Key concepts in ELT

Tricia Hedge

Fluency

semantic fluency, i.e. linking together propositions

and speech acts (also known as coherence);
lexical-syntactic fluency, i.e. linking together
syntactic constituents and words;
articulatory fluency, i.e. linking together speech
segments.
Non-fluency in an English language learner is
discernible in frequent pauses, repetitions, and selfcorrections, as in this extract from the speech of an
elementary learner:
I enjoy . . . er . . . enjoyed . . . e r . . . making
this . . . er . . . homework . . . on pronunciation . . .
pronunciation . . . but . . . urn . . . you know . . . I
have . . . there are lots of mistakes . . . so . . . you
see . . . it helps . . . it is helping me to . . . imp . . .
(coughs) . . . make better . . . my English . . .
This learner is beginning to compensate for this nonfluency by using the fillers 'you know', 'you see', in
the pauses while he deals with his linguistic
uncertainty. It is noticeable, too, that he uses the
communication strategy of paraphrase when he fails
to produce 'improve' and says 'make better' instead
to increase his fluency.

Ss: I went to the theatre last night.

T: (my aunt's house)
S: I went to my aunt's house last night
T: (visited)
S: I visited my aunt's house last night.
T: (yesterday)
. . . etc
More recently teachers have debated whether it is
possible to teach gambits, such as fillers, to
compensate for fluency.
A second meaning of fluency has developed in
relation to the goals of ELT and the nature of
classroom activity. Brumfit (1984) argues from a
definition of fluency as 'natural language use' and
defines the aim of fluency activity in the classroom as
to 'develop a pattern of language interaction within
the classroom which is as close as possible to that
used by competent performers in the mother tongue
in normal life.' He lists a set of criteria necessary for
achieving fluency activity. These have been
simultaneously developed and expanded by a number
of other writers and can be summarized as follows:
the language should be a means to an end, i.e. the
focus should be on the meaning and not on the
form. Other writers have made similar distinctions
e.g. message/medium (Krashen), meaningfocused/form-focused (Ellis)
the content should be determined by the learner
who is speaking or writing
there must be a negotiation of meaning between
the speakers, i.e. the learners must be involved in
interpreting a meaning from what they hear and

ELT Journal Volume 47/3 July 1993 Oxford University Press 1993

275

Downloaded from http://eltj.oxfordjournals.org/ by guest on May 13, 2015

The term fluency has acquired two rather different

meanings in ELT. The first is similar to a typical
dictionary entry. For example, 'fluent' is defined by
Chambers Concise Dictionary as 'able to speak and
write a particular language competently and with
ease.' In this meaning it is normally restricted to
language production, and in ELT it is normally
reserved for speech. It is the ability to link units of
speech together with facility and without strain or
inappropriate slowness or undue hesitation. Faerch,
Haastrup, and Phillipson (1984) include fluency as a
component of communicative competence, and
define it as 'the speaker's ability to make use of
whatever linguistic and pragmatic competence they
have.' They distinguish three types of fluency:

This first meaning of fluency relates to competence in

the learner. Course books in the seventies often
contained fluency drills aimed at increasing the
learner's ability to link syntactic segments with ease.
For example, the teacher would set up a chain drill
and provide each student with a different prompt in
turn which they would have to insert in the correct
position syntactically, as in:

constructing what to say, not reliant on the teacher

or textbook to provide the language
the normal processes of listening, reading,
speaking, etc. will be in play, e.g. improvising and
paraphrasing in speech
teacher intervention to correct should be minimal
as this distracts from the message.

Much ELT material (e.g. Klippel, 1984) has taken up

the concept of fluency activities, and presents tasks
which conform to the criteria above. An example
would be students reading a handout with five
proposals for how to spend a weekend, and agreeing
on the weekend they would enjoy spending together.
More recently the criteria for task design have been
developed in relation to specific skills, e.g. Bygate,
1987, on speaking) and the debate on fluency in the
classroom has extended to the roles of teachers and
learners and the appropriate management of
classroom learning.

