This document discusses various topics related to language learning and assessment. It defines communicative competence as including grammatical, sociolinguistic, discourse, and strategic competence. It also discusses the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines for assessing language proficiency based on global tasks, context, accuracy, and text type. Finally, it outlines five standards for foreign language learning: communication, cultures, connections, comparisons, and communities.

1. On Knowing a Language 1
Today
• Find out your own beliefs about language
learning and teaching
• Start Chapter 1:
• What is it to know a language?
• Standards used to determine language
proficiency

2. On Knowing a Language 2
Instructor’s role in Developing Good
Language Learners (Reiss, 1983)
• Inform students honestly of the amount of work involved
and the benefits
• Create a comfortable classroom climate in which
students feel comfortable and involved
• Help students develop a cognitive style that is
conductive to language learning
• Personalize language instruction whenever possible in
order to motivate students
• Ask students to monitor each other to make them an
active part of the language teaching
• Present all material in a meaningful manner

3. On Knowing a Language 3
The good language teacher
(Mollica and Nuessel, 1997)
Out-of-class Roles
• Researcher
• Planner
• Manager
• Advocate
• Organizer
• Evaluator
• Communicator
In-class Roles
• Teacher
• Motivator
• Evaluator
• Facilitator
• Innovator
• Communicator
• Disciplinarian

4. On Knowing a Language 4
The Good Language Learner
(Stern, 1975; Rubin, 1975)
• Has a personal learning style or uses positive
learning strategies
• Has an active approach to language learning
• Has a strong drive to communicate and learn
from communication. He is willing to do many
things to get his message across
• Practices
• Attends to meaning
• Attends to form and monitors her own speech
and that of others

5. On Knowing a Language 5
The Learner’s Role (Cook, 1991)
• Find a learning style that suits you
• Involve yourself in the language learning
process
• Develop an awareness of language both as
system and communication
• Pay consistent attention to expanding your
language
• Take into account the demands that L2 learning
poses

6. On Knowing a Language 6
Proficiency: a common goal
• Not a theory of language acquisition
• Not a method of language teaching
• Not a curricular outline or syllabus
• Not a concern with grammar accuracy

7. On Knowing a Language 7
Proficiency?
• Expertise
• Competence
• Ability
• Polished Performance
• High-level Skill
• Well-developed Knowledge

8. On Knowing a Language 8
On Knowing a Language
• Being proficient
• For the medical doctor
• For the businessman
• For the tourist
• For the linguist

9. On Knowing a Language 9
Proficiency for the linguist
• Phonetics: knowledge of sounds in terms of
production and perception
• Phonology:knowledge of the sound system
• Syntax: knowledge of the organization of
words into larger structures, particularly
sentences
• Semantics: knowledge of the meanings of
words and sentences
• Pragmatics: knowledge of language use

10. On Knowing a Language 10
Competence vs. Performance
(Chomsky, 1965)
• Competence: what a person knows
• we have the ability to distinguish between
“grammatical” and “ungrammatical” expressions,
as well as recognize ambiguity. We are capable of
judging sentences we have never heard before!
• Performance: what a person can actually
produce
• we tend not to produce what is in our
‘competence’ because of memory limitations,
distractions, errors, false starts, etc.

11. On Knowing a Language 11
Problems with the competence
vs. performance distinction
• Limited to grammatical compentence
• Does not include notions of
• Appropriateness in the use of language, i.e.
context
• sociocultural significance

12. On Knowing a Language 12
Communicative competence
• Concept coined by Hymes in the 60s who
expressed the need to have a
“sociolinguistic and contextual
competence” as well as “grammatical
competence”
• 70s Campbell and Wales: grammatical vs.
communicative competence

13. On Knowing a Language 13
Communicative vs. grammatical
competence: Criticisms
• Distinction forces the following assumptions:
• Grammatical and communicative competence need
to be developed separately
• Grammatical competence is not an essential
component of communicative competence
• “Communicative competence may be defined as the
ability to function in a truly communicative setting-that is,
in a dynamic exchange in which linguistic competence
must adapt itself to the total informational input, both
linguistic and paralinguistic, of one or more interlocutors”
(Sauvignon 1972, p.8)

14. On Knowing a Language 14
Communicative Competence:
A framework (Canale and Swain, 1980)
• grammatical competence: mastery of the
linguistic code
• sociolinguistic competence: ability to use
language appropriately in different contexts and
shift registers
• discourse competence: ability to be
cohesive and coherent
• strategic competence: use of verbal and
non-verbal strategies to compensate for the
gaps in knowledge

15. On Knowing a Language 15
Summary
• Competence vs. Performance
• Communicative vs. Grammatical
competence
• Communicative Competence

16. On Knowing a Language 16
Assessing Proficiency:
The past
• Need for a national standard
• 50s Common Yardstick by Educational
Testing Service (ETS)
• 70s Common Yardstick by Interagency
Language Roundtable (ILR)
• 80s American Council on the Teaching of
Foreign Languages (ACTFL)

17. On Knowing a Language 17
Assessing Proficiency:The
present
ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines
• Global tasks/functions: from naming objects to
developing an argument
• Context/content: from memorized utterances in a
familiar context, to supporting your point of view in a
political discussion
• Accuracy: “fluency, grammar, pronunciation,
vocabulary, pragmatic competence and
sociolinguistic competence”
• Text type: from words in isolation to extended
discourse

18. On Knowing a Language 18
Defining the content of instruction:
Standards for foreign language learning
“Content standards, upon which performance standards are
assessed, lie at the heart of education reforms” (Phillips, 1999 p1)
The five Cs (1996):
• Communication: Communicate in languages other than
English
• Cultures: Gain knowledge and understanding of other cultures
• Connections: Connect with other disciplines and acquire
information
• Comparisons: Developing insight into the nature of language
and culture
• Communities: Participate in multilingual communities at home
and around the world