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UT International Students’
Perception of their
Communicative Competence
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Ilona Schmidt – Linguistic
& Strategic
Frank Chen – Discourse
Cynthia Ward – Sociolinguistic
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Purpose of the Study:•Identify international
college-age students’ perception of their
communicative competence
•Investigate problems in communicative tasks in and
out of classroom
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What is Communicative Competence?
History & Definitions
•Chomsky’s (1965) competence and
performance model
•Dell Hymes (1972)
•Canale and Swain (1980), Canale (1983)
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Characteristics of CC (Savignon, 1983)
- Dynamic
- Context specific
- Relative to the communicating partners involved
- Described as a presumed underlying ability
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Continued….
Major components of CC (Canale and Swain,1980)
•Grammatical (Linguistic)
•Socio- linguistic
•Discourse
•Strategic
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Savignon’s (1983) definition
Culture as communication
• Relationship of social setting to linguistic expression
• Distinction of language usage and language use
• Language form and function.
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Communicative competence:
Savignon’s diagram
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Methodology
•Participants
•Procedure
•Use of questionnaire and interview
•Data analysis
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Subjects Nationality Under G/Grad Length of Res. Major
1 Korea Grad 1 yr. 3 mos. Education
2 China Grad 3 mos. Engineering
3 China Under Grad. 5 mos. Agri. Business
4 China Grad 1 yr. 6 mos. Elec. Eng.
5 Taiwan Grad 1 Yr. Business
6 China Undergrad 4 yrs. Finance
7 Malaysia Undergrad 2 yrs. Ecol/Bio
8 Taiwan Undergrad 1 Yr. Economics
9 China Grad 3 mos. Biology
10 German UnderGrad 9 mos. Chem. Eng.
11 Columbia Grad 2yrs. Indus. Eng.
12 Taiwan Grad 3 yrs. EE
Subject demographics:
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Students’ own perceptions of talking in and out of class:Questions
Much Not much
1. participated in-class discussions last week
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2. participated in group work last week
1 11
3. spoke English outside the classroom
9
3
4. actively sought out opportunities to speak
3
9
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Own perception of ability to understand people and to talk
QuestionsInClass
Out of class
Both Neither
1. What is easier for you:
to understand people’s ideas
3 7 2
2. Do you feel more comfortable
when you are talking:
4 6 1 1
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Own perception of being understood
QuestionWell Not
wellDepends I don’t
know
4. How well do you think people understand you?
3 2 6 1
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Linguistic Competence/grammatical
competence:Definition by Noam Chomsky
(1965)
•Tacit knowledge of language
•Mastery of the generative grammar of the
language
•Knowledge of the lexical, morphological, syntactic, phonological features
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Questions Yes
No
Some-times
1.a Did you study grammar before you came to the US?
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1.b Do you study grammar now in the US?”
3 9
2. Do you have to think whether your sentences
are grammatically correct before you speak?
4 3
5
3. Do you monitor your sentences whether they are grammatically correct while you are speaking?
4 5
3
4. Do you realize when you or others make mistakes in grammar/ word usage?
8 1
3
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Sociolinguistic Competence:Appropriate uses of and the ability to interpret:
• Social meanings
• Body language
• Nuances in communication situation
• Social distance
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Sociolinguistic Competence:
• Knowing when to talk, to listen, and to be quiet.
• Ability to read, interpret and understand the metalinguistic components involved.
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Questions relating to Socio-linguistic Competence:
Did you learn about American culture in your
home country?
Yes –through various forms of media, foreign
friends, and school.
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Has your perception of American people and culture changed since
you arrived in the US?
Yes & No:
through interaction with native speakers
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Discourse Competence:
Competence that combines
grammatical forms and meanings to
achieve unified text in different genres.
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Questions relating to discourse competency:
Do you modify your English when you are speaking in different
situations to different people?
Table 5. Modification of language in different situations Yes No
12 0
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When you are speaking do you pay attention to listener’s
comprehension signals?
