Discusses five directions for integrating the notion of communicative competence in foreign-language instruction: functional orientation, focus on semantic notions, cyclical progression, inclusion of rhetorical device and discursive authenticity, and systematic treatment of language variation. (EKN)

Discusses how to fulfill the goals of communicative language teaching in a first-year German course while at the same time teaching grammar. Illustrates one aspect of "functional grammar" as it can be taught in the first six weeks of a first-year course in German at the university level. (SED)

Discusses a questionnaire administered to beginning Spanish students at Iowa State University, designed to identify and set priorities for student-perceived communication needs. Compares the results with a similar survey of beginning French students at Purdue. (EKN)

Introduces a project in syllabus design for English as a second language at the elementary level undertaken by the British Institute of Madrid. Discusses the principles on which the framework for the experimental syllabus was constructed and explains the rationale for attempting to make it both "notional" and "structural."…

Describes two core syllabi, a communicative one and a grammatical one, and a modular syllabus for elementary ESL courses, with hints for introducing out-of-sequence items. Explains how the syllabi have been designed, what they offer to teachers, and how they have affected first-year teaching as a whole. (Author/MES)

Presents a practical, flexible framework for teaching communicative competence. Examples of objectives, materials, activities, and testing procedures are from the first-year German courses at the University of Arizona but are largely applicable to foreign language instruction in general. (EKN)