Editing Jim Cummins (professor) (section)

==BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communicative Skills)==
{{Main|Basic Interpersonal Communicative Skills}}

BICS refers to the basic communicative fluency achieved by all normal native speakers of a language. It is cognitively undemanding and contextual and is better understood as the language used by students in informal settings, say, on a playground or cafe.  Research by Cummins as well as Virginia Collier suggest that it typically takes language learners 1–3 years to develop BICS if they have sufficient exposure to the second language, "with the exception of severely retarded and autistic children".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Cummins |first1=Jim |title=The Cross-Lingual Dimensions of Language Proficiency: Implications for Bilingual Education and the Optimal Age Issue |journal=TESOL Quarterly |date=1980 |volume=14 |issue=2 |page=176 |url=https://doi.org/10.2307/3586312 |doi=10.2307/3586312 |access-date=24 January 2023}}</ref>