Members Present: J. Eglin, S. Gaskill, K. Hill, S. Kalm, T. Manuel K. Shanley, C. Winkler
Members Excused/
Absent: D. Pletscher, G. Smith A. Walker-Andrews, R.Welsh
Ex-Officio Present: L. Carlyon
Guest: Linda Gillison, Chair, Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures
Chair Winkler called the meeting to order at
The minutes from
The committee discussed possible configurations of a foreign language requirement with Linda Gillison, Chair, Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures. One issue related to a foreign language competency is the number of credits. If the goal is to teach students about the language and the culture rather than fluency, a three credit course structure might be sufficient. These courses could use the inductive approach as apposed to the grammatical approach. However, this could be problematic for the students who like the language and want to pursue fluency; they would then be required to take the 5 credit course series. In addition, this structure would not meet the oral component of the national standards. The department has talked about the possibility of two different tracks, but would still require faculty to teach the courses. This would involve lots of lower division teaching, which is not always popular with the faculty. She will have to talk with the MCLL faculty.
The department would need to find out how many students were taking the courses for general education or pursuing language for other purposes. Currently the department could service 660 students if all beginning language courses were full to capacity of 35 students. The Provost suggests that the department will need to be able to handle 1500 in beginning courses to meet a requirement and this would be difficult. Many students might place out of the beginning courses due to high school proficiency as well.
Professor Shanley taught a Culture expressed through Language course that provides an example of the alternate structure. The course focused on the interaction between language and culture. She focused on the core culture context of five native languages, so students could here the differences, then she had the students listen to a joke in Navaho and they had to discern why the joke was not considered funny in English. Her intent was to shape the material so that it wasn’t scary and students would get excited about it, similar to Music Appreciation for Non-majors.
The problem with the general education program is not the
structure but rather the courses.
Ideally courses should include significant learning experiences that
keep the student engaged, involve significant student effort, are foundational,
and explore human dimensions. This model
was the topic of a recent lecture on campus.
This type of creativity, rethinking, and motivation requires
resources. Without which the process is
filled with fear and territoriality.
This is the same place the
The meeting was adjourned.