The teacher may spend as much time as she likes exploring fundamental assumptions about language. You may want to assign a writing project in which one group writes a paragraph then changes the word order in each sentence. For example, ask each group to collaborate on a short paragraph about the way children learn language. Their parents are the main teachers, but sometimes children just repeat things they hear. Teachers sometimes but main parents repeat just the children are their things they hear.
Groups exchange papers and try to decipher each other's paragraphs to make sense.
Students could share their methods of approaching this problem. It soon dawns on students that language has a rigid structure and that although they may not be able to recite the rules governing syntax, they know them. Students that speak a non-standard variety of English could compare their syntax with standard English and generate rules for translating. First, choose a short passage that is exceptionally descriptive, exciting or well written. Then ask students to write down the passage while you dictate it.