Green RiverCommunity College Spring 2008 Span 103

Profesora: Marisela Fleites-Lear, PhD.

Office: HS, office 49 Phone: extension 4409 email:

Office hours: M, Tu, Th, Fri., from 11:00 to 11:50am plus appointments.

Website:

Course description:

SPAN 103 (5 credits)

The first year of the beginning Spanish language sequence consists of 101, 102, and 103. SPAN-102 is the second quarter of the sequence. The basic tenants of communications including reading, writing, speaking, and listening are developed in a dynamic second language acquisition environment enhanced by technology. Grammar is used as a communication tool to express meaning as students take part in small group discussions, cultural investigation, and presentation. Authentic materials will be focused on in the class as well as assessment. Students should expect to be immersed in the language. English will be used at a minimum.

Prerequisite (s):Spanish 102 or two years of high school Spanish with a “B” or higher. Satisfies a humanities/fine arts/English requirement for AA degree.

  • Overview:

Welcome! We are about to start a great adventure together: learning another language is one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences we can have, one that will benefit our awareness of others, that will enrich our life and that will provide us with a very useful skill. Since language does not exist in a vacuum, our adventure will lead us into learning not only vocabulary and grammar, but the multiple cultures in which this language vibrates and exists: Language is a set of human tools (sounds, symbols, words, corporal movements) to communicate meanings, and meanings exist in and for specific socio-cultural contexts. That is why the textbook our department has chosen devotes each chapter to a different Hispanic country, providing us with readings, pictures, website links, and maps. These will not only serve us as a guide in this immersion in the Hispanic world, but also will help us understanding the amazing diversity found in these countries and the rich history that leads to that diversity. The textbook and workbook also include a very useful set of CDs in which native speakers allow us to listen and get used to the different accents and idiomatic expressions common in these countries.

In Spanish 103 we will learn how to describe people’s personalities, characteristics, favorite activities and professions. We will learn to talk about the news and read the newspapers, express emotions and accept or refuse a date, talk about food and learn how to order a meal at a restaurant, discuss the weather, talk about your daily routine, ask and give directions, and use several important idiomatic expressions. We will study these subjects while we learn about Guatemala, Colombia, Chile and Latinos in the USA. One essential element of these diverse cultures is their different music styles. Music plays an important role in the Hispanic world and is an important tool of communication and human expression. Hence, each class will start by listening to music from the country we are studying, and talking about their instruments and popular music styles.

When appropriate, we will watch short videos that will provide visual images for our journey through these countries. We will also search the web to read from newspapers of these countries. Our textbook is enhanced with a section called “Viajemos por el ciberespacio a…” (Let’s travel in cyberspace to…) which provides internet sites that have been developed and are maintained in these countries. In the calendar of our course and in our website, I include other links that provide not only grammar and vocabulary exercises, but also cultural information. Finally, I will place on reserve in the library several films for you to watch. You can earn extra-credit by watching these films and writing short paragraphs in Spanish about them.

  • Campus Wide Learning Outcomes:

GRCC has identified four college-wide learning outcomes that form the foundation of our educational emphasis. They are:

1) Written Communication (COM).

2) Critical Thinking (CRT).

3) Responsibility (RSP).

4) Quantitative and symbolic reasoning (QSR)

Our course will address most of these campus wide learning outcomes as specified below in parenthesis in our course learning objectives.

  • Course Learning Objectives:

Spanish 103 is guided by the following learning objectives:

1-Students will examine cultural perspectives and values in ways that reinforce or challenge their own views within a multicultural world. This will be done not only through readings about the different Hispanic countries, customs, social problems, power structures and relations with the US, but also through discussions of films and special topics in class and in conversations hours (CRT)

2-Students will demonstrate a sense of personal responsibility by following the guidelines stated in this syllabus and being held accountable for this (RSP).

3-Student will understand and apply the basic principles and conventions of effective oral and written communication in Spanish according to the requirements of this introductory level. This will be demonstrated through the different written and oral assignments in the quarter. Instructor will explain in class rubrics for good oral and written communications that students should follow in their activities. Please find those rubrics at the end of this syllabus as well as a handout on Spanish sentence structure (COM).

4-Students will enhance their critical thinking abilities by examining the following elements of thought not only in the reading materials but also in the answers provided by other classmates in class conversations and discussions: points of view, purpose, question at issue, implications and consequences, assumptions, concepts, conclusion and solutions. In our class, we will understand critical thinking as a mode of thinking about any subject, content or problem in which the thinker improves the quality of her/his thinking by skillfully taking charge of the structures inherent in thinking and imposing intellectual standards upon them (CRT).

