Speak - High proficiency

Global Performance Descriptor

• Learner can communicate effectively in most daily practical and social situations, and in familiar routine work situations.
• Can participate in conversations with confidence.
• Can speak on familiar topics at both concrete and abstract levels (10 to 15 minutes).
• Can provide descriptions, opinions and explanations; can synthesize abstract complex ideas, can hypothesize.
• In social interaction, learner demonstrates increased ability to respond appropriately to the formality level of the situation.
• Can use a variety of sentence structures, including embedded and report structures, and an expanded inventory of concrete, idiomatic and conceptual language.
• Grammar and pronunciation errors rarely impede communication.
• Discourse is reasonably fluent.
• Uses phone on less familiar and some non-routine matters.

Performance Conditions

• Interaction is with one or more people, face to face or on the phone. It is often at a normal rate.
• Speech is partly predictable and does not always support the utterance.
• Considerable level of stress affects performance when verbal interaction may result in personal consequences (e.g. on the job).
• Audience is small familiar and unfamiliar informal groups.
• Setting and context are familiar, clear and predictable.
• Topic is familiar, concrete and abstract.
• Pictures and other visuals are used.
• Length of presentation is 15 to 20 minutes.

Interaction in a group

• Interaction takes place in a familiar group of up to 10 people.
• The topic or issue is familiar, non-personal, concrete and abstract.
• Interaction is informal or semi-formal.

Interaction one-on-one

• Interaction is face to face or on the phone.
• Interaction is formal or semi-formal.
• Learner can partially prepare the exchange.