Language in Use 179-180
An essential aspect of using language to order our experience of the world
is our ability to relate our actions to our written account of them. The
aim of the unit is to show how a writer has to limit the scope for varying interpretation
of what he writes if his words are to provide the basis for action by someone
else. The rules of games have been chosen to demonstrate this, because the majority
of pupils are acutely aware of the problem in this area from their own experience.
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[1] In this session, the aim is to have a game played according to a set of rules which the class themselves have drawn up. What this will reveal is the difficulty of setting down in words instructions for carrying out actions with which one is very familiar. The class choose a game like hopscotch or marbles, and each member of it writes his own account of how he would play it. Then, working in groups, the class use their accounts as the basis for writing up a set of rules for the game.
[2] This session begins with the playing of the game according to the
rule's prepared in the last session. The players should use the rules someone
else has prepared and at least two versions should be tried out. The discussion
should consider some of the following points:
(a) the difference and similarities between the rules
(b) what has been taken for granted and hence not expressed in the rules
(c) problems of interpretation, where the rules are insufficiently clear.
[3] The class now apply what they have explored in [2] to the rules
of a spectator sport they know well. Ask members of the class who actually play
the game to state some of the main rules in their own words. Let the class explore
the implications for play of the rule as it has been worded. The class can now
turn to the rule-book of sport and compare the written rules both with the formulation
they have been offered and with their own experience of the game. Ask for examples
of the following:
(a) written rules which are ambiguous in practice
(b) rules widely ignored or misinterpreted in practice
(c) rules frequently interpreted in conflicting ways by players or referees
or both
(d) cases of changes in written rules and the reasons for them.
A further possibility is for the class to write a set of rules, capable of publication as official, either for hopscotch (taking account of, and permitting, local variations) or for a playground game which has no written but does have a binding oral tradition. Numerous examples of the problems of describing such games can be found in Lore and Language of School Children, Opie, OUP. Official Rules of Sports and Games is published annually by Kaye and Ward.