Presents a validation study on the Hausa Speaking Test (HAST), a simulated oral proficiency interview. Addressed validity of the HaST through examination of the ratability on the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) scale of elicited speech sample and an investigation of the nature of probes on the HaST through speaking…

Steps are outlined in the development of an academic language proficiency test in Spanish, to measure teacher candidates' language abilities necessary to conduct instruction in Spanish-English bilingual classrooms. Such tests must consider linguistic tasks that bilingual teachers generally perform and communicative skills in academic interaction.…

Suggests ways to help college English-as-a-Second-Language learners become readers and in turn develop language comprehension. These include bringing a variety of books into the classroom, allowing students to choose their own books, providing blocks of time for independent reading and group discussion, and freeing the environment of…

Discusses the development of the Adaptive Testing Linguistic Achievement Significance (ATLAS) test used to evaluate second language proficiency of Belgian civil servants. Notes that testers encountered various problems caused by the complexity of language, the difference in background of the candidates and the absence of official objective test…

Seven sophomores at risk for problems with learning a foreign language were taught using a multisensory structured language approach. Over two years, they made significant gains on native language phonological/orthographic measures and a foreign language aptitude test. Despite gains, the students did not catch up with typical students on these…

Examines growth of metropolitan Miami's Spanish-language economy and the economic and cultural advantages of a multilingual workforce. Discusses Hispanic and Latin American businesses, Spanish-language media, statewide and local Spanish instructional programs, Dade County census data on language use and educational attainment, a Miami business…

Discusses an objective small-scale research project involving preservice student teachers of English in Hong Kong. Argues that language proficiency assessment for teachers (LPAT) in Hong Kong is likely to exert a detrimental influence on the assessment of student writing by reinforcing traditional conceptions of language, grammar, and pedagogy.…

This study examined the relationship between first and second language oral language proficiency and reading skills in Spanish-English first grade children (n=85). Reading and phonological processing were related both within and across languages. Three factors (a reading factor, an oral proficiency factor, and an implicit phonological factor) were…

Issues in measuring language proficiency of monolingual and bilingual persons are discussed. Psychometric procedures in developing both English- and Spanish-language proficiency instruments are illustrated through development of the New York City Language Assessment Battery, an assessment of proficiency in both languages used to screen eligibility…

Examines occupational inequality between Hispanic and non-Hispanic White men in the U.S. Neither geographic distribution nor Hispanic subgroup structure strongly affects Hispanic occupational disadvantage, but results support a pattern of "conditional occupational assimilation" by which the extent of Hispanic men's schooling and English…

An interview with Alan Decaux of the Academie Francaise focuses on his campaign for each European to know two languages in addition to the mother tongue, using early foreign language education to attain this goal. (MSE)

Reports on research into the interactive roles played in the verbal comprehension processes by the sequence of textual elements, text-specific prior knowledge, and levels of language proficiency. Four cloze tests were administered to undergraduate and graduate native speakers of English and to undergraduate non-native speakers of English at three…

Assessment of the English writing proficiency of 23 native French speaking students on 3 composition tasks found variance in the qualities of written texts and problem-solving behaviors. Writing expertise was found to affect discourse organization and content, writing complexity, heuristic strategies, and control strategies, while second-language…

Analysis of 38 international teaching assistants' (ITA) performance on general-topic and field-specific SPEAK tests (tests of spoken English proficiency) indicated that, although ITAs as a group did not differ significantly in performance across the two tests, pass or fail recommendations for eight subjects would depend on which test was used. (27…

Suggests that English-as-an-International-Language (EIL) and interlanguage, in recent years, have emerged as two major developments in applied linguistics and language-teaching studies. Three questions are addressed concerning EIL and language teaching. (27 references) (Author/VWL)