Description
Functional Grammar for Teachers is a practical online professional learning aimed at making quality grammar instruction achievable and enjoyable. During it, you will develop your knowledge about language and strategies to teach writing authentically in the primary classroom. I use functional grammar to explain the language system. In this course, we explore how functional grammar can be used to develop students’ knowledge of authentic texts at the levels of the whole text, sentence, clause, and phrase. This package is an excellent refresher for grammar nerds and a great place to start for grammar novices. The content of the workshops is practical and linked to the Australian Curriculum Version 9 for Foundation to Year 6.
Registration includes the following:
Text Types and Genres Reimagined
During this section, participants will be introduced to the basics of text structure…genre! A Functional Grammar approach to contextualising grammar teaching in the primary years will be shared. Participants will develop an understanding of the key components of the register, including what makes a clause. Applications for classroom use of Functional Grammar will be workshopped.
Teaching Sentences and Clauses
This section will dive deep into the heart of functional grammar, the clause. Workshop participants will have the opportunity to understand different types of processes, sentence types and noun groups. During this course, I share practical strategies that can be used in the primary classroom to improve students’ knowledge about clauses and develop their writing.
Developing Descriptive Writing
During this section, We will focus on two functional grammar structures that can improve students’ ability to add detail and description in their writing. Noun groups work as a powerhouse of detail in clauses. Within the workshop, I will demonstrate how using noun groups can lead to critical thinking and creativity. The parts of noun groups will be explored and examples of noun groups in various texts will be analysed. Following this, I will share the rich grammar resource of theme and rheme. Theme and rheme will be investigated as a resource that can be used to develop cohesion in writing. Student work samples will be analysed throughout this workshop to develop participants’ application of these grammar resources.
Discovering Multimodal Texts
In this section, you will develop foundational knowledge of multimodal texts. The students of today’s classrooms ‘read’ much more than words. Texts can include pictures, sounds, colours, movements and more. You will gain ideas and teaching strategies to introduce students to multimodal texts and analyse images during this workshop. Practical examples and ideas for classroom implementation will be explored.
A few extra details about this course:
- The workshops in this package are recorded, and a recording is provided to all workshop participants.
- Participants will be provided with resources and a handout before each workshop.
- These workshops meet the following AITSL Standards: 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.5, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 6.1, 6.2, 7.4
- This package is an ACT TQI Accredited program.
What participants have to say about my workshops:
“I found it inspiring and I can see myself becoming more engaged in the study of grammar.” -Debra
“The resources were helpful and not overwhelming- just right” -Naomi
“Thoroughly enjoyed it all.” -Hedy
“Very engaging with hands-on opportunities to practice skills.” -Kate