Listeners’ comprehension signals
Yes No
12 0
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Do you monitor your speaking to ensure your conversation is related
to the topic?
Monitor
Yes No
10 2
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Please think of a situation when you had/might have difficulty
expressing your ideas. What, in your opinion, caused the
difficulty?
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S1 Concept in biology or mathS2 I am not comfortable with topics I never really touched.S3 Myself because of lacking enough vocabularyS4 Not knowing the exact wordS5 My accentS6 No knowing the exact wordS7 The football game, rulesS8 My feelings, when I don’t understand what the teacher says.S9 Class discussionsS10 Unfamiliar things, such as newly learned knowledge or technical jargonsS11 Unfamiliar topicsS12 Class discussions, lack of vocabulary
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When subjects are not familiar with topic or contexts, they feel
difficulty expressing their ideas due to a lack of
vocabulary and background knowledge.
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Strategic Competence The effective use of coping
strategies to sustain or enhance communication.
The ability to compensate for• imperfect knowledge of
linguistic, sociolinguistic, and discourse rules
• limiting factors in their application such as fatigue, distraction, inattention.
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Closely related to the other three areas of communicative competence. Present at all levels of proficiency. Importance diminishes as the other competencies increase with an overall increase in communicative competence.
Continued…
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Questions relating to strategic competence:
Think of an event when you wanted
to describe something or you wanted
to express an idea and you did not
know the word for it.
What did you do to solve this problem?
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Strategy use in order of preference 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th Total
Paraphrase 4 1 1 6
Ask for help 2 1 1 4
Draw 1 1 1 1 4
Describe or give definition 2 1 3
Message reduction 3 3
Use another word 2 1 3
Use Body Language 1 1 2
Use dictionary 1 1
Relate to other words from L1 or international words
1 1
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2. Think of a situation when you did not understand someone or someone did not understand you in class. What did you do in this situation?
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Strategy use in order of preference
1st
2nd
3rd 4th Total
Ask for repetition 4 2 1 7
Pretend 3 1 1 5
Explain again 2 1 3
Repeat 2 1 3
Give up 1 1 2
Ask a classmate 1 1 2
Use other words 1 1
Use body language 1 1
Use dictionary 1 1
Tell them I do not understand
1 1
Listen carefully 1 1
Not much I can do 1 1
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3. Think of a situation outside the classroom when you did not understand a native speaker (in the store , at the bank, etc). What did you do?
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Strategy use outside the classroom in order of preference
1st
2nd
3rd
Total
Ask for repetition 5 1 1 7
Paraphrase 2 1 3
Point at it, use body language 1 1 2
Tell them I do not understand 1 1
Pretend 1 1
Ask for slowing down 1 1
Dictionary use 1 1
Tell them I am not a native speaker 1 1
No answer 1 1
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4. Do you translate sentences into English
before you start speaking to someone?
•Do you translate sentences into your
native language when people are talking to
you?
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Table 12. Translation
No
Yes
Sometimes
Before presentations
a. Translating into English
9 2 1
b. Translating into L1
11 1
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Summary of the most frequently used strategies:
In resource deficit:Direct strategies•Use another word
•Circumlocution( describing a word, giving definition)
Interactional strategies•Ask for help
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In academic setting:
Interactional strategies •Ask for clarification•Ask for repetition
•Ask for confirmation
Indirect strategies•Pretending understanding
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Outside the classroom:
Interactional strategies•Ask for repetition
•Expressing nonunderstanding
Translation•Non desirable
•At the beginning necessary•Unconscious
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Observations and Conclusions based upon
Findings:•Most students feel that knowing
more about the culture would help their English skills.
•Students are comfortable speaking in both academic and social settings when they are
familiar with the topics.
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• Students use strategies extensively but they are not aware of a great variety.
• Students value fluency and speech correctness but will stress one over the other depending on the situation.
• Students feel more competent in BICS than CALP.
Continued…
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