Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Describing Language Competency

I had a client ask me today about how to describe her language competency -- how well she speaks a foreign language. She'd had four semesters of Spanish in high school. After doing some research, I came up with the following competency scale. Be sure to put it back in your client's hands to describe where they fit on the scale.

Novice/Familiar (beginner)
Proficient/Competent (read/write)
Conversant (speak)
Fluent
Native Speaker

Do you find this scale helpful? Do you have any suggestions or comments? Post a comment below.

3 comments:

  1. what if the person can speak a language but cannot read/write well in that language?

    ReplyDelete
  2. what if the person can speak a language but cannot read/write well in that language

    ReplyDelete