This paper aims to establish a distinction between two concepts involved in the school practice of linguistic reflection - the opposition between case and example. First, the theoretical definition of these concepts is presented. Then, the analysis of a few proposals of work on linguistic aspects found in Portuguese language textbooks is done in order to advance a more precise definition of the concepts developed in this paper. We argue that the choice of basing linguistic reflection on cases rather than on presenting examples is an essential step towards the establishment of linguistic reflection in Portuguese language classes - as it has been proposed by many studies in Applied Linguistics.
linguistic reflection; Portuguese language teaching; textbook