It is suggested that the proficiency guidelines of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) are ideally suited for organizing classroom instruction because they are experientially rather than theoretically based, progressive, and provide a means for defining what it means to "know" a language. This last issue is dicussed in terms of adult language learning. The bulk of the report is devoted to sample classroom activities, illustrating language learning principles and including examples of language practice in a variety of contexts likely to be found in the culture, eleven activity formats for meaningful precommunicative drills (word association, forced choice, matching, logical conclusions, logical questions, definitions, completions and cloze adaptations, direct and indirect translation, visual-based exercises, slash sentences, and sentence combining), approaches to eliciting student meaning early in instruction (personalized sentences, questions, true/false exercises, and sentence builders), and group activities (puzzles, decision-making, mingling, interviews and conversations, and situational role-plays). Other suggestions for encouraging authentic language use, linguistic accuracy, recognition of students' affective as well as cognitive needs, and cultural understanding are also discussed. (MSE)