82-878 Understanding Second Language Fluency
9 units, Carnegie Mellon University
This course explores the notion of second language fluency. The major objective is to help you develop an understanding of what it means to be fluent in a second language. We will discuss the difference between knowing a language implicitly and explicitly and what kinds of learning may be likely to result in what kinds of knowledge. A key concept we will examine is automaticity of processing. Automatic language processing is rapid, consistent, and does not tax the speakers cognitive resources, thus leaving them free for processes such as goal setting, conversational strategy use, spoken or written text comprehension, and monitoring. We will think about fluency in the context of various aspects of language use speech perception, pronunciation, word recognition, sentence comprehension, conversation, and reading as well as about its objective assessment through tests and subjective perceptions on the part of native speakers. You will have an opportunity to develop an instrument to be used as a tool for the assessment of second language fluency, to examine its quality, and to use it to assess others and yourself when using a second language.
Prerequisites: none listed
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