PRIVATE CONVERSATIONAL SPANISH CLASS
Tuesdays, 5:00pm - 6:30pm
November 3 - January 12, 2016 (No class December 22nd)
(10 Week/Class Session)
IIT Research Institute ("The Tower")
10 West 35th Street
Room 8C9-2 (8th floor conference room)
Chicago, IL 60616
November 3 - January 12, 2016 (No class December 22nd)
(10 Week/Class Session)
IIT Research Institute ("The Tower")
10 West 35th Street
Room 8C9-2 (8th floor conference room)
Chicago, IL 60616
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Registration:
- $250 (Early Bird Special - Good on 09/25/2015 Only) - $275 (Due by the first day of class, 11/03/2015) Payment Methods: - Use the link to the right to pay via PayPal. - Pay with cash on the first day of class. |
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Course Materials:
- Spanish-English-Spanish Dictionary (most cellular phones have great applications for this use)
- Course Manual (click here) Students should either download the manual to their laptop or other appropriate device to use in class, or after downloading should print just one Unit at a time, as needed. Unit 31 is the first unit.
- Writing Materials (pen/pencil, paper)
ABOUT THE COURSE
INTRODUCTION
Careful thought has been given to the selection of instructional material for this class. Each student already has had a considerable amount of exposure and instruction in the Spanish language. As is typical, unless a student spends much time in a Spanish-speaking country, or otherwise immerses his or herself into the language, it is always challenging to move from having a cognizant understanding of how the language works to using the language spontaneously in real life situations. It is with this in mind that the course designed by the Foreign Service Institute for the Department of State has been selected. Mary and Mary Anne already have had some exposure to this material. This course provides real life situations and dialogs for the student to master; giving grammatical explanations along the way. Whenever the students need additional clarity about particular structures, the explanations will be given on the spot, if not too time comsuming, or otherwise will be sent via email as a homework assignment. Upon the competion of each unit of instruction, the students will be sent an mp3 audio file, with the voices of native speakers, of the material covered, so that they can practice the material as much as they want!
The course material presents Spanish as a spoken Ianguage, and the skills of listening-comprehension and speaking are accordingly emphasized. Although created in the early '60s, the U.S. government still uses these materials in order to teach diplomats, CIA agents, FBI agents and DEA agents how to speak Spanish. In order to understand the materials, one must first understand the method upon which they are buiIt.
TEACHING METHODOLOGY
The method we will use is known as GUIIED IMITATION and has been used by a considerable number of teachers for many years. Its goal is to teach one to speak easily, fluently, with very little accent, and to do this without conscious effort, just as one speaks his or her own language without conscious effort. There are two very important aspects of this method. First, learning a relatively small body of material so well that it requires very Iittle effort to produce it. This is referred to as OVER-LEARNING. If a student over-learns every dialog and drill as he or she goes through the courses, he or she will almost certainly experience rapid progress in learning the language. The second aspect is learning to manipulate authentically the sounds, sequences, and patterns of the language. The important implication here is the reaIity of both the model and the imitation. The instructor, in this case Earl Hall, who in addition to being a Spanish teacher has worked as a professional Spanish-English-Spanish court interpreter and translator, provides Spanish as people reaIIy speak it in actual conversations, and the student will be helped to achieve an accurate imitation. Additionally, as mentioned above, upon completion of each unit of instruction, the students will be sent audio files with the voices of native speakers, so that they can practice often and so that they are confident with what they have been taught in class. Above all, the normal tempo of pronunciation must be the classroom standard; slowing down is, in this context, distortion.
PRONUNCIATION
Pronunciation is extremely important. It is the basis of all real fluency. A person is readily able to understand anything he or she can meaningfully say, if the correlation between the way he hears it and the way he says it is reasonably similar. Obviously, the more similar, the greater the ease of comprehension.
The basis of the student's imitation is of course the teacher, whose pronunciation is the ultimate source of authority. The fundamental classroom procedure for learning new material throughout our courses is repetition by the student in direct immediate imitation after the teacher. The imitative repetition may at first be done in chorus after the teacher, and subsequently by each individual, or it may be individualized from the start. In either case the student should wait for the teacher's model. Imitating after another student too frequently results in compounding the errors of both. If a person is fortunate enough to begin studying a second language before the age of eight or ten, the powers of imitation are normally sufficient to ensure excellent results in pronunciation without resorting to technical explanations of how sounds are produced. If occasionally an individual has managed to retain this gift that all of us had in childhood, so much the better, but most adults need more specific guidance based on an awareness of the particular problems of producing particular sounds. The drills and explanations are devoted to the specific problems an English speaker with his English habits of pronunciation will have in accurately imitating the sounds and sequences of sounds of Spanish.
