Saudi Student Proficiency in English Language Research Paper

Introduction

It is important to assess and monitor the progress of a student studying for proficiency in the English language. This document is an assessment of a student with an Arabic background having come from Saudi Arabia. She hardly knew English before 16th February 2009 except the recognition of three words; ‘thank you’, ‘yes’, and ‘no’. Nonetheless, she has been studying English since then and although she has not yet achieved competency level, has improved tremendously. The assessor is the husband to the student and has a good command of the English Language. In fact, he is her teacher.

The assessment revolved about fluency in listening, speech, reading and comprehension, writing, and use of body language as well as knowledge of grammar, rules of punctuation, use of lexis, pronunciation, and accuracy. In addition, the assessment touched on the progress of the learner in English proficiency in various elements being assessed.

Fluency

Listening

The listening ability of the learner is remarkable and she is able to comprehend what she is being told. She can identify similar terms as well as simple phrases regarding herself, her family, and the surrounding if ones speak clearly and slowly. She can also comprehend phrases and high frequency lexicon related to matters that regard immediate relevance to her. For instance, matters like family and personal information, employment, local area, and shopping.

She is also able to get the key points in clear, short and basic messages. She can comprehend key points in clear average speech on subjects that are familiar, and particularly on matters that she encounters in school, work, and during her leisure moments. Moreover, she is able to understand key points of various television and radio programmes touching on topical issues of both professional and personal interest if the conveyance of messages is clear and fairly slow.

She is also able to comprehend extended lectures and speech as well as dense arguments as long as the subject matter is rather familiar. She can comprehend most radio and television news as well as programmes touching on current affairs. She also understands most films that are characterized by the Standard English dialect. What is more, she is able to comprehend extended talk even if it is characterized by unclear language structures and relationships that are not explicitly signalled. In fact, she does not have much difficulty in comprehending the spoken English language as broadcast or live even if it is conveyed at a fast rate.

A study of her level of listening proficiency indicates that the learner’s listening ability is good, but has difficulties in comprehending unfamiliar words. In the short prose, The Gold Rush, even though she heard properly the pronunciation of the word Armidale’, she is not able to comprehend it. The prose, however, indicates some weaknesses like being unable to get simple words such as ‘more than’, the Gold’, ‘came’, ‘now, ’mor’, and ‘exciting’. The poor grammar characterizing the prose further shows her weakness in comprehension because she fails to make corrections of the words ‘chinese’, ‘exiting’, ‘mor’, ‘gold rush’, ‘come’, and ‘be’ to ‘Chinese’, ‘exciting’, ‘more’, ‘Gold Rush’, ‘came’, ‘become’ respectively.

Speaking

The speaker has weaknesses in speaking fluently. This is established through her inability to talk at length with few pauses. In addition she is unable to speak the appropriate things in a wide range of contexts.

Generally, however, her fluency in speaking is fair. This is justified by the fact that the speaker can interact with another person in simple speech so long as the other party is ready to rephrase or repeat sentences at a fairly slower speed. However, the speaker requires occasional assistance in formulation of some sentences that she is attempting to say. She is able to answer and ask simples questions that are within the range of familiar subjects.

The speaker is also able to communicate through simple terms that necessitate direct altercation of information mostly on subjects and activities that are familiar. She can manage short exchanges in a social setup, although it is difficult for her to understand to the level of keeping a conversation to proceed by her efforts alone.

She is also able to deal with majority of scenarios that would occur in a new area where people speak Standard English language. In this regard, she can engage in a conversation so long as the subjects matters are familiar, related to personal interests, or relevant to daily life activities such as hobbies, family, travel, work, and topical events.

To some extent, it is substantial to say that the learner has attained a fairly high level of fluency in regards to interactions through speech. Her spontaneity allows steady interaction with native English speaker fairly feasible. Furthermore, she is able to take an active role in informal debates in common contexts, and at the same time defending and sustaining her opinion. She also has fluency and spontaneity in expressing herself.

That is, her language use is flexible and effective in both professional, and social settings and purposes. In fact, she can formulate opinions and concepts or ideas with relatively fair precision as well as relate her contribution to her audience in a skilful manner.

