WEBVTT

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[MUSIC]

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Hi, there language learning aficionados.

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This is Keith Swayne at Five Arrows again.

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I've been talking in my previous
videos about the difference

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between proficiency and achievement or
proficiency and fluency.

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Today, I wanna talk about different levels
of proficiency and what those look like.

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When you think of yourself
speaking another language,

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you'll find some of these descriptions
are helpful to peg the level at

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which you are able to perform
certain tasks in a language.

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When people are learning languages,
they always move through

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a particular series of levels of skill and
this is very helpful.

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When I have people joining our classes,

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I asked them to take a look at a chart on
a website which I'm gonna be referring to.

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You'll see my eyes looking over on other
parts of my computer screen here as I look

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at some of the descriptions.

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But I ask students to take a look and
see what describes them the best.

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With a chart like the one
that's on my website,

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you're able to figure out
exactly what level you're at.

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It also helps you figure
out what you need to do or

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what you need to be able to do in order
to speak at a new proficiency level.

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So if you're a beginner in Polish,

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what would it look like if you were
an intermediate speaker of Polish?

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And what should you be doing in
order to reach that next level?

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It hardly matters what you study or
what kind of a program you use.

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You will progress in the same
order of development.

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So let's take a look at a few of these.

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And again, as I said, I'm referring
to something else on my screen.

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First, let me talk about the very
first level of proficiency and

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this is describing something between
absolute beginners and a novice.

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There's various levels of novice, but an
absolute beginner is a person who doesn't

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really have any ability at all in
their target language and that's fine.

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That's the starting point for everyone
at some point including in English.

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That's where you're at, but
a person who studies a new

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language will soon move to
a novice level of proficiency.

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And a high novice level speaker of
a new language can use maybe 50 or

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100 words in their new language, they're
able to do some really basic things.

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They're able to survive in
the most predictable situations

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by using rehearsed words and phrases.

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There can't be any surprises for a novice.

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And if there are any surprises,
they are quickly lost.

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It doesn't take very long to move from the
novice level to the intermediate level.

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And an intermediate student
of a new language looks very

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different from a novice.

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An intermediate student can start
a conversation and end one,

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can order food from a menu, can tell time
and the days of the week and the dates.

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An intermediate student is able to make
purchases in their target language.

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Maybe get directions on foot or
in a vehicle, can introduce themselves and

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get some personal information about
the person they're speaking with.

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And they are able to distinguish
between formal and informal address if

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you're speaking Spanish or French,
or Portuguese, or something.

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You'll know there's a difference between
the way that you speak to somebody that

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you know well and somebody you don't.

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They're able to maintain
very simple face to face

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conversations with lots of mistakes,
that's fine.

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But now, they're beginning
to function this language.

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That is an intermediate student.

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But again, they're looking at
predictable uses of the language.

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What you'll find is that the time that
it takes you to move from a novice to

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an intermediate is doubled when you
go from intermediate to advanced.

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And when you move from advanced to
advanced plus or to superior or

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to distinguished levels of proficiency,
each level takes twice as long or

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more than the previous level.

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So that's helpful.

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So sometimes you'll say, I feel like
I'm at a plateau in my target language.

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That's completely normal.

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It just takes longer to get to
the next level of proficiency.

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And keep going, you're gonna do fine.

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It's impossible to keep working on your
languages and not become bilingual if

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you're just following a few basic rules,
and that's another video to come up.

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Let's talk about advanced
levels of proficiency.

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An advanced student, this is not
a perfect speaker of the language.

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And sometimes when people are calling
me about advanced Spanish classes or

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French classes,
they'll say I don't know if I'm advanced,

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because they're freaked
out by the term advanced.

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Advanced doesn't mean perfect.

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Advanced means someone who has a pretty
good idea of how the language works.

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If you are an advanced student, you have
probably worked through some kind of

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a textbook and you know the basic
structures of your language,

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does it have genders like masculine and
feminine.

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How did the verbs work?

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What's roughly the word order?

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Are there any weird
sounds in this language?

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You got a picture, it doesn't mean
that you've mastered everything or

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even that all the things
that you studied and

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maybe tried to memorize that
you can use them perfectly.

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That's a different thing, but
advanced means you've got a handle on it.

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Your pronunciation is always intelligible.

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It's not perfect.

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You might be easily recognized as
a native speaker of something else.

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It means that you could exchange
a basic message over the phone.

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Generally speaking,

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you can understand maybe 80% of what's
going on in a simple conversation.

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And the people who are speaking with you
can understand 80% of what you're saying,

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but there's still mistakes and
there's still difficulties.

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There's still challenges.

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The communication works when
you're at advanced level.

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So when you're at an intermediate level,
you can survive.

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This is what we mean when we say
things like I can get by in.

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I can get by in Greek.

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It means I can survive.

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I could handle basic situations.

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I can combine the words and phrases that
I've learned before to get my way around,

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and it's far from perfect, and
sometimes it's really confusing.

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That's intermediate.

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Advanced means I can
have a conversation and

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I might not pass myself
off as a native speaker.

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In fact, I can't quite at that level, but
I don't need a predictable situation.

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If I run into somebody who speaks
my target language, we can talk for

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a half an hour in connected discourse.

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Meaning, sentence after sentence
without large pauses and hesitation.

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And sure, you stop and you look for a word
and you mix up your word order and you say

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some things that aren't quite right and
maybe make an embarrassing mistake.

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That's still at an advanced level,
but getting beyond an advanced level

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means that you're able to perhaps
work in your target language,

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that you don't avoid certain
features of a language.

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I know when I was learning Spanish, one of
the things that I did early on is I would

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talk in the present tense all the time.

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Everything was as if
it's happening now and

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then I'd add in some words like yesterday,
I'm going downtown.

