--- Forwarded Message from "Mary Morrisard-Larkin" <[log in to unmask]> ---
>Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2003 16:01:15 -0500
>From: "Mary Morrisard-Larkin" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: #7044 First Year Self-Instructional Courses
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Read - We just heard about a new 1st year program from Prentice-Hall called Gente. One of the ancillaries is a grammar review Cd-ROM that includes video of a teacher explaining grammar rules, etc. Mary M-L
>>> [log in to unmask] 02/18/03 04:54PM >>>
--- Forwarded Message from "Read Gilgen" <[log in to unmask]> ---
>Date: Tue, 18 Feb 2003 08:40:34 -0600
>From: "Read Gilgen" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: First Year Self-Instructional Courses
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WANTED: Quality, first year self-instructional materials for French, German, Spanish.
At Wisconsin, like at many other places, we're faced with the prospect of some very difficult budget cuts. Everything's on the table as far as how to deal with these cuts. Some ideas work well from a budget point of view, but not from a curricular point of view. The opposite can also be true.
One of the ideas being floated is to stop teaching courses that make up for lack of proficiency of incoming freshmen. Right now we require a certain proficiency to pass the language requirement, which often means a student with four years of high school Spanish, French, or German might have to take a course or two here to reach desired proficiency.
Three ways to compensate for not teaching "remedial" beginning languages would be: (1) simply give credit for high school seat time, (2) require them to start another language, or (3) take self-instruction courses until they're proficient in the language they started in high school.
All of this is a long background to the question:
What do you folks know of out there that are good first year self-instructional courses in Spanish, French, or German? If you can send me off-line some leads, I'll follow up. ([log in to unmask])
I know how tough it is to do self-instructional language, both from an instructional and learning point of view. But I've written my own first year self-instructional text (Spanish, many years ago, but out of print), so I know it can be done. Any leads will be gratefully appreciated.
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