Concept Attainment

The teacher presents two lists — Examples (YES) and Non-Examples (NO) — of a grammar pattern or vocabulary category. Students compare lists and figure out the rule or feature. An inductive reasoning activity that develops noticing and generalisation skills.

Procedure

1. Prepare two columns on the board: YES and NO. No labels explaining why.
2. Start with two YES items and two NO items. Students study.
3. Students propose the rule. Don't confirm yet.
4. Add a third YES and a third NO. Students refine their rule.
5. Continue adding examples until students have a firm rule.
6. Students test the rule: they propose new items, classify as YES or NO, verify against the teacher's intended rule.
7. Teacher confirms the rule explicitly.

Example: Countable vs Uncountable Nouns

YES	NO
three apples	three musics
many books	many informations
a chair	an advice
dogs	furnitures

Students figure out: NO items are uncountable nouns used as if they were countable.

Example: Gerunds vs Infinitives after "stop"

YES	NO
He stopped smoking (= quit)	He stopped smoking to say hello — wait, this is also grammatical but different meaning...

For concept attainment, picks contrasts where the rule can be cleanly induced.

Good Concepts to Attain

Grammar	Contrast
Present perfect vs past simple	With/without time adverbs
Articles	Specific vs generic reference
Countable vs uncountable	Using a/an vs some/much
Reported speech tense backshift	Present-reported vs past-reported
Gerund/infinitive patterns	After specific verbs
Phrasal verb types	Separable vs inseparable
Adjective order	Size + age + colour + origin + material

Why It Works

• Inductive reasoning: students build the rule from patterns; stronger than receiving the rule.
• Comparison is the engine: YES vs NO forces attention to what's distinctive.
• Metacognitive by-product: students practise hypothesising and revising, a transferable skill.
• Teacher's hand is light: teacher provides data, not rules. The class works the concept out.

Variations

• Silent concept attainment: teacher writes items; students silently write their best guess at the rule.
• Student-generated additions: after hypothesising, students propose their own YES items for the class to classify.
• Double concept attainment: two patterns contrasted (must vs have to; will vs going to).
• Negative-only start: start with only NO items; students infer what's missing that would make them YES.

Tips

• Choose examples carefully: they must rule out plausible-but-wrong hypotheses. This is the hardest part of preparing.
• Don't explain too early. Let learners wrestle with the wrong hypothesis for a bit — it's productive confusion.
• End with the explicit rule, not just attainment. Students need verbal confirmation.
• Works well at B1+. Below that, metalinguistic capacity is too limited.

Source

Bruner, J., Goodnow, J. & Austin, G. (1956) A Study of Thinking. Wiley. Adapted for education by Joyce & Weil Models of Teaching and for ELT by many contemporary teachers.