Faked placement might have their logic

[Vera Beljakova]

Dear Liza Ginsberg,

I'd like to hear your suggestions on-list, especially because I also
teach Russian part-time to South African adults (business men) 
who seem never to have had a single grammar lesson in their lives.

I have to devize ways to circumvent grammar teaching.....
But I wish 'crash courses' would be given in high schools and 
universities for people like me (heritage/native speakers),
who could always speak grammatically, but would have liked to have better
understood the language structure, and one needs to start at ground level
to understand the building blocks of a language....even for native speakers.

And though I obtained a BA Hons, I have never felt confident
in the written aspect....much like English schoolchildren can speak and read 
and write English without knowning grammar.

Vera Beljakova






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------------- Original Message --------------
From:       B. Shir [redorbrown at YAHOO.COM]
To:         SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
Cc:         ?
Date:       Fri,03/02/2006 19:40:27
Subject:    Re: [SEELANGS] Faked placement might have their logic

100% agree with V. Bell. During my 10 years of teaching the
Russian Language, I have had many students with the same
problem.
I will be happy to continue off-list, for what I am going
to suggest might sound like "kramola".
Liza Ginzburg
Senior Instructor

--- "atacama at global.co.za" <atacama at GLOBAL.CO.ZA> wrote:

> Trying to enter at the elementary level might have a very
> good reason,
> besides trying to obtain high marks with little effort.
> 
> Take my case: I am what would be called a
> Russian-language
> heritage speaker, born of Russian/German parents in
> Berlin,
> with home language Russian & some German, and then
> entered
> the British school/university system.
> 
> Although my spoken Russian and German were excellent, I
> didn't
> really understand grammar at all.   I was pushed into the
> higher
> classes, eventually obtained a degree - but I am still
> extremely
> sorry that I never had elementary classes where simple
> grammar is
> taught..... I now do high level translations, but don't
> really
> understand grammar.
> 
> I also spoke Spanish, but had the good fortune to
> re-start it at
> elementary level in London thus obtaining a good
> foundation of grammar,
> which I really think is essential in any language.
> 
> I would suggest for students in such a position to be
> give
> crash courses in basic language before they proceed to
> higher
> levels.
> 
> V. Bell
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Original Message:
> -----------------
> From: Prof Steven P Hill s-hill4 at UIUC.EDU
> Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2006 04:28:42 -0600
> To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
> Subject: [SEELANGS] "Faked" placement scores from native
> speakers
> 
> 

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