Balancing Accuracy and Fluency: What Every ESL Teacher Should Know

Imagine this: a student who claims to be fluent in English at an advanced level, but whose vocabulary clearly falls within the B2 range. Or consider the opposite — a learner whose speech flows effortlessly at a near-native C2 pace, yet their grammar is riddled with consistent B1-level mistakes.

Which of these aspects — fluency or accuracy — truly defines a learner’s language level? And more importantly, which should be prioritized in the learning process?

In this article, we’ll explore the balance between fluency and accuracy to better understand their roles in language acquisition. The answer to the problem lies in understanding its foundations. These are the definitions of both fluency and accuracy.

Simply put, the ability to speak in a foreign language without stopping to search for words, both in general and academic/business settings. This also implies a certain amount of grammatical mistakes that are taken as a part of the natural speech and do not impede understanding.


In simpler terms, it is about communicative efficiency: the capacity to speak or write smoothly, even if not always perfectly. A fluent speaker may occasionally make errors, but they can sustain interaction, convey ideas, and respond spontaneously in real time — all of which are crucial for successful communication.

Drawing on personal experience, I would say “no”. Fluency is not taught in the same way as grammar rules and exceptions are, but rather trained and encouraged throughout the whole process of learning. The “how” is our next important question to answer.

Practical ways of training students’ fluency:

Constant Language Exposure

As controversial as this step may seem, it works especially well for students who feel too shy, have poor vocabulary capacity, or simply lack role models.

Use short podcast episodes, dialogues from series, or authentic Instagram/TikTok posts in English as input.

Repetition with Variation

Practising the same structure across different contexts reinforces automaticity. 

For example, if you’ve introduced expressions like “as far as I’m concerned” or “it goes without saying”, ask students to reuse them in various topics — from business etiquette to relationship advice. Gradually shift the topic, but keep the phrase in use.

Story Retelling with Constraints

After listening to a short story or watching a video, ask students to retell the content:

This allows them to develop both flexibility and fluency while staying mentally engaged with the content.

Time-Paced Speaking Practice

Set a timer (30 sec / 1 min / 2 min). Give each student a random topic (e.g., “something you regret buying”, “a film that made you cry”), and have them speak without pauses or hesitations for the allotted time. 

Don’t interrupt or correct them — just take notes. Afterward, ask peers to recall what they understood, and then give soft correction if needed.

Dialogue Chains & Roleplay

This can be particularly useful for students preparing for job interviews, visa appointments, or IELTS speaking tasks. 

You may naturally start wondering at this point if accuracy is less important at this point. The short answer would be “no”. And I will show you why in the following part. 

Essentially, accuracy comprises three main features of language that are used with the highest level of precision possible. These are: grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation.

Again, speaking professionally, Skehan (1996) defines it reflects “the extent to which a learner’s output conforms to target language norms” — whether that’s in grammar, vocabulary, spelling, or pronunciation. 

Yes, and this is where all the teacher’s energy is directed to during those classes and tasks that are designed for grammar/vocabulary clarification, drilling of accurate pronunciation, and error correction.

How does the teacher deal with proper accuracy training? While there is no single ultimately working strategy that would give a guaranteed result, I may suggest the following strategies and outline their benefits for your students.

Start with drills

Just like in fluency development, this kind of activity helps students to fossilize the correct patterns and improve their confidence in choosing the right words, verb tenses, or word stress. 

Move on to less scaffolded tasks

Tasks such as gap-filling activities. These help students transition from recognition to controlled production.

At this stage, feedback from the teacher is still crucial: students should not only receive corrections but also understand why their answers were wrong or why one option works better than another. 

Incorporate guided production

This might include speaking or writing tasks where students are expected to use specific structures accurately in longer stretches of language — like describing a picture using past simple and past continuous, or writing a formal email using conditionals.

Don’t skip the correction stage

Delayed feedback or error correction sessions (especially with the help of reformulation or peer correction) help students become more aware of their common mistakes and learn from them. 

Revisit and recycle

Accuracy does not develop in a straight line. Students will forget or misapply rules they once mastered, especially under pressure. 

The most discouraging question we constantly hear from the students is “When will I sound like a native?” They often come up to us with this question out of a mix of curiosity, ambition, and sometimes anxiety. And here’s the truth: there is no need to.

The goal of language learning is not to mimic a native speaker's voice but to find a personal voice in a second language. To be understood. To express oneself clearly, comfortably, and confidently, even when making mistakes.

And each learner will need a different balance of them at different stages. So instead of chasing one ideal model of speech, help your students build the skills they need for their lives, careers, and personalities.

When they stop asking “When will I sound like a native?” and start saying “I said what I meant, and they understood me” — that’s the real milestone. 

As Willis (1996) points out in the framework of task-based learning, fluency activities “should not come at the expense of accuracy” — nor should accuracy-based drills block learners from gaining communicative confidence. 

Learners need space to experiment and automatise language (fluency) as well as structured opportunities to refine and correct it (accuracy).

And finally… Unlike the title of the article suggests, accuracy and fluency are actually a powerful couple of studying characteristics and thus cannot be compared in their efficiency for ESL studies.

My afterword for the aspiring teachers who might be looking for an answer, or an exact ally to rely on — do not. Do not look for just one simple solution; look for what is needed most by your students. 

Listen to their concerns, examine their learning styles, and adapt your lesson planning to your students, not to the book or the course curriculum.