The learner has also indicated an ability to engage in conversations without much effort with the use of linguistic styles that make a speech appealing. Her use of colloquialism and idiomatic terms is fairly good. In fact, she is able to use colloquialism and still express her ideas and opinions fluently as well as in finer details. It is remarkable that in the event she experiences a problem she is able to backtrack and streamline her statements such that her audience barely realizes the strategy.

The speaker is also able to handle most of the circumstances that require simple speech. She can describe, through simple speech, things such as people she knows and where she lives. Moreover, she can describe her family, lifestyle or living conditions, her recent and present employment, and her educational backgrounds, which is an indication of the ability to apply a string of sentences and phrases, although she only uses simple terms. In addition, she is able to link phrases in an uncomplicated manner to describe events, experiences, her ambitions, hopes and dreams. She can also explain plans and opinions as well as narrate stories without much difficulty.

The speaker has also indicated the ability to present clearly detailed descriptions on a wide range of topics relating to her area of interest. She can clarify point of views on current issues detailing their merits and demerits on a range of alternatives. The student can also present clearly comprehensive descriptions of composite subjects while incorporating sub-themes and developing certain points, and refining the ideas with a suitable conclusion. What is more, the learner has indicated the ability to present clearly smoothly-linked arguments through a style that is coherent to the context under description and characterized by logical sentence structures that help the audience to realize and recall important points.

Reading and comprehension

The learner is able to understand words and names that are familiar. She can comprehend basic sentences such as those contained on posters, catalogues, or notices. She can also read basic short texts. Furthermore, she is able to find precise and foreseeable information on basic materials that are common on our day to day life such as prospectus, advertisements, timetables and menus as well as on short and basic personal correspondences.

She can grasp fairly well descriptions of feelings, events, and wishes in basic letters. She is able to read well reports and articles relating to contemporary issues where a writer takes a certain viewpoint or attitude. She comprehends fairly well contemporary text.

The learner’s reading has improved tremendously and she can read many words without any difficulty. In fact, the Progress Report indicates reading as the area where she has scored the highest percentage. Nonetheless, she still needs regular practice to grasp words that are complex as well as unfamiliar.

Writing

The learner is able to write simple and short texts such as holiday greetings on postcards and personal information on forms including names, address and nationality. She is able to write basic messages and notes regarding subjects that are within the scope of her immediate needs. She can write basic personal letters, for instance, to thank somebody. Her writing also demonstrates the ability to write basic connected sentences on subjects matters that are familiar. She is able to write comprehensive and clear text on several topics related to her interests. She expresses herself in clear and well structured prose brings out her view point at a considerable length. Her written text has also demonstrated smooth flow and wise use of various styles.

However, as explained below, her paragraph creation and sentence structuring is very poor. Her writing lacks a topic sentence in paragraphs, which are themselves poor in flow of ideas, and supporting sentences are misplaced. In fact, sentences that should be used as supporting sentences appear in the beginning of a paragraphs. In addition, although she manages to express what she meant to say, there is incoherence and mix up of ideas as well as poor flow of ideas in the paragraphs.

Body language

The learner has not mastered competently the use of body language. It is evident that her use of gestures, facial expressions, postures, tones, mood, and intonations does not align with the message she intends to portray. There is need for her to improve on her body language, a requirement which is dependent on her mastery of other various styles of the Standard English language. That is, there is need to relate the spoken words with the body language. Nonetheless, her body language conveys her messages more effectively than through her spoken words.

Accuracy

The learner’s application of English language is marred with several instances of inaccuracy. She makes simple mistakes like omission of letters in a word as well as omission of words in a sentence. In the text about the Gold Rush, she forgets to write the letter ‘e’ on the word ‘more’, and omits the following phrases and words: ‘more than’, ‘the gold’, and ‘now’. Although her writing indicates that she has mastered the rules of capitalization, she forgets to capitalize the proper noun ‘Chinese’ and ‘Gold Rush’. The learner also demonstrates weaknesses in other areas of her English language study.

