1. Grammatical competence is how well a person has learned that features and rules of the language. This includes vocabulary, pronunciation, and sentence formation. The main question is: How well does a person understand English grammar?
2. Sociolinguistic competence is how well a person speaks and is understood in various social contexts. This depends on factors such as status of those speaking to each other, the purpose of the interaction, and the expectations of the interaction. The main question is: how socially acceptable is the person’s use of English in different settings?
3. Discourse competence is how well a person can combine grammatical forms and meanings to achieve different types (genres) of speaking or writing. The main question is: How well does one properly combine all the languages elements to speak or write in English?
4. Strategic competence is how well the person uses both verbal forms and non-verbal communication to compensate for lack of knowledge in the other three competencies. The main question is: Can a person find ways to communicate when he or she is lacking some knowledge of English?
• Communicative Language Teaching: Communicative language teaching (CLT) is an approach to foreign or second language learning which emphasizes that the goal of language learning is communicative competence. The communicative approach has been developed particularly by British applied linguists as a reaction away from grammar-based approaches such as the aural-oral (audio-lingual) approach. Teaching materials used with a communicative approach teach the language needed to express and understand different kinds of functions, such as requesting, describing, expressing likes and dislikes, etc. Also, they emphasize the processes of communication, such as using language appropriately in different types of situations; using language to perform different kinds of tasks, e.g. to solve puzzles, to get information, etc.; using language for social interaction with other people.
• Competence learning model: Especially when we take specialized courses, learning seems to take place in four stages. We begin with unconscious incompetence: we do not know how much we do not know. Once we begin our course of studies, we become consciously incompetent: we know how much we do not know. From there we proceed to conscious competence: we have functional knowledge and can perform competently, but we have to think about what we are doing. Finally, after we have had enough experience, we become unconsciously competent: we know it and we can do it, and we do not much have to think about it. This model applies to a great deal of language learning, to TEFL training and to many other areas of study.
• Comprehensible input: Language that is understandable to learners.
• Content words: Words that carry meaning; usually nouns, verbs and sometimes adjectives and adverbs.
• Context clues: Clues used when guessing word meanings; clues that provide students with meaning or comprehension based on the environment in which a word is found.
• Contrastive analysis: Comparing two languages to predict where learning will be facilitated and hindered.
• Controlled practice: Practice of language forms in a way that is controlled by the teacher.
• Creative construction hypothesis: Hypothesis in language acquisition which states that learners gradually develop their own rule systems for language.
• Culture: The sum of the beliefs, attitudes, behaviours, habits and customs of a group of people.
• Deductive teaching: Also known as deduction, from the verb “to deduce”; a teaching technique in which the teacher presents language rules and the students then practice those rules in activities. Deductive teaching is usually based on grammar-based methodology and proceeds from generalizations about the language to specifics. (See “Inductive teaching”.)
• Delayed copying: The teacher writes a short familiar sentence on the board, gives students time to look at it, erases it, and then they see if they can write it.
• Descriptive grammar: Grammar that is described in terms of what people actually say or write, rather than what grammar books say tho grammar of the language should be. See “prescriptive grammar”.
• Diagnostic test: A test to diagnose or discover what language students know and what they need to develop to improve their language abilities; may be used before a course of study and combined with placement test.
• Dictation: A technique in which the teacher reads a short passage out loud and students write down what the teacher reads; the teacher reads phrases slowly, giving students time to write what they hear; the technique is used for practice as well as testing.
• Discourse: See “communicative competence”.
• Facilitator: A concept related to a teacher’s approach to interaction with students. Particularly in communicative classrooms, teachers tend to work in partnership with students to develop their language skills. A teacher who is a facilitator tends to be more student-centred and less dominant in the classroom than in other approaches. The facilitator may also take the role of mentor or coach rather than director.
• Feedback: Reporting back or giving information back, usually to the teacher; feedback can be verbal, written or nonverbal in the form of facial expressions, gestures, behaviours; teachers can use feedback to discover whether a student understands, is learning, and likes an activity.
• Fluency: Natural, normal, native-like speech characterized by appropriate pauses, intonation, stress, register, word choice, interjections and interruptions.
• Form-focused instruction: The teaching of specific language content (lexis, structure, phonology). See “language content”.
• Free practice: Practice activities that involve progressively less control by the teacher.
• Function words: Also known as form words, empty words, structure or structural words and grammar words; these words connect content words grammatically; function words have little or no meaning by themselves. Examples include articles, prepositions and conjunctions.
• Functional syllabus: Syllabus based on communicative acts such as making introductions, making requests, expressing opinions, requesting information, refusing, apologising, giving advice, persuading; this type of syllabus is often used in communicative language teaching.
• Gesture: A facial or body movement that communicates meaning; examples include a smile, a frown, a shrug, a shake or no of the head. Gestures often accompany verbal communication.
• Grammar: See “descriptive grammar” and “prescriptive grammar”. Also, see “communicative competence”.
• Graded reader: Reading material that has been simplified for language students. The readers are usually graded according to difficulty of grammar, vocabulary, or amount of information presented.
• Grammar translation: A method of language teaching characterized by translation and the study of grammar rules. Involves presentation of grammatical rules, vocabulary lists, and translation. Emphasizes reading rather than communicative competence.
• Grammatical syllabus: A syllabus based on the grammar or structure of a language; often part of the grammar translation method.
• Guided practice: Intermediate step in teaching between controlled and free practice activities; there is still some teacher guidance at this stage.
• Idiom: A group of words whose meaning is different from the meanings of the individual words: “She let the cat out of the bag” or “He was caught red-handed.”
• Inductive teaching: Also known as induction, from the verb “to induce”; a facilitative, student-centred teaching technique where the students discover language rules through extensive use of the language and exposure to many examples. This is the preferred technique in communicative language teaching. (See “ Deductive teaching”.)
• Input hypothesis: Hypothesis that states that learners learn language through exposure to language that is just beyond their level of comprehension. See “Krashen, Stephen”.
• Interference: A phenomenon in language learning where the first language interferes with learning the target or foreign language.
• Interlanguage: The language a learner uses before mastering the foreign language; it may contain features of the first language and the target language as well as non-standard features.
• Interlocutor: In a conversation, this refers to the person you are speaking to.
• Intonation: How we change the pitch and sound of our voice when speaking. See “language content”.
• Krashen, Stephen: Krashen’s Theory of Second Language Acquisition is a highly practical theory for communicative language learning. This notion of second language acquisition consists of five main hypotheses: the Acquisition-Learning hypothesis; the Monitor hypothesis; the Natural Order hypothesis; the Input hypothesis; and the Affective Filter hypothesis. These hypotheses represent practical interpretations of what happens in language acquisition, and they form the basis of a system of language teaching called “The Natural Method.” Please see “The Krashen Revolution”.
• Language Content: Language has three components, which are commonly taught as language items.