Speech is characterized by a few memorized words or phrases. Speech is made up of lists of vocabulary. Speakers are unable to handle even the most basic survival situations. Can handle everyday social encounters such as greetings, leave taking, use of polite formulae with some degree of appropriateness. Can handle a simple survival situation that one might encounter abroad.
Discourse is characterized by simple sentences or phrases.
There is little use of cohesive devices. Intermediate speech is quite inaccurate, even in basic structures. Vocabulary is quite limited. Intermediate speakers are intelligible to native speakers used to dealing with foreigners . At the upper level, intermediate speakers start showing aspects of the advanced speaker.