When u r doing a college resume and want to show colleges u r fluent in a language, what exactly defines ur “fluency.” Does my 700 SAT II Spanish and 740 SAT II French score make me fluent in the language? What about my two years of taking Chinese in elementary school?
<p>Well, first of all, you don't use "u" and "r". :)</p>
<p>Generally fluency is when you can read a newspaper in the language with no problems or difficulty, that sort of thing.</p>
<p>high SAT II scores do not necessarily = fluency</p>
<p>i don't know about the other languages. i was born in japan and my parents taught me japanese before english. i am fluent in japanese and took the SAT II and got an 800. It was about something that 3rd to 5th graders in Japan could've done. So, does that count as fluent? i'm not sure.</p>
<p>No.
Why? First, because I've seen the Spanish SAT II. It's ridiculous. Did you see the question that was something like "Pedro no puede entrar a su casa porque su hijo se ha llevado a) la llama b) la llave c) la puerta" or the one that was "Yo tomo zumo de naranja para quitarme a) la sed b) ... c) el sweater."
Second, because I've lived in Spanish speaking countries for 11 years and we get a lot of study-abroad students who aced Spanish class and the SAT and it's not an indication of fluency in the least.</p>
<p>No. Your SAT II scores does not show fluency. It shows that you have high proficiency of the language. To be fluent means being able to communicate (writing, reading, speaking, and listening) without much difficulty. Right now, we're fluent in English and we are expected to speak English to other English-speaking people so we communicate without much difficulty. Now, what if a Spanish-speaking person comes up and starts a conversation? Can you keep up with the conversation? Or will you say "No hablo espanol muy bien"? Picture yourself in such a scenario and you'll see how fluent you really are.</p>
<p>i agree that SAT II language test doesn't mean fluency because japanese one was such a joke. but then my question is how can we show if we are fluent in a language that is neither your first language nor english? do we just write that in the essay/short answer?</p>
<p>^ that's what i've been wondering too.</p>
<p>That depends on how much you want to stress that point.
You could at least take an AP exam in that language. Or an official language test, like the TOEFL and the IELTS for English; there's one for almost every language there is.</p>