User:Aubriejwinger/Syntax
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[edit]Syntax
[edit]In the discipline of linguistics, syntax (/ˈsɪntæks/ SIN-taks) is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences.
Application of Syntax in teaching English
[edit]Syntax plays a crucial role in language education. In primary and elementary school, it supports the development of reading, writing, and later, second-language skills. To effectively teach English, students must first build a foundation in syntax, typically through sentence structure instruction. Young learners often struggle with proper word order, making syntactic awareness—a student's ability to recognize how words relate within a sentence—an essential early skill.
One effective method for reinforcing this is sentence scrambling, where students rearrange jumbled sentence elements into a grammatically correct order. Instruction at this level often introduces basic syntactic terms such as "subject" "predicate" and "clause" helping students identify sentence components and paving the way for more advanced understanding later on.
In high school, syntax instruction becomes more analytical. Students learn to identify and construct more complex sentence types, including compound, complex, and compound-complex structures. This instruction deepens their understanding of clauses and grammatical relationships, which improves both writing and reading comprehension.
Standardized tests like the SAT and ACT frequently assess syntactic accuracy, emphasizing the continued importance of syntax throughout a student’s education.
References
[edit]Cain, K., & Oakhill, J. (2007). Children’s comprehension problems in oral and written language: A cognitive perspective. Guilford Press.
Sedita, J. (2020, June 2). Syntactic Awareness: Teaching Sentence Structure (Part 1). Keys to Literacy. https://keystoliteracy.com/blog/syntactic-awareness-teaching-sentence-structure-part-1/