She has problems in hearing and comprehending some words that are not familiar. In the prose about the Gold Rush, she cannot comprehend the words ‘armidale’, ‘become’, and ‘quickle’. She fails to punctuate appropriately in her writing, and misspells simple words such as ‘exciting’, and fails to apply the right tense on simple verbs such as ‘come’. These inaccuracies maybe associated with hearing and low level of mastery of the English language.

She makes grammatical mistakes while composing sentences. She omits the article ‘a’ in several cases that is needed. In the test requiring her to comprehend and write about the implication of some illustrations, she writes ‘you will have big house’. Moreover, she fails to put the word ‘to’ in the statement ‘you might learn cook’. Her grammatical inaccuracies are also in the form of misplaced words in relation to the subject matter. For instance, she writes ‘you will have rich money’ instead of ‘you will have a lot of money’.

Pronunciations

The learner’s general pronunciations is still poor. Although one is able to comprehend in most cases what she says, she fails to observe some of the rules of spoken Standard English. Her intonation and stress is not very good. In most cases, she does not make variations of pitch in her statements making her speech plain. She also fails to stress on words that need to be emphasized. Her pronunciation is greatly affected by dialectic characteristics of her mother tongue. She is not able to pronounce correctly a wide range or words, although, her audience can comprehend what she is attempting to say.

Grammars

The learner’s grasp of grammar is fairly good. She observes several guidelines of good grammar in her writing. Most of the terms that she uses are properly spelled with the few misspelling being a result of carelessness. However , her grammar is in considerable cases riddled with various flaws.

She has weaknesses in grouping similar ideas in a sentence and paragraphs. In her prose about her favourite day of the week, for instance, she has written that “after lunch I watch TV or read a book and read a magazine, but I don’t like tea, I don’t like jogging or playing basketball”. In this statement, it would be more appropriate to group things she generally dislike like tea, jogging, or playing basketball in a different sentence from that which she describes what she does on Saturday. That is, the context under which she talks about not liking tea, jogging, and playing basketball is misplaced. In fact, the sentences lacks harmony and coherence.

She has not achieved the competency level that would allow her to write smooth flowing sentences. In the same prose, it would have been more appropriate to match the verbs tense such that the phrase would read something like “after lunch I like watching TV…” to much with the tense of the phrase “I don’t like jogging or playing basketball”.

She also has weaknesses in using the articles ‘the’, ‘a’ and ‘an’. She talks of her favourite day being a Saturday and refers to the day as if it was a particular Saturday even though she means any Saturday in general. That is, she writes “because it’s the weekend” as opposed to “because it is a weekend”. Furthermore, she goes ahead to write that she “read magazine” instead of writing “read a magazine” and fails to include the article ‘a’ in the phrase “…week is Saturday”. These are indications that she has not yet mastered the use of these useful components of grammar. Furthermore, her general structuring of sentences is poor.

The prose indicates that the learner has not mastered the use or rather how to use sentence connecters, and lacks a good reserve of these important elements for creating sentences. The second sentence in the prose, for instance, could be linked as follows; “I usually stay in bed until 9 o’clock, after which, I take breakfast and read a magazine”. In her use of these connecting words and phrases, she fails to punctuate the sentence appropriately. The full stop after the words “…until 9 o’clock” is misplaced and the sentence should be rewritten as indicated above. Moreover, in the sentence “in the evening I often invite…” there ought to be a comma between “evening” and “I”. Her level of grammar is also lowered by several other factors.

Her use of verbs in relations to some nouns indicates poor use of grammar. It would have been more appropriate if she wrote “I normally prepare a small lunch” as opposed to “make a small lunch”. She talks of “have breakfast” as opposed to the more appropriate “take breakfast”.

She uses pronouns, nouns and verbs in scenarios where it is not necessary and omits the same objects when they are necessary. Grammatically, it would sound better, to say “…I usually clean my room and call my mother” rather than what she has written, “…I usually clean my room and I call my mother”; this is unnecessary repetition of words. The word “read” before the word “magazine” and the phrase “I don’t like” after the phrase “I don’t like tea’ are not necessary; they are just careless repetition of words and phrases that characterize poor grammar and sentence structuring. Additionally, she carelessly omits the verb drink, which presents a very significant position.

