The Great Eight: Teaching the Eight Parts of Speech

Let's face it, most students view the eight parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, adverbs, interjections, prepositions, and conjunctions) as less than exciting. In fact, I can remember beginning a lesson a few years ago by telling my pupils (in my most-excited voice), "Boys and girls, this morning you're going to learn how to identify and use conjunctions!" Someone in the back of the room moaned, "Borrrrrring." 

Well, who can blame him?

The parts of speech probably aren't the most riveting material for young writers to take in, but they are a very important concept to master. They are the building blocks for all writing, as well as for mastering foreign languages. Just as young students of math must master the four basic operations to become proficient mathematicians, young writers should have a thorough understanding of how the various parts of speech function in the English language. Here are two activities I use with great success to teach and reinforce the eight parts of speech.

Daily Oral Language

The premise behind daily oral language is that it gives pupils a chance to practice their spelling, sentence-writing skills, and their knowledge of the use of conventions - including punctuation, capitalization, and rules of grammar. Additionally, this activity can be used to teach and review the eight parts of speech (nouns, adjectives, pronouns, etc.) and types of sentences that we use (declarative, imperative, exclamatory, and interrogative). Each class member has his own notebook with D.O.L. written on the front, which he uses every day.

Before I open my door at the beginning of the day, I write some sentences on the board that are filled with mistakes. With the lower grades, I usually include two to three short sentences. With the upper grades, I usually write four or five longer sentences. The types of mistakes students are expected to find involve spelling, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, and sentence structure errors. My class knows that as soon as they come into the room and complete their morning tasks, such as turning in their homework and putting their lunches away, they should go straight to their desks, pull out their daily oral language notebooks and get to work. They simply turn to the next empty page, and then begin. Let's say I have a third grade class. The class would see something like this on the board:

today is novembr 4th We are going to have a Great day! 

at 11:00, we will practice our musical play After returneng

 from lunch, Mrs white is coming in to due art with you

 

4 Sentences

Circle Proper Nouns - 2

Box Pronouns - 4

Underline Action Verbs - 6

As you can see, there are quite a few mistakes. The students' job is to recognize the mistakes BEFORE they write in their notebooks. They must fix the mistakes as they go along. The goal is to have a perfectly written sequence of sentences in their notebooks when they are done. Then, they have to identify the parts of speech. In this case, they circle two proper nouns (November, Mrs. White), box four pronouns (We, we, our, you), and underline six action verbs (going, have, practice, returning, coming, do). I always let them know how many sentences there are in the sequence, and how many examples of each part of speech they must identify. When most everyone is finished, I run my hand underneath the sentences. When I come to a mistake of any kind, volunteers raise their hands to tell me what needs to be fixed. Once the sentences are in order, I ask for volunteers to identify the parts of speech.

Vivid Vocabulary

When faced with a topic that my pupils view as boring, I often utilize a classroom game in order to make the learning of that topic more enjoyable. Kids love games, and they love competition. A very simple game I use when teaching the eight parts of speech is what I call, vivid vocabulary. I use a book that has a lot of descriptive writing, such as A Bad Case of Stripes, by David Shannon. As a warm-up, I read passages from the book, and ask students to give me examples of the parts of speech that they heard. For instance, I read from page twelve in the book, and ask them to give me examples of adverbs. From page sixteen, I'd ask for examples of interjections, etc.

Then, I place them in groups of four and give them a "Vivid Vocabulary Worksheet," which they use to record the parts of speech. I also give them some photocopied pages from the book. As a group, their job is to locate as many parts of speech as they can from the photocopied pages, and correctly record them onto their worksheet. I usually give them five minutes to complete this activity. For every correct word they record, they are awarded two points. But for every word that is incorrectly recorded, they lose a point. Whoever has the most points at the end of the game is the winner. This very simple game is always a hit. The nice thing is that the "Vivid Vocabulary Worksheet" is a fluid thing. Sometimes, they will be looking for adverbs, conjunctions, nouns, and verbs, and other times, they'll be looking for interjections, adjectives, pronouns, and prepositions - or any grammatical combination that I assign. However it works best for your class, take the time to teach and reinforce the eight parts of speech; it will provide a solid foundation for your students' future education. 

Additional Educational Resources

Eight Parts of Speech PowerPoint

Here is a very good PowerPoint which presents the eight parts of speech in clear and colorful form. In it, learners view slides that focus on one part of speech at a time. Extension discussion and activities could be easily adapted to this fine presentation.

Slowly But Surely

This fabulous resource combines math and language arts in the teaching of the parts of speech! Nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs are the focus. This is perfect for third to fifth graders, and should lead to a much greater understanding of these parts of speech. Impressive!

Perfectly Painless Parts of Speech

Yes, even middle schoolers need brushing up on their knowledge of the parts of speech. Here you will find a really fun method for reviewing this important aspect of English grammar. After watching a video as a refresher, small groups create posters, songs, and/or advertisements in order to re-teach the parts of speech to their classmates. The Wacky Web Tales website is accessed, which provides a mad-lib-style educational experience centered around the eight parts of speech.