  • Instructional Methods:

In teaching language, a method refers to a systematic set of teaching practices based on a particular theory of language and language learning. We will be using a combination of several methods:

1- The natural approach to language instruction, meaning that the class will be taught all in Spanish and all communication in the classroom (with minor exceptions) will take place in Spanish. This is possible by the use of cognates (words that have the same meaning and sound similar both in English and Spanish) and by your teacher functioning as an actor and using props to convey meaning. Students will find this surprisingly easy, once you get used to it. Students can guess the meanings if they allow themselves to be immersed in the language.

2- The instructor also will use the “Total physical response” method that connects certain physical activities with sentences and expressions. The student needs to be willing to perform certain tasks following commands.

3- The instructor will use also the method of “Teaching proficiency through reading and storytelling”, for which oral and written short stories will be used to enhance students’ comprehension of vocabulary and grammar, using questions to lead students in personalizing the stories.

4- The instructor will use also “Audio-lingualism” by modeling sentences and providing opportunities for practicing patterns.

In summary, the class will not be based on mechanical repetition or drills but on activities to develop communicative proficiency, with special focus on the message contained in sentences and discourse. We will play a lot of games in class such as “charades” (acting out a phrase or words), “Pictionary”, Human Bingo, “Hangman” (los ahorcados), etc. We will create also “real life situations” for which students will produce and act out “skits” to use the vocabulary and the structures learned in class related to the content area studied at the time (you will “go” to the market, to a dorm, to rent a house, to a clothing store, etc.). All of these will require constant interaction among students and with the instructor as well as a thorough preparation for each class.

The success of these methods depends to a great degree on students’ completion of homework, because students are responsible for studying in advance the new grammatical content and vocabulary from the textbook. Class time will be devoted to practicing the material with the methods described above. The instructor will work more as a facilitator to promote students’ participation and interaction. Although Spanish should be used in the classroom, English is permitted before and after class or during office hours, and in class when there is no other way of getting the points across.

  • Textbooks & Supplemental materials:

1) Required books: From the Dímelo Tú series:

1.1- Textbook: Rodríguez, F., Samaniego, F., et al. Dímelo tú. Boston: Thomson

Heinle Corporation, 2006. (5th edition: ISBN: 1-4130-0637-X)

1.2- Workbook: Cuaderno de Actividades y Manual de laboratorio. Boston:

ThomsonHeinle Corporation, 2006. (5th edition: ISBN: 1-4130-1183-7)

1.3- Audio program: Lab Audio CDs (1-4130-1184-5)

1.4- Workbook/Lab Manual Answer Key with Audio Script. Boston:

ThomsonHeinle Corporation, 2006. (5th edition: ISBN: 1-4130-1185-3)

2- Recommended supplementary materials:

2.1- Larousse Pocket Dictionary Spanish-English

2.2- Spinelli, Emily. English Grammar for Students of Spanish. The Olivia and

Hill Press, 1990.

2.3- Atajo 4.0 CD-ROM: Writing Assistant for Spanish (ISBN: 1-4130-0060-6)

  • Technology:

Students will need access to a computer to complete course work. As explained earlier the textbook comes with a series of supplements that require a computer like to use the CD-ROM Atajo as a writing assistant, to access the textbook website for exercises and cultural information, as well as the Spanish department’s website, and the links provided by instructor in the course catalog. All written assignments should be typed using double space as format (so that instructor can write corrections).

  • Assessment:

The instructor will use several assessment tools which will be reflected in the grading policies for the course. Each day in class the instructor will use “embedded assessments”, that is, the instructor will be evaluating each student’s achievement of the course objectives in regular classroom-based activities in which students participate normally. This will allow the instructor to adjust instruction to address in a timely manner any information gaps or communication problems. Other methods include:

1- A comprehensive exam for each chapter: Students must prove they have mastered the vocabulary and grammar included in each chapter. Each exam will include the writing of a small essay using the content studied. It will also include questions related to the information learned about the country studied in the chapter. These exams will be taken in the TestingCenter on the assigned days (see calendar).

2- ¡Escríbelo!: For each chapter, students will complete and turn in the final draft of the writing assignment included in the workbook for each chapter (double spaced and typed). This will help you review the vocabulary and structures learned for each chapter. Since this is worth 30 points, it should be as complete as possible (for example, three sentences are not acceptable!).

3- Completion of group skits (obritas): We will form groups that will work preparing skits with “real life situations” to present to the class. Each group will present once during the quarter. The group will have to meet outside of the classroom to accomplish this task. Each member of the group should contribute as equal partners to the work of the group and should be allocated an equal amount of words and “lines” in the skit production. The instructor will evaluate each member separately, taking into consideration performance and the perceived quality of each member’s contribution to the group.

