Do you think it is important to learn English grammar? Some teachers consider it to be the basis of the basics, so they only teach it. Others believe that it is boring, ineffective, in a word, the past century; therefore they don’t pay much attention to grammar. Let’s see together how important English grammar is.
How important is English grammar?
According to Anderson Institute, There is an opinion that all of us have long been overloaded with grammar, and we need to focus only on spoken English. Indeed, if we recall the “classical” school of learning English, then many in the school and the institute went through the times, grammatical constructions, performed exercises, and translated texts. It was often very tiring and, unfortunately, did not give the desired result. People have learned something but never learned to speak English. Sad but true.
So you don’t need to learn grammar?
First, let’s stop being intimidated by the word “grammar”. Any English grammar textbook is a collection of templates that are used in colloquial speech. One day one of the teachers came up with a wonderful idea – to systematize popular conversational patterns, to bring them into at least some semblance of a system. This is how the first book on grammar was born.
How important is grammar for those who need to speak the language?
Many people want to learn spoken English. But they don’t even roughly understand what it is. You can’t suddenly pick up and speak in a foreign language. Even if you know the words, you cannot put them together so that they carry any meaning. Words are put together according to special principles. Each language has its own. Grammar should not be judge by the grammatical errors in a sentence but considers many areas to be taken care of and you need to feel the language to make yourself comfortable.
For example, in Slavic languages, the order of words is not important, but there is a system of cases and endings, which shows the connection between groups of words. In the languages of the Romano-Germanic group (and this is not only English but also French, German, Italian, etc.), special word order is used. This means that words are arranged in a sentence according to a certain algorithm.
Imagine a theatre. If the audience does not buy tickets in advance, then before the performance they will start jostling and fighting for the best seat but if everyone knows in advance where his place is, then there will be no crush. This is how it happens in English – every word knows where it belongs. Grammar will tell you about all the intricacies of the arrangement of words in an English sentence. I’m sure you already want to start learning grammar as soon as possible!
Benefits of Good Grammar
- Boost up the confidence level
Good grammar brings positivity inside you and it all results in uplifting your confidence to an extent and on the other side bad grammar provides you a negative cycle.
- Increases credibility
Credibility is the quality of yours so that people have to trust you and this builds by good grammar as it rotates the judging factor of people against you in 360 degrees because imagine if you are reading a newspaper and it has mistakes in it so its basic attitude that you doubt in the news also which they are delivering.
- Makes you a strong communicator
Communication is the key to success which lags you behind if you are not a person with good grammar as effective communication is very essential for standard living.
- Perfectionism
Bad grammar fear is something which puts you off from any task and makes your work less visible according to others and on the other side good grammar is pure perfectionism in itself because as we know that the number of attention people gives to text messages is far different from job cover.
But I want to warn you about something
English grammar is not a cure for all ills, although it should not be neglected. It is important to find a balance between learning grammar and practicing other English skills. Now loud words about new super modern techniques are being heard from everywhere. You are assured that you can quickly speak English without learning grammar.
But if you ask a competent teacher to analyze such conversational courses, then you will be surprised to know that they consist mainly of a stripped-down version of the same grammar. They are simply called in a fashionable way: “Spoken English”.
You can get into a conversation by memorizing some common everyday phrase patterns. This is not so difficult to do. But this will not lay the foundation, it will not teach you to build sentences yourself, it will not teach you how to improvise in speech. I don’t want my students to turn into robots, all the time memorizing something. After all, you can learn to build phrases and correctly express your thoughts by mastering the most necessary conversational patterns in the system.
Grammar is the system
Speaking English at random, and speaking well without tormenting the interlocutor – these are two big differences. What’s the point of speaking quickly if you manage to make a bunch of mistakes and don’t notice it?
Consider a girl of eight years of age. At the age of six, she lived for half a year in an English-speaking country and learned to speak fluent English without an accent. She is understood by native speakers and can express her thoughts quite freely. But at the same time she makes a bunch of mistakes, does not know the times at all. Due to the fact that she is a child and expresses her thoughts situationally, all mistakes are forgiven her. But if she were an adult, then there would be many more requirements for her English. And this level would not be enough for her to communicate comfortably with native speakers.
Do you know adults who talk like they are little children? Do you like communicating with them? I am sure that you will be missing for a long time. Now think, would you like to be this “adult” in conversation, who uses language as a small child? But that’s how you’ll say it if you don’t master the English grammar.
I am not saying that English grammar is the only key to success and should come first. But I find it much better to speak with a minimum of mistakes, or no mistakes at all.