Her work, in particular the prose about her favourite day, spells out poor paragraph structuring. She fails to create topic sentences in her paragraphing. In fact, the breaking of text into paragraphs is poor with incoherency. Paragraphs breaks where they should not break and begin without a topic sentence. For instance, in her favourite day prose, the sentence ending with “…it’s the weekend!” should not break such that another paragraph starts with “I usually stay in bed…” In fact, the prose could be better as one paragraph; however, ideas are mixed up under various subjects.

Good paragraph structuring requires that similar ideas are grouped together and that supporting sentences build up on the main points. The learner has not followed these guidelines and her points are mixed up. For instance, in her favourite day prose, she mixes up the points about her likes and her Saturday activities. The prose that is supposed to be a descriptive essay is more or less like chronicles of events, which still does not represent quality writing in terms of sentence and paragraph structuring, grammar, and punctuation.

Her use of punctuation is similarly poor. In the prose about her favourite day, she uses an exclamation mark in place of a period. In fact, her use of the exclamation mark is often misplaced. She has replaced the function of an exclamation mark with that of a period. She also inserts a period between “9 o’clock” and “then”, where a comma would be more appropriate. She has almost perfectly understood the rule of capitalization, especially in regards to proper nouns and pronouns, and the first letter in the begging of a sentence.

There are also other occurrences of poor grammar in her writing. In the prose about her favourite day, she writes time in numerical figures, which is against the conventional guidelines in professional writing. The numerical figure “10” in the phrase “10 o’clock” should have been written as a word.

Lexis and syntax

The vocabulary level of the learner is low. It is apparent that the speaker does not have sufficient vocabularies to spice up her writing. Elsewhere, the syntactical forms are limited or rather the speaker has not yet achieved the competency in using these forms. The speaker is not able to speak in reasoned, coherent, and “semantically sensible sentences” (Mora). In the prose about her favourite day, there are barely any lexis or idiomatic expressions. Most of the terms are the common words that are usually used in spoken casual English. In other words, she has very few vocabularies that she can use in her writing.

Conclusion

The learner has gained considerable knowledge on the application of the English language as a means for communication. She is able to write several vital English words that are useful in day to day life. She can talk and write about the happenings of a typical day, and express herself.

The experience with the learner also demonstrates that she has a great deal of weaknesses. She is has not mastered the use of the articles ‘a’, ‘an’, and ‘the’. She is also not able to relate correctly some adjectives to describe certain nouns as indicated in the phrase “have rich money”. She also fails to use connectors in areas where they are necessary. In fact, she has a deficiency of sentence connectors in her vocabulary and has not mastered effective use of these connectors. Her grammar is characterized by poor punctuation and syntax.

The learner is also weak in sentence structuring and proper paragraph formulation. Her sentences are characterized by lack of coherence in ideas; various words in single statement represent several unrelated ideas. The paragraphs lacks topic sentences. The sentences which ought to be the supporting the main idea appear in the beginning of paragraphs where the topic sentence should be.

The learner has also not mastered competently the use of the body language. Her intonation, emphasis on words, tones and other body expressions do not match her spoken English words that she speaks, thereby, making her communication ineffective.

References

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Capital Community College Foundation. 2004, Guide to grammar and writing. Web.

Fast, J. 1989, Body language, Simon & Schuster, United Kingdom.

Garvie, E. 1976, Breakthrough to fluency, Blackwell, United Kingdom.

Haegeman, L. M. V and Gueron, J 1999, English grammar: a generative perspective, Wiley-Blackwell, United Kingdom.

House, J. 1996, Developing pragmatic fluency in English as a foreign language, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 225 -252, Education Resources Information Centre.

Hudson, R. A. 1998, English grammar, Taylor and Francis Group, London.

Mora, Jill Kerper, Language assessment: what it measures and how. Web.

Reiman, T. 2007, The power of body language, Simon and Schuster, United Kingdom.