Project work has been part of educational thinking

and practice on experiential learning for the greater
part of this century (Dewey, Kilpatrick, Illich, Frey)
and has influenced the teaching methodology of
curriculum subjects at the school level. More recently
since the mid-seventies, as ELT has espoused
principles of learner-centred teaching, learner
autonomy, the negotiated syllabus, collaborative
learning, and learning through tasks, English
language educators have explored and exploited the
tradition of project work, and it is now part of the
English language curriculum in many contexts.

Further reading
Brumfit, C. 1984. Communicative Methodology in
Language Teaching: The Roles of Fluency and
Accuracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bygate, M. 1987. Speaking. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Faerch, C , K. Haastrup, and R. Phillipson. 1984.
Learner language and language learning. Clevedon:
Multilingual Matters 14.
Klippel, F. 1984. Keep Talking: Communicative
Fluency Activities for Language Teaching.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Legutke and Thomas (1991) use data from case

studies of project work in the UK, USA and Germany
to suggest three types of project: encounter projects
enable students to make contact with native speakers,
for example, American, or British visitors to their
country. Text projects encourage students to use
English language texts, either a range of them to
research a topic or one text more intensively, for
example, a play to read, discuss, dramatize, and
rehearse. Class correspondence projects involve
letters, audiocassettes, photographs, etc. as
exchanges between school pupils in different
countries.

Project Work
A project is an extended task which usually integrates
language skills work through a number of activities.
These activities combine in working towards an
agreed goal and may include planning, the gathering
of information through reading, listening,
interviewing, etc., discussion of the information,
problem solving, oral or written reporting, and
display.

Projects usually involve a number of features:

the study and use of authentic English language
materials
an emphasis on student group-centred experience
and de-emphasis of teacher-directed work
the encouragement of student responsibility for
planning, carrying out, and presenting the task
a sequence of activities over a period of time, e.g.
planning, fieldwork, preparation of information,
presentation
the use of a range of skills
activity outside the classroom in the students' own
time.

Brumfit (1984) gives an example in which advanced

adult students elect to work in groups to produce a
radio programme about their own country. A range of
topics, for example, ethnic groups, religion,

Project-based learning has been promoted within

ELT for a number of reasons. Learners' use of

276

Key concepts in ELT

Downloaded from http://eltj.oxfordjournals.org/ by guest on May 13, 2015

In Brumfit's view,fluencyactivities will give students

the opportunity to produce and understand items of
language which they learn in form-focused work or
accuracy work. It is significant that his definition of
fluency covers all of the language skills. His
suggestions for creating natural language use in the
classroom include creative writing, class libraries,
and project work.

education, are assigned to the groups, who research

their topic and write andrehearsea script. Hutchinson
(1991) suggests a project on 'Animals in Danger' for
secondary school pupils, in which they use
knowledge from Science and Geography to research
threatened species, write an article, and make a
poster. Fried-Booth (1987) gives a more teacherdirected example suitable for junior learners at an
elementary level, in which they are asked to collect
food labels or wrappings from tins, cartons, packets,
etc. for a period of a week. These are used to create a
wall display with a map of the world illustrated with
the labels, which are attached to therelevantcountries
of origin and export with coloured threads and pins.
The map is then used for oral practice and controlled
writing.

language as they negotiate plans, analyse and discuss

information and ideas is determined by genuine
communicative needs. At the school level, project
work encourages imagination and creativity, selfdiscipline and responsibility, collaboration, research
and study skills, and cross-curricular work through
exploitation of knowledge gained in other subjects.
Successful use of project work will clearly be
affected by such factors as availability of time, access
to authentic materials, receptiveness of learners, the
possibilities for learner training, and the
administrative flexibility of institutional timetabling.

Further Reading
Brumfit, C. 1984. Communicative Methodology in
Language Teaching. The Roles of Fluency and
Accuracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Fried-Booth, D. L. 1987. Project Work. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Hutchinson, T. 1991. Introduction to Project Work.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Legutke, M. and H. Thomas. 1991. Process and
Experience in the Language Classroom. Harlow:
Longman.

Received May 1993

Tricia Hedge

Downloaded from http://eltj.oxfordjournals.org/ by guest on May 13, 2015

The author
Tricia Hedge is the Editor of this journal.

277