Norwegian teacher students’ conceptions of grammar

What is it about?

We investigate what Norwegian teacher students think of when they hear the word "grammar". We gave 235 students a survey, and they had to write down their answers to the following questions: 1) How would you define the word "grammar"? 2) Do you think grammar is an important part of Norwegian as a school subject? 3) Do you feel confident in grammar? Most students define grammar as correct writing. Many also associate grammar with language structure. A few students mention that grammar has to do with theoretical knowledge of language structure, precise communication, text or constituent analysis. Nearly all students report that they find grammar to be of importance. Moreover, most of the student consider their own competence in grammar to be relatively good. The students were also given a knowledge test in grammar with questions about Norwegian morphology and syntax. The results were quite poor, so there is a discrepancy between the students' self-evaluation and the results from the knowledge test. We discuss our findings in light of national and international literature and propose plausible contributing factors. We also reflect upon possible consequences for teacher education.

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Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

Why is it important?

The study is the first to investigate teacher students' beliefs about grammar in Norway, and it also adds to the growing body of international research in this field. Since our findings resemble the results from similar studies in other countries (i.e., grammar is the same as writing correctly), our discussion of the consequences for teacher education will be valuable for teacher educators internationally.