19JA80-18-Q-0010_-_Attachment_3_-_English_Speaking_Levels.pdf

Request for Quotations No. 19JA80-18-Q-0010

Attachment 3

Attachment 3 - English Speaking Levels

Speaking Level 1 (Elementary Proficiency)

Able to satisfy minimum courtesy requirements and maintain very simple face-to-face conversations on familiar topics.

A native speaker must often use slowed speech, repetition, paraphrase, or a combination of these to be understood by this individual.

Similarly, the native speaker must strain and employ real-world knowledge to understand even simple statements/questions from this individual.

This speaker has a functional, but limited proficiency.

Misunderstandings are frequent, but the individual is able to ask for help and to verify comprehension of native speech in face-to-face interaction.

The individual is unable to produce continuous discourse except with rehearsed material.

Examples:

1. Structural accuracy is likely to be random or severely limited.

2. Time concepts are vague.

3. Vocabulary is inaccurate, and its range is very narrow.

4. The individual often speaks with great difficulty.

5. By repeating, such speakers can make themselves understood to native speakers who are in regular contact with foreigners but there is little precision in the information conveyed.

6. Needs, experience, or training may vary greatly from individual to individual; for example, speakers at this level may have encountered quite different vocabulary areas.

7. However, the individual can typically satisfy predictable, simple, personal and accommodation needs; can generally meet courtesy, introduction, and identification requirements; exchange greetings; elicit and provide, for example, predictable and skeletal biographical information.

8. He/she might give information about business hours, explain routine procedures in a limited way, and state in a simple manner what actions will be taken.

9. He/she is able to formulate some questions even in languages with complicated question constructions.

10. Almost every utterance may be characterized by structural errors and errors in basic grammatical relations.

11. Vocabulary is extremely limited and characteristically does not include modifiers.

12. Pronunciation, stress, and intonation are generally poor, often heavily influenced by another language.

13. Use of structure and vocabulary is highly imprecise.

Speaking Level 2 (Limited Working Proficiency)

Able to satisfy routine social demands and limited work requirements.

Can handle routine work-related interactions that are limited in scope.

In more complex and sophisticated work-related tasks, usage generally disturbs the native speaker.

Can handle with confidence, but not with facility, most normal high-frequency social conversational situations, including extensive but casual conversations about current events, as well as work, family, and autobiographical information.

The individual can comprehend most everyday conversations, but has some difficulty understanding native speakers in situations that require specialized or sophisticated knowledge.

The individual’s utterances are minimally cohesive to articulate basic concepts.

Linguistic structure is usually not very elaborate and not thoroughly controlled; errors are frequent.

Vocabulary use is appropriate for high-frequency utterances, but unusual or imprecise elsewhere.

1. While these interactions will vary widely from individual to individual, the individual can typically ask and answer predictable questions in the workplace and give straightforward instructions to subordinates.

2. The individual can participate in personal and accommodation-type interactions with elaboration and facility; that is, can give and understand complicated, detailed and extensive directions and make non-routine changes in travel and accommodation arrangements.

3. Simple structures and basic grammatical relations are typically controlled; however, there are areas of weakness.

4. In the commonly taught languages, these [areas of weakness] may be simple markings such as plurals, articles, linking words, and negatives, or more complex structures such as tense/aspect usage, case morphology, passive constructions, word order, and embedding.

Speaking Level 3 (General Professional Proficiency)

Able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate effectively in most formal and informal conversations on practical, social, and professional topics.

Nevertheless, the individual’s limitations generally restrict the professional contexts of language use to matters of shared knowledge and/or international convention.

Discourse is cohesive.

The individual uses the language acceptably, but with some noticeable imperfections; yet, errors virtually never interfere with understanding and rarely disturb the native speaker.

The individual can effectively combine structure and vocabulary to convey his/her meaning accurately.

The individual speaks readily and fills pauses suitably.

In face-to-face conversation with natives speaking the standard dialect at a normal rate of speech, comprehension is quite complete.

Although cultural references, proverbs, and the implications of nuances and idiom may not be fully understood, the individual can easily repair the conversation.

Pronunciation may be obviously foreign.

Individual sounds are accurate; but stress, intonation, and pitch control may be faulty.

1. Can typically discuss particular interests and special fields of competence with reasonable ease.

2. Can use the language as part of normal professional duties such as answering objections, clarifying points, justifying decisions, understanding the essence of challenges, stating and defending policy, conducting meetings, delivering briefings, or other extended and elaborate informative monologues.

3. Can reliably elicit information and informed opinion from native speakers.

4. Structural inaccuracy is rarely the major cause of misunderstanding.

5. Use of structural devices is flexible and elaborate.

6. Without searching for words or phrases, the individual uses the language clearly and relatively naturally to elaborate concepts freely and make ideas easily understandable to native speakers.

7. Errors occur in low frequency and highly complex structures.