Two Dumb Questions

[Richard Robin]

*Dear SEELANGers,

It seems to me that in any discussion of articulation, it helps to talk
about things, not in terms of semesters or years, but hours of classroom
contact — assuming medium-sized classes, about 10-15 people. That gives us
a common measuring stick that allows us to analyze the results of seemingly
disparate programs, approaches, and materials. So for me, any
“intermediate” textbook, whether it is billed as a second-year book or a
third-year book, is one that starts to push people towards paragraphing. At
my institution, the student readiness for that major initial push comes
after about 220-240 classroom hours and is tied to reaching Intermediate
Low speaking proficiency. A count-the-hours approach also allows me to
compare results of less traditional programs: intensive stateside summer
programs and short-term study abroad at less than Advanced levels (e.g.
CLS). It informs me of the difference that an enhanced-Russian environment
might make (or not). Counting hours also allows us to compare students of
Russian to students in other languages with different program structures.
And my my school, that yields some interesting conclusions.

-Rich Robin*

On Sun, May 27, 2012 at 2:52 PM, Melissa Smith <mtsmith02 at ysu.edu> wrote:

> Far from dumb questions!
>
> The concept of "second-year Russian" depends very much on what the
> first year consisted of, and what the students' future path of study
> can be expected to me. In the "olden" days (before 1984,
> approximately), there were two or three first-year texts, and only one
> second year "Making Progress With Russian," by Davis and Oprendek.

-- 
Richard M. Robin, Ph.D.
Director Russian Language Program
The George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052
202-994-7081
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Russkiy tekst v UTF-8

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