Grammar

     I thought the article that we read about grammar was very helpful. Personally, I learned better from the "mini lessons" in school, even though many people do not believe they were. I personally enjoyed doing the grammar activities because it helped me learn. I was interested in grammar and English and enjoyed it, so it is understandable that it is uncommon for people who do not like English to learn from those exercises.
     I understand that doing little exercises about grammar without actually applying it to the writing can be useless to some students. If a student isn't naturally good at English, spelling, grammar, etc. I can understand how this would confuse them. I always feel it was a very important idea, that you should not be too hard on your students for grammar. If students don't have any wiggle room for their grammar, they will not take risks. If students don't make mistakes, they will not learn in my opinion.
     According to the NCLRC page about teaching grammar, the grammar drills and mini lessons will help students succeed on tests, but will not benefit in the long run. "This results in bored, disaffected students who can produce correct forms on exercises and tests, but consistently make errors when they try to use the language in context" (NCLRC). This is understandable because the students are not being taught how to use the grammar in writin, but the rules when using drills. All in all I believe this handout had a lot of great points and useful information.

Source:

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/grammar/grindex.htm