Performance Descriptors For Language Learners: Actfl
Performance Descriptors For Language Learners: Actfl
PERFORMANCE DESCRIPTORS
FOR LANGUAGE LEARNERS
2012 Edition
Acknowledgements
ACTFL wishes to acknowledge the editors and contributing authors of this new document.
Authors and Editors: Paul Sandrock and Elvira Swender
Contributing authors: Maria Antonia Cowles, Cynthia Martin, and Robert Vicars
ACTFL also acknowledges the critical role of those members of the profession who reviewed these Performance
Descriptors: Arnold Bleicher, Peggy Boyles, Donna Clementi, Greg Duncan, Helga Fasciano, Martin Smith, and
Laura Terrill.
The ACTFL Performance Descriptors for Language Learners were built on the solid foundation provided by the
original task force that produced the 1998 ACTFL Performance Guidelines for K-12 Learners. The members of that
task force forged new ground to help educators implement the standards, providing important descriptions of
how language learners demonstrate performance of the three modes of communication in instructional settings.
Informed by the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines, the 1998 task force carefully identified appropriate learning targets
that impacted instruction and assessment in language classrooms across the U.S. and beyond. The new ACTFL
Performance Descriptors for Language Leaners benefited from the experience of language educators implementing
the original guidelines.
ACTFL acknowledges the authors of the 1998 ACTFL Performance Guidelines for K-12 Learners: Greg Duncan
and Elvira Swender; the Section Editors: Martha Abbott, Peggy Boyles, and John Miles; and the members of the
Performance Guidelines for K-12 Learners Task Force: Harriet Barnett, Karen Breiner-Sanders, Mari Haas, Eileen
Lorenz, Alisha Reeves Samples, Nancy Rhodes, Kathleen Riordan, Margaret Singer.
The ACTFL Peformance Descriptors for Language Learners 2012 may be used for non-profit, educational purposes
only, provided that they are reproduced in their entirety, with no alterations, and with credit to ACTFL.
The Standards for Foreign Language Learning (1996, 1999, 2006), describe what students need to know and be
able to do as they learn another language, defining the “what” of language education. The ACTFL Performance
Guidelines for K-12 Learners (1998) first described “how well” language learners were expected to do the “what”
from the content standards. The 2012 ACTFL Performance Descriptors for Language Learners are an update and
revision to the 1998 Performance Guidelines.
The current Standards for Foreign Language Learning are written for K-16 and include language-specific progress
indicators for elementary, secondary, and postsecondary learners. Likewise, these Performance Descriptors apply
to language learners across the same span of ages and grade levels, identifying a continuum of language learning,
which will prove useful in addressing articulation across all institutions.
Language learners in instructional settings from prekindergarten through graduate studies are in a continuous
process of cognitive development that influences their ability to perform language tasks. Learning targets need
to consider the age appropriateness and cognitive development of the language learners and may require varying
amounts of time to achieve. The description of three ranges of performance (Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced)
allows users of these Performance Descriptors to identify appropriate learning targets for language learners who
begin at any age or grade level (prekindergarten, elementary school, middle school, high school, or postsecondary
institutions) and whose language learning continues for varying amounts of time.
Since the original publication date of the 1998 K-12 Guidelines, learning environments have changed. These new
Performance Descriptors reflect how language learners perform whether learning in classrooms, online, through
independent project-based learning, or in blended environments.
The Performance Descriptors form a roadmap for teaching and learning, helping teachers create performance tasks
targeted to the appropriate performance range, while challenging learners to also use strategies from the next
higher range. In an instructional environment, the content and tasks are controlled, resulting in higher expectations
of learners’ performance compared to how they perform in a non-instructional environment. For example, Novice
language learners use highly practiced and memorized sentences and questions within the supportive learning
environment and within known contexts even though they are not yet Intermediate level language users.
These Performance Descriptors also help educators set realistic expectations at the summative assessment level.
The ability to look ahead to the next range of performance allows instructors to create assessments that show
what the language learner is able to do within the learner’s current range as well as how well the learner is able to
perform in the next higher range.
