“It’s about grammar when we go over it together” – Students’ beliefs about grammar teaching in language classes

Abstract

This article examines 12 to 15-year-old students’ beliefs about grammar and grammar teaching in the language subjects Danish, English and German in a Danish lower secondary school context. The article is part of Gramma3, a larger focused ethnographic study on grammar teaching practices in Danish schools. The article contributes with an often-overlooked student perspective to the ongoing discussion of grammar teaching. The qualitative analyses of 13 focus group interviews with students indicate that their beliefs of grammar teaching are diverse and negotiable, but often tied to materialities (e.g., computers and books) and traditional forms of teaching (e.g., fill-in-the-blank exercises). The students create a connection between grammar across the languages by themselves; where some see similarities, others see differences. The perceived degree of difficulty of grammar and grammar teaching depends on the students’ views on each of the three languages. The students believe that it is important to be taught grammar to learn languages, to be able to express themselves properly and to improve their future opportunities. The students’ affective responses to grammar teaching in the language subjects are diverse and often dichotomous. Based on these findings, the authors recommend developing more meaningful contextualized grammar teaching across language subjects.