er and I are developing (Bachman & Palmer, in press). We define language ability essentially in Widdowson’s (1983) terms as the capacity for using the knowledge of language in conjunction with the features of the language use context to create and interpret meaning. Our model of language ability includes two types of components: (a) areas of language knowledge, which we would hypothesize to be unique to language use (as opposed to, for example, mathematical knowledge or musical knowledge), and (b) metacognitive strategies that are probably general to all mental activity.
This view of language ability is consistent with research in applied linguistics that has increasingly come to view language ability as consisting of two components: (a) language knowledge, sometimes referred to as competence, and (b) cognitive processes, or procedures, that implement that knowledge in language use (e.g., Bachman, 1990a; Bialystok, 1990; Spolsky, 1989; Widdowson, 1983). It is also consistent with information-processing, or cognitive, models of mental abilities, which also distinguish processes or heuristics from domains of knowledge (e.g., Sternberg, 1985, 1988). Language use involves the integration of multiple components and processes, not the least of which are those that constitute language ability. It is unlikely that every language test we develop or use will be intended to measure all the components in our model. Nevertheless, even though we may be interested in focusing on only o英语论文网 【http://www.51lunwen.org】ne or a few of these in a given testing context, we need to be aware of the full range of language abilities as we design and develop language tests and interpret language test scores, For example, even though we may only be interested in measuring an individual’s knowledge of vocabulary, the kinds of test items, tasks or texts we use need to be selected with an awareness of what other 682 TESOL QUARTERLYcomponents of language ability they may evoke. We believe, therefore, that even though a given language test may focus on a narrow range of language abilities, its design must be informed by a broad view of language ability.
Language Knowledge
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What we refer to as language knowledge can be regarded as a domain of information that is specific to language ability and that is stored in long-term memory. For our purposes, we do not attempt to characterize how this knowledge is stored. That is, we use the term knowledge to refer to both conscious and tacit, analyzed and unanalyzed knowledge. While the importance of such distinctions has been recognized in other areas of applied linguistics, it remains to be seen how relevant they are to the design, development, and use of language tests.
Language knowledge includes two broad areas: organizational knowledge and pragmatic knowledge. These are constantly chang-ing, as new elements are learned or acquired, and existing elements restructured. The learning or acquisition of areas of language knowledge is beyond the scop
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