4- Composición (final essay): The purpose of writing an essay at the end of the quarter is to bring together and apply all the knowledge of Spanish students have acquired in class and to use it to express themselves in Spanish. To make the most of the lessons in the textbook, use only the vocabulary and the grammar learned. For the purpose of maximum practice, if you don't know how to say what you want to say, paraphrase it using the grammatical constructions of the lessons: “If you can't say it in Spanish, don't say it at this time.”

Your knowledge of the structure of English composition will serve you well in your Spanish class. That is, you need to THINK about what you want to say and about how to organize your thoughts logically and clearly. Your composition or essay should include a topic statement, supporting evidence given in logically related sentences with transitions from sentence to sentence, and a closing statement or conclusion (follow the rubric for writing essays included in this syllabus). It should always have a suggestive title (please, be aware that in Spanish the only word that starts with a capital letter in the title is the first word; the rest do not use capital letters). You need to document any sources you use with a “Bibliografía” at the end of your essay. Please, use the MLA format.

The composition should be typed and double-spaced. The letter size to be used is #12 (‘Times New Roman”), normal margins. The length will be a minimum of 30 lines (not sentences, but written full lines, that is, a line with 5 words will not be considered a line). Please, don’t forget to write your name and the time of your class in your essay for proper identification.

Theme: My visit to… You will research a place in a Hispanic country that interests you. You will write an essay as if you had visited this place. You will describe your real or imaginary “experience” there, including information about the history and the culture of this place. At the end it will look like a travel log, that will give the reader meaningful insight into this place.

Try to use as many grammatical structures studied in 101, 102 and 103 as possible. Remember that you can only use the grammatical structures you have learned so far in your Spanish studies. Don’t try to translate your more complex English structures and idiomatic expressions.

5-Final oral presentation: Each student will tell a story to the class using the vocabulary we have learned this quarter. The presentation should take a minimum of 2 minutes. Students can not read the presentation, it is ORAL. Notes in Spanish can not be used either. You will be evaluated on how well you were able to use most of the grammar and the vocabulary taught during this quarter.The presentation will be done for the whole class, so everybody will be present and have to attend (if you miss one day of the oral presentations you will loose 40 points). It is our last exercise together for this quarter.

Your oral and written final presentations should prove proficiency in the grammatical points we will see this quarter, which include:

1-Irregular verbs in the preterite.

2-Adverbs with “mente”.

3-Negative and indefinite expressions.

4-“Hacer” with expressions of time.

5-Imperfect tense.

6-Present perfect.

7-Future tense.

8-Conditional tense.

9-Subjunctive mood.

Grade distribution:

1. Class participation and daily homework ______35%

2. Composición (essay) (1) ______10%

3. Written Tests (5) (Pruebas) ______50%

4- Final oral presentation ______5%

The METHOD I will use to grade will be as follows:

I will give you points for every assignment for a total of 1000 points:

100 pts every test (5) = 500 points

100 pts for composición = 100 points

350 pts for daily class participation and daily homework= 50 points for attendance; 50 points for daily participation in class; 250 points for daily homework (you will loose 10 points each time you don’t have your homework done, 30 points if you don’t turn in the ¡Escríbelo! Section or any other assignment that you have to turn in and 40 points if you don’t participate in your group skit).

50 points for final oral presentation =50 points

At the end of the course, I will convert your final total of 1000 points into the corresponding decimal grading (see list of equivalencies at the end of this syllabus). Please be aware that a passing grade for this class is 2.0 (600 pts). Please notice in our calendar the dates for assignment completion. No late assignments will be accepted and examination dates are final (unless extenuating circumstances occur, for which you need to communicate immediately with the instructor). Students will find their final grade via the Registrar web system.

There will be a series of activities students can do to earn extra credit: watching videos placed on reserve in the library by your instructor and writing about them in Spanish as well as participating in related lectures, seminars or cultural events announced in class. I will post the information for these in our website and I will also announce them in class.

  • ATTENDANCE:

The importance of daily attendance cannot be exaggerated. A major goal of the course is spontaneous, oral communication, which depends on daily exposure to the language and daily practice. Work in class will often go beyond the textbook, so that missing class will mean missing important information that may not be available in your textbook. Since you have all the assignments already in the calendar included in this syllabus, missing class is not a justification for not doing your homework. After 3 justified absences your participation grade will go down accordingly: each absence will be equal to 10 points of your final total. For the sake of the class, I will demand punctuality. Three times tardy will equal one unexcused absence. The policy for withdrawals and incompletes follows the campus established policies for those. In any case, communication with the instructor is vital to plan for any special arrangement to accommodate student’s needs while fulfilling the course’s expectations. Please be aware that email is the preferred method of communication with the instructor.