by Stephen Murphy

Created on: October 19, 2009   Last Updated: October 24, 2009

Many students understand their writing is below standard, but don't know how to fix it, and they express frustration when the teacher gives them low marks. Students struggle with grammar because of the overabundance of television and the internet, and the popularity of new social technology. They do not know what active verbs are let alone tell why they are important. There are techniques to teach students to use active verbs in their sentences based on the use of the crawl, walk, run phase.

In the crawl phase of explanation, identify the vocabulary used; explain why the active verb choice is better and how a passive verb choice weakens the writing. Be sure to give plenty of examples of each. The end state is for the students to understand what the difference between active verbs and passive verbs, and which is better and why.

1. Identify the vocabulary.

Verb - The part of speech that expresses existence, action. The word verb actually originated around 1350 or so part of the Middle English time period, and even before that was translated from Latin. It is important to give the history, because it is not just something the teacher made up, rather something that is part of history.

Active verb - a verb that is acted on by the subject, for example: Jill ate the banana.

Passive verb - a verb which has a subject acted upon rather than having the subject do the action, for example: The banana was eaten by Jill.

2. Explain the reasons why a passive voice weakens the writing. In the first example, 4 words are used; the sentence is simple and complete. The second example has six words, and makes the reader think. Both sentences are grammatically correct, but why would you use 6 words when 4 words would do. It can also make the reader think the ball is the subject of the sentence, when the subject is Jill. This is the most important section in teaching because students will challenge the rules when it comes to writing.

3. Examples: In the crawl phase, it is important to give the student as many examples as possible, if possible devote an entire lesson to examples. It is important to utilize a variety of teaching techniques for the different types of learners through a variety of media such as writing on the board, talking out loud, and playing a sound recording. The plethora of different media will be able to reach more of the students in the class as well as giving students multiple ways to understand.

The walk phase is the next step in the teaching process where the

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