The one thing we learned as trainee English teachers was that any point of time you are dealing with several syllabi – the prescribed one, the version of the prescribed one that you customize for your class, the students agenda (which includes ability and willingness to learn, previous knowledge and so on). Naturally, then, the teaching of the language is as interesting as it is unpredictable. This also holds good for Grammar, where there are almost as many exceptions to the rule as there are rules.

The aim of any grammar lesson is to get learners to use Standard English, so they are better understood by a larger pool of people. At a higher level, they would enjoy the beautiful nuances of the language. The process of this rule learning and internalizing can be made good fun if the teacher chooses to be innovative.

The prescribed material for Grammar is usually dull –exercise after incomprehensible exercise. Look at the material again. Will a child enjoy innumerable passages about eco-friendliness? Can you jazz it up? Or supplement it with material that they relate to? Why not teach the lesson through things they like to talk about. My most elating moment as a teacher was when my ‘poor’ students (financially, as well as in their grasp of the language – the financial aspect is mentioned to draw attention to the act that they had no other place to learn except at school) enjoyed the worksheets I had prepared, completed them triumphantly and correctly (most important, I thought). The worksheets material was mainly about their everyday lives, their campus and the movies they saw and so on. Not erudite, but highly functional!

Another thing for the teacher to do is to use the full potential of their voice. It perks the kids out of the somnolence that generally accompanies the thought of a grammar lesson. The aural stimulus makes them stop and listen, rather than sometimes just rely on intelligent guess work to complete the exercise. Using different tones and stresses for questions, statements and exclamations works thoroughly enthuses them and there’s a lot of practicing and teasing and showing off that usually accompanies this lesson. Ditto for phonetics.

The googly was another favorite method. They looked forward to the trick questions I might throw their way. For example, four out of five questions in active and passive voice exercise would be convertible, but the fifth would be a sentence in the perfect continuous tense that could not be converted.

I also allowed for different students working at different paces. So in a quiet work hour, they would be busy completing their worksheets, with no pressure, moving nicely from the easy to the difficult.

However we live in times when even toddlers are computer and smartphone savvy. And their EVS lessons tell them to save paper!! It makes good sense to make worksheets on PowerPoint, which nicely allows for multiple choice questions, all neatly organized, one question per slide. The added graphics or sounds add to the fun! And they will probably feel sweetly important, dealing with their teacher via email and therefore tackling the lesson with enthusiasm.

Interactive games are another wonderful method of making the young ones like their grammar. For instance, each student could be given a prop – any common classroom item – and asked to do something different with it. Meanwhile the others write or memorize what they did. Think of the long list of verbs you will get, how they would learn the difference between ‘being verbs’ like ‘thinking’ and ‘doing verbs’ like walking!

Another word about students at different points on the learning curve! Often, pairing them up helps; the stronger one helps the slower one. Pairing them up with a little competition helps more (the pair that completes first, and correctly, gets an extra star!). You just have to ensure that only one does not do the work of two. But the advantage of pairing is that the slightly slower learner may be good at something else, and so in another learning situation, he can be the stronger one helping someone else. It also reinforces the important idea that it’s ok to be good at some things and not so good at others.

When a slower learner improves or works especially hard at a particular activity, do single him out for praise in kind words – ‘X has used the most seven-letter adjectives in his essay’. Even a consistently active learner can be given a public pat on the back once in a while. All students need appreciation for what they do and encouragement to do better.

You simply have to understand your students, and organize the lessons that will induce learning without tears.

Author Bio
I'm Ramya Raju, a freelance writer/web designer from India. I write on varied topics like English Courses, SEO, Web Design, Mobile, Marketing etc., I have an experience of about 8 years in content writing and have worked for top blogs and websites. I'm generally an extrovert; I like photography, anthropology and traveling to different countries to learn the culture and living of the local inhabitants.
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