A central concern of the proficiency movement is to shift the focus of instruction from knowledge about the language to using that knowledge in functional ways. This concern is not new, but has acquired special force in the current proficiency movement, because student knowledge is measured on an absolute scale which lists linguistic tasks that a speaker, listener, reader, or writer can perform at each level. However, the increased focus on functionality can confront the classroom teacher with a peculiar dilemma: how to improve grammatical accuracy when the students have already developed a good measure of functionality. This dilemma emerges most clearly in a small, but significant number of students who are functional at the ACTFL-ETS Intermediate and Advanced levels and whose proficiency does not stem primarily from classroom instruction, but from extensive direct exposure to the target culture. The typical pattern of such type learners, as they are called in contrast to school type learners, is that they have passable to good pronunciation, extensive vocabulary, but a relatively weak command of the grammar. School type learners by contrast often have a firmer command of the grammar but weaker, less differentiated vocabulary. Presumably, the ultimate goal of instruction for both types of learners is a Superior rating, in which all the basic grammatical structures are firmly in place, and a broad, rich vocabulary has been acquired, adequate to sustain accurate, professional level discourse on a wide variety of concrete and abstract topics. To the extent that the grammar of street learners has not become ossified (making further attempts at refining structural accuracy difficult or useless), street learners represent the very group that needs grammatical instruction most urgently, and they are also most capable of receiving instruction and performing functional language tasks in the target language. Nevertheless, their functional abilities pose a problem for classes at the Intermediate High / Advanced level. Students without experience in Germany must learn to become functional in the everyday concrete tasks characteristic of the Advanced level. Unin-