Studying grammar gives us insight, but doesn't teach communication

The argument

The claim here is not that grammar is worthless but that its value has been misidentified. Knowing grammar offers one wonderful insight into language and, through language, into the human mind. It gives us the vocabulary we need to talk about how language works: to describe how sentences are structured, to name the parts they are built from, and to say how words are transformed between tenses. Without that vocabulary a speaker may use a construction perfectly well and still be unable to discuss it, compare it or analyse it. Insight of that kind, however, is a different achievement from competence. The inner workings of language are fascinating to English teachers, to linguists and to language enthusiasts, and there is nothing wrong with pursuing them for their own sake. But a subject being fascinating to specialists does not make it fascinating to everyone, and describing how a system operates is not the same as being able to operate it. Speakers routinely produce well-formed sentences without being able to state the rule they have just obeyed, which is enough to show that the descriptive knowledge and the practical ability come apart. Since language learning is intuitive, the order in which grammar is usually taught inverts the way the skill is actually acquired. Learners take in structure by encountering it, using it, and being understood or misunderstood in return, which is to say that students will learn best by doing. Teaching the rules first asks them instead to memorise confusing rules and trends that an enthusiast just happened to notice, and presents those observations as prerequisites for speaking rather than as descriptions drawn from speech already fluent. That is why grammar can be genuinely worth studying — as enrichment, as a shared vocabulary, as a way into a fascinating system — and still not be something communication depends on. Learning grammar is useful, but not necessary.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Grammar is not just about giving insight to language enthusiasts. By understanding the inner workings of language, a student can talk about literature and writing with much more precision and clarity. It gives students the vocabulary to interpret the author's intentions, literary devices, writing style, and more in a work of literature. A student's writing can also improve by use of proper grammar mechanics and writing conventions which have been modeled in the literature that they have studied. While it is true that people acquire language naturally, to truly understand and use it effectively requires a working knowledge of grammar.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Grammar study is essential to learning how to properly harness the English language to communicate clearly and effectively.