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Two years ago, I am talking with my
friends and I'm doing this and that.

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So I was avoiding certain structures and I
know that a lot of my advanced students in

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Spanish will avoid the subjunctive,
because it's so different from English.

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When you get to a superior
level in your target language,

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then you don't avoid certain
grammatical features.

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Another thing that differs
between advanced and superior.

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Sometimes even when you're
an advanced level in language,

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I know that this has happened to me.

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You start a sentence and you get
halfway through it and you think, no,

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I can't finish this sentence.

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No matter what I do, I don't know how
I'm gonna find a way around this.

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At a superior level,
you can finish any sentence you start.

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Sometimes in an advanced level, you can't
finish it in anyway that you thought of.

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And you have to step back and say, okay,
how will I say this in some other way?

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Can I paraphrase this?

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Can I find some other way around?

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Can I draw a picture on
a napkin to get the job done?

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That's called circumlocution.

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Talking my way around what I
was trying to say directly, but

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a superior student can
complete any sentence.

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They can participate in a conversation
between native speakers.

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Sometimes when we're speaking
with native speakers,

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they adjust the way that they talk.

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Because they recognize that we're
not really all the way there yet and

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they'll slow it down a little bit, and

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keep their word choices
a little bit simple or simpler.

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But when you are at a superior level,

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the people you're talking with
don't adjust their language at all.

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Some people who speak your target language
don't know how to talk to foreigners and

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that makes it really difficult for you
if you're at an intermediate level, and

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sometimes even if you're
in an advanced level.

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But at a superior level,
you might not catch everything.

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But you're okay talking with
native speakers in the way that

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they usually talk.

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You're able to understand
the information over the phone.

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You're able to take notes when
you're listening to somebody talking

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the language.

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You're able to communicate
clearly with a group of people,

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even on professional subjects.

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There's some technical subjects other
than just sort of the day to day stuff.

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You're able to get through
common blunders and mistakes.

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That's super helpful.

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Learning how to handle the problem
if you can't finish a sentence or

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if you don't know how to say something and

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you've really blown it
knowing how to handle that.

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A superior student is able to understand
conversations between native speakers and

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can serve as an interpreter for people
who don't speak that target language.

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Again, it might not be quite perfect.

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But at a superior level,
your knowledge of your native language and

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your target language is good enough
that you can handle exchanges for

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other people and you're able to
carry out job responsibilities.

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You could actually work
in your target language.

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There's another level yet,

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which is the distinguished
level of language proficiency.

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This is a person who practically never
makes mistakes in the target language,

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is always understood by native speakers
when they're talking with them.

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A distinguished speaker is able
to understand jokes and puns.

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That's a tricky thing, when you can
understand jokes and puns spontaneously

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without preparation, without reading
them in advance or something.

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And somebody's making a joke or
wordplay and you can follow it.

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A distinguished person is able to convey
exact meanings on various subjects,

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including professional things and
talking about feelings and opinions and

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that sort of thing.

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It's one thing to be able to explain
anything that happens in your life in

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tangible, physical objects.

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But when you start talking about your
feelings and emotions and your opinions

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about politics or the way your business
should run, that's a higher level yet.

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That's more what we would call
distinguished proficiency.

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There is a significant understanding
of target language culture and

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that's one thing that is really
important to your development in

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proficiency in your target language.

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A distinguished speaker is also
able to adjust their speech to

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accommodate whatever situation they're in.

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So for example, if you are involved
in explaining a legal position before

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a judge, you talk differently
than the way that you talk with

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your buddies when you're having
a coffee in the coffee shop.

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There is a different register.

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Register is a reference
to a level of formality.

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A distinguished speaker
recognizes that and adjusts.

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A native level speaker is,

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this is the holy grail of language
students and we all hope to get there.

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The real truth is that as adults,

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most of us will not become native level
proficient in a foreign language.

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Although some of us get pretty close,
depending on how early we started and

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our motivation level and
the amount of time that we put into it.

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And of course, if you take my classes,

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you have a better chance than
whatever else you're doing.

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But native level proficiency
means that you are treated

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like a native by outside speakers.

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You're in a conversation and
you're one of the gang.

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They don't adjust things to
treat you as a foreigner.

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You feel more or less at home in your
target language as you do in English and

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sometimes you feel you're at home more
when you're speaking your second language

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than your first language.

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You're really an insider at this point.

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Another test, this is a tricky one.

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If you can do mental math in your target
language, if you can sit there and

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do calculations in your head
in your target language.

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Wow, you've really accomplished something,
because that is not a simple task and

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most language students can't do that.

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When you are a native speaker,

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that's when you would say that you
are completely bilingual and bicultural.

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You function in this language
just like your own language.

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In real life for most of us as
language students we're somewhere

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else on the proficiency scale
other than native level.

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If you grew up with two languages,
if you're the the child of a missionary or

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if you were a diplomat's
kid in another country and

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grew up with a couple of languages, then
it's very possible that you might be very,

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very native like in in two or
more languages.

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But if you're a person like me who
grew up in a mono lingual home and

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spoke only English in your home and
then started to pick up languages.

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Especially as an adult as I did,

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then you're probably somewhere
else in the proficiency scale.

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And of course, your proficiency in
various languages will be different.

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In some languages,
you'll have a high level of proficiency.

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And in other languages, it will be lower.

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But it's very helpful for
describing your language skill.

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And when you're talking with somebody else
and they tell you that they speak another

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language fluently,
you don't know what that means.

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So using a proficiency scale is very
helpful andat the bottom of the screen,

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I'll put a reference to the chart on my
website that describes proficiency levels.

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I hope this was helpful for you and
I look forward to talking to you again.

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Thanks, bye, bye.