ESL Theories

ESL Theories

1. Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS)

   • Language skills needed for social situations in environments with peers, teachers, and others
     • Interacting with a student on the playground or in the lunch room, encouraging casual conversation
   • Jim Cummins

2. Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP)

   • Language skills needed for academics
     • Reading, speaking, writing, or listening in the classroom, working one on one with student
   • Jim Cummins

3. Input Hypothesis

   • Stephen Krashen
   • All people understand language in the same way through many forms of communication
     • People who speak different languages can look at the same picture and get a similar understanding, so using different pictures and visual demonstrations can help ESL learners

4. Universal Grammar

   • Noam Chomsky
   • All languages are based on the different components of sentences such as verbs, nouns, and adjectives
     • Try to relate the structure of the child's first language to the similar structure in sentences in English

5. Threshold Hypothesis

   • A person must be competent in one language before being able to understand and use another language
     • Working with a student using their first language until they fully understand it and then adding English into the curriculum
   • Jim Cummins

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