PERFORMANCE
Performance is the ability to use language that has been learned and practiced in an instructional setting.
Coached by an instructor, whether in a classroom or online, or guided by instructional materials, performance
refers to language ability that has been practiced and is within familiar contexts and content areas. The
practice and assessment of performance should reflect authentic, real world use of language, even though
the language is learned and practiced in some type of learning environment. Best practices for assessment
of performance suggest that assessment be conducted in the same communicative manner in which the
language was learned, practiced or rehearsed. To prepare for an assessment of performance, language learners
need to practice the language functions, structures, and vocabulary they will apply on the assessment tasks,
rather than practicing and memorizing exactly what will be on the assessment. Educators should provide
language learners with practice of a variety of tasks related to the curriculum. In this way, learners will be
ready to apply these elements in the context of the new tasks they will face on the performance assessment.
To help language learners transfer their language skills, instruction needs to focus on real world-like tasks
with the anticipation that learners will be prepared to do the same outside the instructional setting (as in a
demonstration of proficiency).
In assessing performance, a language learner is evaluated against the description of the features of the domains
of a given range within those contexts and content areas that have been learned and practiced. Demonstration
of performance within a specific range may provide some indication of how the language user might perform on
a proficiency assessment and indeed might point toward a proficiency level, but performance is not the same
as proficiency. The language a learner produces on a collective set of performances generally correlates to a
proficiency level, that is, the ratings that a language learner receives on a variety of performance assessments
provides evidence of how the learner will be rated on an assessment of proficiency.
PROFICIENCY
Proficiency is the ability to use language in real world situations in a spontaneous interaction and non-
rehearsed context and in a manner acceptable and appropriate to native speakers of the language. Proficiency
demonstrates what a language user is able to do regardless of where, when or how the language was acquired.
The demonstration is independent of how the language was learned; the context may or may not be familiar;
the evaluation of proficiency is not limited to the content of a particular curriculum that has been taught and
learned.
An assessment of proficiency determines if the language user provides sufficient evidence of all of the
assessment criteria of a particular level according to the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines. The individual must do
everything expected at a level in a sustained fashion, that is, all of the time, in order to be rated at that level.
• Practiced: Tasks are derived from the • Spontaneous: Tasks are non-rehearsed
language functions and vocabulary that situations
learners have practiced or rehearsed but
which are applied to other tasks within
familiar contexts
• Familiar Content and Context: Content • Broad Content and Context: Context
based on what was learned, practiced, or and content are those that are
rehearsed; all within a context similar but appropriate for the given level
not identical to how learned
A language learner who demonstrates the overall features for a given range, whether most of the time or all of
the time, would be considered to be in that range of performance. In a proficiency context, a language user who
meets the criteria for the Intermediate level, but is not able to do so for some content areas or tasks all of the
time in spontaneous, unrehearsed, language use would be rated Novice High. In the Performance Descriptors, the
same profile would place the learner as entering into the Intermediate range because most of the time, and for
those tasks and content areas that have been learned and practiced, the performance is in the Intermediate range
as defined by the performance domains (see page 8). Likewise, the language learner who meets the criteria for
the Advanced range most of the time (and who would be rated Intermediate-High on a proficiency scale) would
be considered to be entering into the Advanced range of performance. The Superior range of performance is not
addressed in these Performance Descriptors because within and beyond the Advanced range, performance and
proficiency tend to merge. Once students sustain language ability beyond the Advanced range, where contexts and
content areas are defined in general and broad terms, the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines should be used to describe
language abilities.
The first three domains describe the parameters for the language learner’s performance in each range:
• Make inferences
Contexts and • Oneself Contexts are situations within which the learner
Content can function;
• One’s immediate envi- Content is the topics which the learner can under-
ronment stand and discuss
• General interest
• Work-related
Text Type • Words Text type controlled by the learner is that which the
learner is able to understand and produce in order
• Phrases to perform the functions of the level
• Sentences
• Questions
• Strings of sentences
• Connected sentences
• Paragraphs
In instruction, activities are scaffolded, that is supported by the instructor by pre-teaching critical elements such
as key vocabulary or a new structure or practice of a language function. With such support, language learners are
helped to perform at the next range by learning to use language at that next level. As the support is removed,
language learners gradually over time become able to demonstrate that performance on their own. In this way,
language learners begin to show characteristics of the next range as they approach the top end of their current
performance range.
