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After 3 years of work and effort, the writing of the students who had studied grammar showed no significant differences in overall quality from that of students who had studied no grammar. Frequency of error in spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, and other mechanical measures did not vary from group to group. As far as their writing was concerned, studying grammar or not studying grammar simply made no difference. Summarizing the research that was published after the Braddock et al. (1963) report, Hillocks (1986) noted that: None of the studies reviewed for the present report provides any support for teaching grammar as a means of improving composition skills.

On another—and this is important—they differentiate Standard from nonstandard English. Too often, our language arts classes confuse usage and grammar, even though they are distinct. Standard English, Nonstandard English, and Formal Standard English. Every person speaks a dialect, a variation of the core language that usually is associated with geographic location and/or socioeconomic status. In the United States, we have West Coast dialects, Southern dialects, Midwestern dialects, East Coast dialects, and numerous variations within each region.

Many who argue against teaching Standard conventions seem to believe it will. The reality is that failure to teach the conventions of Standard and formal Standard English in our classes is unlikely to 9 Consider this extreme example: Judges recounts how the Gileadites killed 42,000 Ephraimites simply because the latter pronounced the word shibboleth as sibboleth (12, 4–6). 1–3). 36 CHAPTER 2 have any effect on society’s attitudes toward speakers of nonstandard English, but it will most certainly have an effect on our students’ lives.