TEACHERS' GRAMMAR COURSE

Grammar is not most people's favorite subject!

Are you afraid that you might be a bit weak in grammar? Our Academy advises about English grammar in the following way: first, that our main duty as English teachers is to assist our students to learn how to talk! And, secondly, that if you are an English native speaker, or if you have learned English up to a highly-accomplished English as a Second Language standard, you do not need to review grammar for yourself (unless you want to become a professional writer) because you already use English (and its grammar) almost perfectly!

However, if you plan on teaching English to people who are learning it as a foreign language, you do need to review grammar thoroughly and well in order to avoid teaching it! In other words, if you are an English native speaker, you've got all of the "grammar" imbedded deeply in your speech and writing patterns already, so when a student asks, for example, "Teacher, I never understand present perfect tense. You can explain for me, please?" you probably will be able, after 30 or 45 minutes (or perhaps an hour), to "dredge it all up" and give a pretty good lecture on how this tense works, along with some examples and drilling. After this, your student may actually be satisfied, but we will say: "What a shame all of that time which should have been spent in conversation practice has been wasted!" Indeed, your student will find it impossible to remember very much of what you have taught her by the next class.

On the other hand, if you have reviewed grammar, you will find that in just 10 minutes you can give your student all the information she can hold now, along with examples and drilling. After this, of course, you can cleverly insert some present perfect clauses into the rest of the lesson for reinforcement, in the end delivering a wonderful lesson and turning a potentially disruptive question into a giant step of progress in your student's conversational skills!

The same holds true when we teach from the student's text of an English conversational development course. We have to "remind" our students about grammatical elements and structures (indeed it is essential!), but this must be done rapidly and efficiently, as we have not been engaged to teach grammar, but to help our students learn to speak.

Our TEFL for Target Learner Groups Course already contains a grammar course element, which covers the requirements of many trainees. However, if you are indeed really poor at grammar, or perhaps just want to make sure of yourself, our Teachers' Grammar Course could be for you. After all, it's very affordable and consumes only two convenient periods of one and one-half hours each week.

To help you decide whether to join the course or not, we invite you to click on the "Take your Exam Now!" link below. This short test consists of only 10 multiple-choice questions. Just click beside the answer you feel is correct and then click on "Check the Results". You will discover immediately your percentage of correct answers, and which question numbers were answered wrongly. You will also receive our recommendation as to whether taking the Grammar Course would be a good idea.

Finally, you will get a full explanation about any wrong answers you have given, along with information telling you which answer was correct and why.

Are you game? If so . . . Take your Exam Now!