn, but I think I have a lot to teach, too.

I live in Hawaii and I am married to a lovely and beautiful Japanese woman who also happens to be the most talented hula and Tahitian dancer I have ever seen. She has introduced me to the world of Polynesian dance in a way I had never imagined. And this has helped me understand what I have learned to do differently and what has allowed me to figure out grammar and how to teach it.

When my wife and I see Polynesian dancing together, we both intuitively know when we are watching an average, good or great performance. However, while I can only see the dance as a whole and admire the costumes in their entirety, my wife can do so much more. She sees everything I see and appreciates the beauty of the whole. But she can go so much deeper. She sees the precision of the hands. She admires the contrast of well chosen colors for the muu-muu and the lei. She sees the little extra grace in the expert kaholo. I see hula one way, she sees it two ways, each one complementing the other.

To truly understand grammar, you need to develop a second way of looking at language. Of course, the most important thing is to be able to understand and communicate to the best of your ability. But there are times, especially when you read and write, that you need more. Most of the time, when you go to the doctor's office, a general examination is enough to figure out what's going on. However, sometimes the doctor needs to see what's happening on the inside. That's when your doctor's uses an X-ray machine or an MRI. As a language student, you need to develop your own grammatical X-ray vision. When you read something that you just don't quite understand, how do you figure it out? When you write something that just doesn't seem quite right, that is obviously a little awkward, how do you fix it?

You need GRAMMAR VISION.

And there are just three little steps you need to take to get the basics, just three little things you need to learn.

1. Parts of Speech -- Can you identify the correct part of speech of any word in any sentence of any book written in English?
2. Parts of a Clause -- Can you identify the subject, verb, object (both direct and indirect) or the complement of any clause in any sentence in any book written in English?
3. Types of Clauses -- Can you identify a main clause, a noun clause, an adjective clause or an adverb clause?

If you can do this, you can do almost anything. And it's much easier than it sounds. If you make a true effort to learn this, if you truly believe that this is important and truly want to figure it out, you can do it in as little as a month.

This is the first in a series of blog entries I will write detailing my ideas and explaining the basics. If you are a student who is interested in learning or a teacher who is interested in trying this out, I need some more guinea pigs.