Bisc/Calp Essay

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BICS/CALP Taylor Brown Grand Canyon University: EDU 536 June 3, 2014 BICS/CALP BICS and CALP are both used when discussing bilingual education from the work of Jim Cummins beginning in 1984. Cummins used these terms to demonstrate his ideas of developing a second language in students. BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communicative Skills) describes the development of the second language the is necessary for day-to-day living through conversation and interaction with others. CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency ) describes learning the language though academic situations to understand the content used within a classroom. Jim Cummins uses these two terms to differentiate between both social and academic language acquisition. Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills are the language skills that a student needs for the day-to-day social interactions and social situations with classmates, friends, adults, teachers, etc. The students may use these skills when they are with friends, on the school bus, at recess, talking in the lunch room at school, speaking on the telephone, playing sports, etc. These social interactions are known to be context embedded. This means that the conversations are face-to-face. This is where the learner learns cues to place with words such as expressions, gestures, etc. This language skill is not specified or specialized. Most students learn and develop these language skills within six months to two years after arriving in the United States. Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency refers to academic learning. With this type of learning students learn by listening, speaking, reading, or writing about the subject content in school. This type of learning is more then essential when it comes to students learning in
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