Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Upon successful completion students should be able to:

1. Manage common interactions, in both oral and written forms, in predictable settings using the present tense.
2. Apply circumlocution and inference skills, at a beginning level, when navigating selected real world situations in German.
3. Recognize and identify linguistic and cultural diversity within the German-speaking world and how it differs and/or relates to one’s own culture.
4. Identify selected historical and cultural movements in the target culture through exposure to literature, art, music, film and/or  performing arts in the target language.
5. Acquire and apply strategies for analyzing authentic materials in the target language.

Students are expected to attend all classes, participate actively in classroom activities, and prepare oral and written homework assignments. Students may meet with the teacher in conferences. After the introduction to the course, German will be used in the classroom at all times. Students should plan to spend one or more hours in preparation and practice outside of class for each class hour.

Students will be assessed by any combination of the following:

1. Active participation in class in the target language
2. Short individual presentations
3. Contextual written tasks (in or outside of class) to assess reading, writing, cultural, and aural competencies
4. Oral interviews with partner or instructor
5. In-class, interactive student role-plays

(these concepts are not necessarily presented here in the order presented in class; presentation depends largely on the makeup of the student population in a specific course)
Themes:

1. Greetings, introductions and leave-takings
2. Asking and giving names and personal descriptions, personal data
3. Basic vocabulary including some or all, but not limited to, the following: clothing, colors, numbers, alphabet and spelling, body parts, family, weather and seasons, dates, months, time, food and drink
4. Origin and nationality
5. Hobbies and free time, talents and plans for the future
6. School and university
7. Gifts and doing favors for people
8. Occupations
9. The workplace
10. Location of things using dative prepositions
11. Holidays
12. Famous Germans and their occupations

Concepts and Issues:

1. Possession, giving and receiving gifts, the concept of "möchten" (would like) and "gern" (to like to do something)
2. Responsibilities
3. Birthdays and holidays
4. Daily routines (using to some extent separable verbs)
5. Basic geography of Germany and surrounding countries
6. Celebrating holidays, giving and receiving gifts, doing favors
7. Talking about how the German education system differs from the US
8. Discussing occupations, work, work ethic, vacations in German-speaking countries compared to the US; career plans

Course Content: Competencies and skills
The student will:

1. Manage introductions, leave-taking and exchanges basic personal information in a culturally appropriate manner
2. Describe self and others: personality, physical attributes and emotions, weather and states date, time, year, and season
3. Make statements about daily activities, likes and dislikes
4. Recognize basic cultural and linguistic difference among the three main German -speaking countries of Germany, Austria and Switzerland
5. Formulate simple questions and answers
6. Identify and name people and objects
7. Write lists and short sentences using correct word order
8. Read and understand main ideas in texts using abundant cognates and context
9. Use regular and irregular verbs in the present and present perfect tenses; modal verbs in the present tense
10. Use nominative and accusative cases with pronouns
11. Use possessive adjectives in the nominative and accusative cases
12. Understand the cultural differences of the different "yous" in German
13. Understand and give simple commands