Instruction targets the next level and assessment provides language learners with the opportunity to show what
they can do – with or without assistance in the form of a controlled context or content, practice and preparation,
or rephrasing and paraphrasing to increase comprehension. Instructors need to target instruction across two
ranges, broadening learners’ performance at their current range and working to develop some abilities at the next
higher range. Novice students, for example, need instruction and practice to improve their performance within the
Novice level while simultaneously targeting the functions and contexts of the Intermediate range. Novice students
need to experience Intermediate language in controlled and supported activities in order to gradually acquire
the knowledge and strategies they will need in order to become confident and independent users of language
in the Intermediate range. Instructors should consider recycling content and contexts at the next higher level of
functions, providing multiple opportunities for learners to expand into the next performance range, developing
stronger language control, vocabulary, communication strategies, and cultural awareness.
• Students use orally, listen to, and write Latin or Greek as part of the language learning process.
Therefore, while reading and understanding the written messages of the ancient world is a key to communication
in the study of Latin and classical Greek, the oral use of the language can also be employed to help students
avoid reading or translating word-for-word as they must listen in “chunks” (several words holding the meaning or
phrases) and respond spontaneously during oral communication. This practice also builds student interest and
heightens understanding of and appreciation for the languages and their cultures.
The chart (on the next page) graphically illustrates the influence of time-on-task on language performance and
shows what outcomes are reasonable to expect of students who begin language instruction at various points in
the K-16 spectrum. The outcomes depicted in this chart reflect general approximations based on performance
testing and indicate targets that are possible for all students, given standards-based programs with continuity of
instruction, sufficient time on task, and learning focused on performance. While performance outcomes may vary
according to the mode of communication, the expectations in this chart represent a composite of performance
outcomes for interpersonal, interpretive, and presentational communication. The most common program model
for language learning in this country continues to be two years of instruction at the secondary level. This model
limits students to performance in the Novice range. In an increasing number of standards-based, performance-
based programs with continuity and sufficient time on task (e.g., beginning in the elementary grades with at
least 90 minutes of instruction per week and continuing through the secondary years), learners are reaching the
Advanced range of performance. Evidence is emerging that elementary immersion programs are able to produce
students that are performing well into the Intermediate range by middle school and exiting high school in the
Advanced range. These students have the potential to exit postsecondary programs approaching or at the Superior
level of proficiency. Such comparisons are given with the caution that reaching each range of performance is more
than simply matching hours or years of instruction. The age and cognitive development of the language learners
greatly impacts language learning. The level of literacy and language performance in the learners’ native language
impacts their development of literacy and language performance in additional languages.
Conversely, when students encounter languages with minimal similarity to their native language, some new
strategies need to be employed to understand and to be understood. American students learning Arabic, Chinese,
Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Swahili, or Urdu face different language learning challenges: unfamiliar sounds,
different writing systems, and new grammars. These linguistic features, which oftentimes cannot be linked to
anything the language learners know in their native language, generally extend the language acquisition process.
Heritage speakers of a language learn to use their heritage language through a variety of means, often through family
and community interactions, sometimes more formally in an instructional setting, The modes of communication
provide educators of heritage speakers with a useful analytical tool to determine an instructional emphasis.
Interpersonal communication and interpretive listening tend to be strengths for many heritage speakers. At the
same time, some heritage speakers may benefit from focused support in the modes of presentational writing and
interpretive reading if prior language experiences were not in an instructional setting.
Language learners also benefit by understanding the Performance Descriptors and the targeted expectations
shown in this chart. The ranges of performance describe a pathway for learners to keep track of progress made,
to identify domains needing additional practice, and to gain a clear understanding of how to move into the next
higher range of performance. By collecting and reflecting on evidence of performance, language learners are able
to set their own language learning targets, motivating them to improve their performance.