Writing in English is often a problem for EFL learners in part because
students may translate literally from their L1, and also because they
may organise their writing by focusing on the grammatical structure at
the level of clause or sentence. However, many studies argue that
language is meaningful at a unit larger than a clause or sentence (e.g.,
Halliday, 1994; Ravelli, 2005; Martin & Rose, 2003). To write
successfully, students need to be trained to take broader perspectives
and learn how to organise the text as a whole. Given that text unity can
be created through hierarchies of waves of information ("periodicity"--
see Martin & Rose, 2003), this article argues that discourse
organisation and grammatical structure are systematically related, and
that it is useful for the language teacher to consider both levels when
investigating students' use of language, and teaching language in the
classroom. Using systemic functional linguistics (SFL), I discuss the
relationship of discourse and grammar and examine the implications for
the language classroom.