It is well to remember that a sizeable investment in pronunciation practice will pay handsome dividends later; correct pronunciation safely relegated to habit leaves one's full attention available for other aspects of learning the language.
Grammar
Learning grammar is not the goal! For most people, the goal is not to become a grammar expert. The goal is to be able to speak Spanish conversationally. Grammar is only one of the means to the end of speaking Spanish. We believe in grammar, and we include it in our method. However, let's be honest. Studying grammar will not make you fluent. To reach a conversational level you need to speak the language and speak it often.
Careful thought has been given to the selection of instructional material for this class. Each student already has had a considerable amount of exposure and instruction in the Spanish language. As is typical, unless a student spends much time in a Spanish-speaking country, or otherwise immerses his or herself into the language, it is always challenging to move from having a cognizant understanding of how the language works to using the language spontaneously in real life situations. It is with this in mind that the course designed by the Foreign Service Institute for the Department of State has been selected. Mary and Mary Anne already have had some exposure to this material. This course provides real life situations and dialogs for the student to master; giving grammatical explanations along the way. Whenever the students need additional clarity about particular structures, the explanations will be given on the spot, if not too time comsuming, or otherwise will be sent via email as a homework assignment. Upon the competion of each unit of instruction, the students will be sent an mp3 audio file, with the voices of native speakers, of the material covered, so that they can practice the material as much as they want!
The course material presents Spanish as a spoken Ianguage, and the skills of listening-comprehension and speaking are accordingly emphasized. Although created in the early '60s, the U.S. government still uses these materials in order to teach diplomats, CIA agents, FBI agents and DEA agents how to speak Spanish. In order to understand the materials, one must first understand the method upon which they are buiIt.
TEACHING METHODOLOGY
The method we will use is known as GUIIED IMITATION and has been used by a considerable number of teachers for many years. Its goal is to teach one to speak easily, fluently, with very little accent, and to do this without conscious effort, just as one speaks his or her own language without conscious effort. There are two very important aspects of this method. First, learning a relatively small body of material so well that it requires very Iittle effort to produce it. This is referred to as OVER-LEARNING. If a student over-learns every dialog and drill as he or she goes through the courses, he or she will almost certainly experience rapid progress in learning the language. The second aspect is learning to manipulate authentically the sounds, sequences, and patterns of the language. The important implication here is the reaIity of both the model and the imitation. The instructor, in this case Earl Hall, who in addition to being a Spanish teacher has worked as a professional Spanish-English-Spanish court interpreter and translator, provides Spanish as people reaIIy speak it in actual conversations, and the student will be helped to achieve an accurate imitation. Additionally, as mentioned above, upon completion of each unit of instruction, the students will be sent audio files with the voices of native speakers, so that they can practice often and so that they are confident with what they have been taught in class. Above all, the normal tempo of pronunciation must be the classroom standard; slowing down is, in this context, distortion.
PRONUNCIATION
Pronunciation is extremely important. It is the basis of all real fluency. A person is readily able to understand anything he or she can meaningfully say, if the correlation between the way he hears it and the way he says it is reasonably similar. Obviously, the more similar, the greater the ease of comprehension.
The basis of the student's imitation is of course the teacher, whose pronunciation is the ultimate source of authority. The fundamental classroom procedure for learning new material throughout our courses is repetition by the student in direct immediate imitation after the teacher. The imitative repetition may at first be done in chorus after the teacher, and subsequently by each individual, or it may be individualized from the start. In either case the student should wait for the teacher's model. Imitating after another student too frequently results in compounding the errors of both. If a person is fortunate enough to begin studying a second language before the age of eight or ten, the powers of imitation are normally sufficient to ensure excellent results in pronunciation without resorting to technical explanations of how sounds are produced. If occasionally an individual has managed to retain this gift that all of us had in childhood, so much the better, but most adults need more specific guidance based on an awareness of the particular problems of producing particular sounds. The drills and explanations are devoted to the specific problems an English speaker with his English habits of pronunciation will have in accurately imitating the sounds and sequences of sounds of Spanish.
It is well to remember that a sizeable investment in pronunciation practice will pay handsome dividends later; correct pronunciation safely relegated to habit leaves one's full attention available for other aspects of learning the language.
Grammar
Learning grammar is not the goal! For most people, the goal is not to become a grammar expert. The goal is to be able to speak Spanish conversationally. Grammar is only one of the means to the end of speaking Spanish. We believe in grammar, and we include it in our method. However, let's be honest. Studying grammar will not make you fluent. To reach a conversational level you need to speak the language and speak it often.
COURSE MANUAL
Here is the manual for the course. As mentioned above, students should either download the manual to their laptop or other appropriate device to use in class, or after downloading the file should print just one Unit at a time, as needed. Unit 31 is the first unit.
| spanish_course_units_31_-_45.pdf |