They have facilitated a fresh approach to communicating these teaching methods in a manner potentially more conducive to the operational appropriation of unknown languages. By thus identifying language needs, they were able to pinpoint the knowledge and know-how required for attaining this communication “threshold.

The CEFR organizes language proficiency in six levels, A1 to C2, which can be regrouped into three broad levels: Basic User, Independent User, and Proficient User, and that can be further subdivided according to the needs of the local context. The levels are defined through ‘can-do’ descriptors. The levels did not suddenly appear from nowhere in 2001, but were a development over a while, as described below.