COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE ABILITY
(Bachman &Palmer)
LANGUAGE KNOWLEDGE
ORGANISATIONAL KNOWLEDGE PRAGMATIC KNOWLEDGE
GRAMMATICAL KNOWLEDGE
Vocabulary
Syntax
Phonology/graphology
TEXTUAL KNOWLEDGE
Cohesion
Rhetorical and conversational
Organization
Imaginative functions
FUNCTIONAL KNOWLEDGE
Ideational functions
Manipulative functions
Heuristic functions
Cultural references and
Figures of speech
SOCIOLINGUSTIC KNOWLEDGE
Dialects and language
Varieties
Registers
Natural and idiomatic
Expressions
EVIDENCES
The goal of any communicative language should be enable students to express themselves confidently, accurately, and fluently in speaking and writing; to understand spoken and written English as it is used in the world today; and to function socially in English in a variety of settings, both familiar and unfamiliar. Much practice is needed to reach those goals.
Because the typical student has limited opportunities to observe and practice English outside of class, the goal of the classroom must be to provide rich sources of input for observation as well as intensive opportunities for controlled and free practice. In other words, the classroom must become both a microcosm of, as well as a rehearsal for the real word.
PERMITTING ACTIVE OBSERVATION OF LANGUAGE
Although the world is saturated with English (through the Internet, films, music, and television much of it is incomprehensible to beginning and intermediate students and difficult and frustrating to learn from. Nevertheless, students should be encouraged to seek out and observe English outside of class whenever possible.
On the other hand, students benefit greatly and learn easily from exposure to models of spoken and written English at their own productive level or language just above that level.
ENCOURAGING REPETITION OF NEW LANGUAGE
Some people believe that repetition of language is indicative of an outdated behaviorist audio-lingual approach. Consequently,...