The Words in the Word: Teaching Grammar through the Bible

By Linda Reed

Most of us don’t realize we’ve signed up to teach grammar when we sign up to teach English. We often just love Internationals, and perhaps teaching. We feel called and we care.

But, clarifying the words that form contractions, conjunctions, or consonant pronunciation—we’re often not so sure.

What if we could provide these necessary insights in a package that we love? What if the Bible was our resource for teaching grammar?

God’s Word uses fascinating grammatical detail: Psalm 23 uses the “simple present tense.” The Lord is my shepherd, He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside still waters, He restores my soul. Even though I walk through the valley, you prepare a table before me, my cups overflows.

With a simple display on ScreenShare on Zoom we can observe the Psalm by first asking: “What do we learn about this Shepherd?”

Then, we can narrow to: “Let’s highlight every present tense verb (use highlighter).”

Now, “let’s list all these verbs, sorting into separate lists those that end in /s/ and those that don’t.” At this point the grammar rule could be elicited or we could teach the pattern of “third person singular” requiring the /s/ addition. Further, if desired, pronunciation patterns for the /s/ and /z/ sounds could be observed and taught.

In the final questions, we could move back out to overall questions about the Great Shepherd and our response to someone like Him. (The pattern for this type of lesson plan is like an “hourglass”.)

Isn’t this a wonderful way to teach grammar?

Psalm 40:1-4 portrays the simple past tense and provides opportunity to teach regular and irregular past verbs. The pronunciation sounds /d/ and /t/ and /id/ (as in “I waited patiently for the Lord”) are all there.

You may be thinking: “That’s impossible!”

During the most challenging season of COVID, we used the entire book of John, chapter by chapter to teach grammar. In John 2, we noted that Jesus was going to “a wedding” and then in v. 2, he is invited to “the wedding.” It was a great way to discuss the use of the indefinite articles (a/an) and when we use the definite article (the).

As we moved through John, we discussed metaphors and modals, question formation (e.g. “Who do you say that I am?”), and the littlest of grammar problems, the use of “of” in John 21. But all the way through, we took in the grand sweep of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

To make our journey usable for others, we catalogued these lessons and paired each one with a SOCEM discussion sheet. We put these in order for others to reuse. In order to complete this team project, Heritage College students skillfully compiled these grammar lessons from each chapter in the Book of John.

If you would like to use or view this John resource book, click the link here: https://eslministries.org/resources/teaching-materials/bible-study-christianity-lessons/ (scroll down to “The Gospel of John Resource Book” and click on the arrow on the right).

Truly “wonderful words of life” are found in God’s Word. Watching internationals view them for the first time was truly holy ground.

Whatever you do in the days and months ahead, pay attention to the words in His Word. They may become your Emmaus Road, a chance to see Jesus in a whole new way!