Thread: GRAMMAR POINT
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Unread May 31st, 2010, 02:20 am
susan53 susan53 is offline
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Default Re: GRAMMAR POINT

Sounds like something on a CELTA course ...???
Not going to do your homework for you, but ask yourself these questions :

For 10 ..
a) is there anything different about the past form of "used" and other past forms? Would it cause learners particular problems?
b) there's nothing special about an infinitive+noun construction - students would only need to know that the verb was transitive and therefore had to have an object .eg I need to have a shower. If you take away a shower the sentence is meaningless. But it's just the same with eg I had a shower last night. Nothing special about the infinitive. But anyway, is there an "infinitive + object" construction here? What is the grammatical class of the expression every morning - ?
c) What problems might this construction cause students? Try : 1) converting it into the present 2) comparing the pronunciation of used here with that in I used up all the sellotape - we need some more. 3) explaining why you can't say : I used to go to Rome yesterday.

So - which of the three do you think you'd most need to focus on?

For 11...
Take it as a general principle in teaching that you should deal with one thing at a time, and start with the simplest and build up. What level do you think students would need to be before they came across a construction like this? What individual items would they need to know - you'll find them in the following examples :

Do you like dogs?
That's the man who painted my house.
She's someone who you can relate to easily.
She's someone to whom you can relate easily.
David was here yesterday.
I was lying on the beach this time yesterday.

They're not in order of teaching. What order would you teach them in, and which would you teach at each level? So, by the time you got to the sentence you have to teach, what would you assume the students already knew, and what would be the final thing to teach?

For 12...
Another (related) principle : when you want to teach something, do it in the simplest possible way without adding in more difficult language which would distract the students from your teaching point. So for each of the possible teaching points above, ask yourself : if you wanted to teach it, could you produce simpler examples with less "extraneous" material? You should find that there's only one where the answer is "no" - that's your teaching point.
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