What makes a person fluent

On the other hand, it is also possible that a conversational non-native speaker might know more of the jargon related to certain specific things and therefore be able to talk about them at greater length than a native speaker! Often, however, conversational fluency achieved by non-native speakers will come with some telltale sign. An accent that can sometimes be very thick, an odd way of constructing sentences, difficulty in writing or unusual gaps in their vocabulary as a consequence of not having grown up with the language are usually what sets the two kinds apart.

From the definition above it is fluency, the problem is that you might not be fluent in German, but rather in Denglisch, that mishmash language that is spoken in as many ways as there are people that speak it. All of the above sometimes do the trick in terms of communication and if they are heard by someone who does not speak the target language, they might even believe that the speaker is fluent in an actual language and not just making it up.

But even if native speakers of the target language can understand you, they would usually not judge you to be fluent. So if you are taking formal exams or learning with Chatterbug, you can probably start saying that you are fluent in a language at around about the B2 level. Two rather tough tests of fluency are humour and particularly playful humour in a group setting and banter.

Being able to think on your feet and be witty is often hard enough in your own language, so if you can do it in a foreign language, you can and should be proud of yourself.

It can be quite easy to look and even feel more fluent than you actually are if you are talking about topics that you know a lot about and that you are used to. If what you want is to fool people, by all means, stay within that particular comfort zone!

On the other hand, if you want to really become fluent, you need to go into uncharted waters. Probe more into what THEY do. The reason for this is that people get used to each other and their mannerisms, so if you have local friends that you speak Denglisch, Spanglish, Franglais or whatever with and they understand pretty much everything you say it might simply be that they are used to you.

A great way to find out, a litmus test if you will, is any local bureaucracy. In my teacher training I don't think we used the word "fluency" much. This isn't a complaint - just an observation. So my question is - what IS fluency? Does it exist? The post got me thinking about what we mean when we talk about fluency in a language, and the slight differences in definition between what the layperson and EFL teachers mean when they say someone is fluent.

This includes the ability to understand films, television programmes, newspapers, stand-up comedians, which undeniably also requires a certain level of cultural competence. This of course comes with the assumption that one is learning the language so as to communicate mainly with native speakers of the language, and assimilate into the native speaker culture.

For more about this, see this blogpost about teaching English versus teaching English culture. The English Language Teaching a. ELT world. One could speak fluently smoothly without pauses but be extremely inaccurate, making lots of grammatical or lexical mistakes throughout. In a typical English proficiency test like IELTS, the speaking part sees candidates being marked on their fluency separate from their accuracy.

According to the British Council Learn English webpage , being fluent means you speak easily, quickly and with no pauses. It is perhaps a little odd to suggest that a person who speaks a language well does so without pausing. After all, natural pauses occur in our daily conversations for several reasons: the speaker is thinking about what they are saying; the speaker is thinking about how they are saying it in order to best achieve their communicative aims; the speaker is using an intended pause to create effect a dramatic beat, an emotional moment, a moment of suspense, etc.

But seeing that we are evaluating foreign language learners, we seem to be only penalising pauses that are taken to formulate an accurate sentence.

We have all met language learners who are so concerned about formulating the most accurate sentences in their heads that we end up waiting all day for just one sentence to be uttered. Was that a dramatic beat or did the speaker pause to formulate the present perfect in that sentence? Or perhaps the speaker paused to formulate the present perfect but was cleverly disguising it as a dramatic beat? What are fluency activities and accuracy activities?

It might be due to my attitudes and beliefs and my background in Task-Based Learning, Dogme and Business English teaching, but I find any activity that ignores the need for meaningful communication and encourages the practice of language out of context highly questionable.

You can renew your subscription or continue to use the site without a subscription. If you have questions about your account, please contact customer service or call us at This message will appear once per week unless you renew or log out. Skip to main content Skip to main menu Skip to search Skip to footer. Search for:. Manage subscription. Subscribe to the Monitor. Monitor Daily current issue. Monitor Weekly digital edition. Community Connect. People Making a Difference.

Points of Progress. A Christian Science Perspective. Monitor Movie Guide. Monitor Daily. Photo Galleries. About Us. Get stories that empower and uplift daily. See our other FREE newsletters. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy. Select free newsletters: The Weekender.