From November 7 to 9, 2013, the

Second Saarbrücken Conference

on Foreign Language Teaching

will be held at the Chair of Applied Languages of the Business School of Saarland University of Applied Sciences (Germany),. The conference features the theme:

Language Knowledge and Language Skills -

Prerequisites, Relativity, Methodology

The conference topic refers to those extremes of a continuum which are constantly present in language teaching.

Conference languages are German, English, French, and Spanish.

The scope of the conference extends to the following areas which are of an exemplary character. The following list is therefore to be understood as a general guideline and can be further extended:

·   Meaningful relationships between language knowledge and language skills in general

·   Communicative competence and language correctness

·   Language assessment as communicative or knowledge-based acts (integrated or separate testing of the four basic language skills)

·   Linguistic categorizations and cerebral processes

·   Grammaticality and communication: general tendencies and specific demands

·   Langue and parole in spoken language

            Grammatical necessities to secure basic communicative needs

·   Communicative grammar: from basic structures up to a comfortable repertoire of mental structurisation

·   Relationships between communicative activites and repertoire extension in the foreign-language classroom

·   Language teaching on the different linguistic levels: the pendulum from language knowledge towards language skills and its forms of transition

·   From the grammar-translation method towards the direct method: a kaleidoscope of approaches

·   Sociability and language

·   Irony and ambiguity as communicative devices between language knowledge and language skills – encoding and decoding requirements for language learners

·   Linguistic registres and substandards as (non-)requirements of language mastery

·   The necessary cultural knowledge for the acquisition of intercultural experience

·   Humour as the reflexion of a high mastery level of language knowledge and language skills combined

·   Social and linguistic roles: what should learners know so as to be able to communicate and interact adequately

·   Social knowledge, language knowledge and discourse competency

·   Strategic competency as a dominantly knowledge-oriented ability

·   The use of the internet and online dictionaries

·   Text reception and online dictionaries

·   The Internet as a work of reference

·   Competence- and performance-oriented teaching and learning materials

·   Necessities of the safe acquisition of LSP structures and their use in specific situations of communication (e.g. translation and interpretation)

·                                                                                                                            (...)

The above-mentioned aspects logically result in the following sections:

·   Section 1: Linguistic Approaches

·   Section 2: Methodological Approaches

·   Section 3: Methodological Approaches in LSP (languages for specific purposes)

·   Section 4: Communication and Interculturality

·   Section 5: Internet and Multimedia

·   Section 6: Product-Oriented Presentations

Section 1: Linguistic Approaches

The following questions represent potential guidelines for this section:

·   In what way(s) can grammar functionally be taught - from the basic structures of a language up to a comfortable mastery of its most complex structures?

·   How can the borderlines between grammaticality and communication be defined?

·   Is it still possible to ask students to actively learn vocabulary in the classroom situation? It is possible to do without?

·   Is language correctness more or less important in view of the demands young people are facing in terms of communicativity and spontaneity?

·   Should the basic linguistic skills be examined and tested in a separate or integrated way?

·   What happens in the brain when language is processed? What do these findings imply for linguistics and language teaching?

The above questions are merely to serve as an orientation to potential contributors. In principle, the section is open to any relevant topic or approach.

Section 2: Methodological Approaches

The following questions represent potential guidelines for this section:

·   What is a reasonable relationship between language knowledge and language skills in teaching languages for special / specific purposes (LSP)?

·   In what ways should communicative exercises and inventory-extending activities be applied in the classroom? How should this be applied to the teaching of translation in LSP?

·   To what extent do learners master registre-specific differenciations in their performance of (oral) LSP?

·   How can the history of content-course teaching be described with respect to  language knowledge and language skills? What are the potential future trends?

·   How can content-course teaching be described with respect to the individual learner on his/her way from language knowledge towards the application of language skills? What can be deduced from this description of different learning stages - for teachers and learniers on the one hand and for the requirements of the respective subject on the other.

The above questions are merely to serve as an orientation to potential contributors. In principle, the section is open to any relevant topic or approach.

Section 3: Methodological Approaches in LSP (Languages for specific purposes)

The following questions represent potential guidelines for this section:

·   What is a reasonable relationship between language knowledge and language skills in teaching languages for special / specific purposes (LSP)?

·   In what ways should communicative exercises and inventory-extending activities be applied in the classroom? How should this be applied to the teaching of translation in LSP?

·   To what extent do learners master registre-specific differenciations in their performance of (oral) LSP?

·   How can the history of LSP content-course teaching be described with respect to  language knowledge and language skills? What are the potential future trends?

·   How can LSP content-course teaching be described with respect to the individual learner on his/her way from language knowledge towards the application of language skills? What can be deduced from this description of different learning stages - for teachers and learniers on the one hand and for the requirements of the respective subject on the other.

The above questions are merely to serve as an orientation to potential contributors. In principle, the section is open to any relevant topic or approach.

Section 4: Communication and Interculturality

The following questions represent potential guidelines for this section:

·   What kind of cultural knowledge is necessary to realise intercultural experience?

·   How can a feel for irony and ambiguity in the target language be conveyed to learners?

·   Can the mastery of humor in a foreign language be considered the best evedence of  students’ knowledge and skills?

·   In how far is it necessary to teach linguistic registers and sub-standards to learners? How far should this apporach reach? Where are its limits?

·   What knowledge and what skills must learners have to be able to communicate and interact adequately?  

·   What kind of language knowledge and discourse competence should learners have so as to be able to communicate successfully?

·   How can strategic competence – in parts or examples - be described as a dominantly knowledge-oriented linguistic skill?

The above questions are merely to serve as an orientation to potential contributors. In principle, the section is open to any relevant topic or approach.

Section 5: Internet and Multimedia

The following questions represent potential guidelines for this section:

·   What  should a functional, learner-oriented use of the Internet in the classroom siuation look like? I what situations can it be counterproductive?

·   What quality do online dictionaries provide as a means of spontaneous information in times of Smartphone and iPad?

·   What online dictionaries do learners use (analysis of use and necessity)?

·   How reliable is the Internet as a means of reference? How is it currently used by  language learners? How should it be used?

·   Are course materials nowadays still designed to predominantly follow a skills-oriented approach? Have there been changes regarding the concept of course materials in the last two decades? What are future trends? What should desirable future trends look like?

The above questions are merely to serve as an orientation to potential contributors. In principle, the section is open to any relevant topic or approach.

Section 6: Product-Oriented Presentations

This section is reserved for product-oriented presentations. As these may be commercial, a small charge will be raised.

Presentations in this section can be combined with the book exhibition.