Most of my intermediate adult students easily understand the teachers but can not understand everyday English - maybe 30% at the most for anything on TV.   They struggle when they finally go to mainstream classes and find that they can only understand 50% of what the lecturer is saying.  They need to not only understand but to also be understood by the locals, of which many will not be native English speakers but perhaps migrants or other international students.  Everyday language for them will mostly be informal yet they have to be able to listen to a formal lecture and take notes.  In addition, a formal lecture will probably contain a fair amount of informal language and possibly slang as well.

 

However, they also need to know grammatically correct formal language in order to have the ability to produce formal written correspondence for work or study, yet be able to informally communciate in writing through personal letters, e-mails and blogs at the appropriate level  (i.e. dependent on recipient/forum).

 

Teaching both in conjunction is an essential part of our curriculum aimed at international students progressing on to academic study in our country.

 

BTW, my students love it when I teach them informal language, like �how are ya today � and �watcha doin � on the weekend �. Naturally we discuss how to say these correctly and appropriate usage but they do comment that they had heard these and didn �t know what they meant.  This is such an important aspect to them in being able to blend in.