To?Learn?A?Language?Is?Not?Simply?A Question?of?Learning Its?Grammar

1.Introduction

During the millions of years of evolving history from body language to gesture language， language has constantly been developing. The Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary （2002， p883） defines Language as \"A system of sounds， words， patterns， etc used by humans to communicate thoughts and feelings\". A language， whose most important function is communication， includes many aspects. For a language， grammar， which describes the structure of the language， is important but not the only vital aspect of learning a language.

Firstly， this essay will discuss the process of learning a language and whether it is useful only pay attention to grammar teaching. This essay uses first and second language as examples to clarify some valid methods to learning a new language. Then it lists some drawbacks of language teaching situation all over the world and some efficient methods to improve it. There are some examples from daily life and it clearly shows us some measures should be down in the future teaching and learning area.

Secondly， facts show some current situation of grammar focus teaching not always success in communication area and sometimes it can be a failure. Variety on methods and aspects are necessary in language teaching practice. This essay lists some methods to solve the problem of grammar focus learning and teaching. Focus should be diverting to more aspects than only grammar. Nevertheless， without grammar teaching， the similar situation with poor writing ability and logicalness will appear as well.

Finally， the essay summarizes some new methods of teaching English， the efficiency of the variety teaching methods. To declaim my point， the whole essay will raise some thinking concern to daily language teaching. A conclusion can be found that learning a language is not simply to learn its grammar. Many area should be covered when we learning a language.

2.Background

People all capable to speak their own language without hesitate， while they usually do not care about how to use the grammar and they can freely communicate with the right grammar， the can talk， whisper， command and also do what ever language can do. At the sane time， languages also are combining many things， writing speaking and reading. Actually people don not use grammar exactly in writing part because they seldom focus on grammar study. Many aspects affect people's language communication ability. Grammar is not only way to learn a language.

If people want to communicate freely， we must find out how we can communicate how it works. Whether grammar is playing a monodrama？ Heatherington （1980， p3） states that reading， writing and speaking in a language is the most obvious and unique of human social activities. No evidence shows to learn a language simply to learn its grammar. The target of learning a language is communication， use as many methods as we can to learn a language to attain this aim. Moreover， language developing thousands year， human learned how to survival from the variety languages. Summarize many valid methods and aspects to learning a language.

In recent years， it is generally accepted by most that teaching grammar is equals to teaching a language. According to the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary （2002， p645）“grammar is study or science rules for forming words and combing them into sentence.” Grammar shows how the language works， how to combine a paragraph， how to use right formation to construct sentences even passages.

3.Current situation

The first time most people recognize grammar is when they learn their own language formally or learn the second language in school. When people discuss the issue of learning languages， the first idea which comes to their mind is learning grammar. People start to learn their own language， at the time when he or she was born， everyday continuously receive messages from outside world； surrounding people give those repeated words and sounds with it. Baby can master a language without official teaching.

Heatherington （1980，p15） Most infants learn to speak， even born in a nonspeaking parents， as long as they can get contact with other spoken languages， they can easily learn to speak without formally teaching. This is relating to the first language， but when we adjust our view to a second language teaching area， the same thing does not happen a lot. Compare with first language learning， seems like second language learning have to built on the first language. At the same time， people firstly think in their first language then transfer into target language. How it can be a good result， when learning a language in this process？

【作者簡介】何欣（1985.07-），女，漢族，內(nèi)蒙古通遼人，南昌航空大學(xué)教師，講師，碩士，研究方向：語言學(xué)、語料庫、二語習(xí)得 寫作。