A functional curriculum for an adult ESL program

Functional language has recently become increasingly important to the field of teaching English as a second language recently. The large number of adult immigrants living in the United States has made it necessary for teachers to place their attention on the communicative purpose. A functional curriculum which emphasizes intercultural linguistic expressions and social interactions is especially needed.The program is designed to teach certain functions of English to Chinese immigrants in the United States, however, it can also be used by Chinese speakers of English in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The curriculum which focuses on establishing and maintaining social relations with native English speakers, covers speech acts such as greetings, partings, thanking, complimenting, inviting, requesting, and apologizing. The structure and language in the curriculum are geared toward intermediate students.The goal of the program is to improve the student's ability to communicate and to handle routine social interactions successfully, while developing their fluency in reading and writing. This goal can be accomplished by (1) ensuring that students internalize what has been taught to their actual usage repertoire and (2) by focusing on the student's functional language needs. With a minimum of teacher explanation and maximum of student participation in class, students can quickly begin to produce meaningful and appropriate language in a variety of situations.