It may seem odd to assert that the basic patterns of English, the sentences, should be so difficult to teach - especially to English speakers - that we have to create a set of four manuals on constructing sentences. But we must realize that our teaching goal here is effective writing - and writing, the most demanding form of language, is founded on sentence mastery. Usage that is clear and fluent in light conversation or simple spoken transactions in home or street dialects is ineffective for complex analytical expressions in the academic, technical, or business world. A typical remedial student is a headline reader, a TV watcher, a phone user - but neither a serious reader nor a frequent writer. The sentence structures needed to produce educated writing or speech are not "normal" or "native" to these students. Also students are often unfamiliar with the conventions of sentence punctuation. In some ways the remedial writer and the ESL writer face the same problems of learning difficult and demanding sentence patterns as well as setting aside the easy structure of light talk. This is the core of our problem. My solution is to promote sentence mastery through the pattern-repetition-integration methods most commonly used in teaching foreign languages. Ample practice using slot positioning is available in all four manuals, and the instructor decides how much is necessary.

Author: Rosaline Fung

Publisher: VisionKeeper Publishing