126-036 German as a Foreign Language

Credit Points

HECS Band

Coordinator

Prerequisites

37.5 points of second/third year subjects. European studies students wishing to enrol in this subject would normally have completed 37.5 points of European studies at second/third year, see Prerequisites.

Semester

Contact

Subject Description

In contemporary Australia, German plays a minor part as a community language, whereas it is traditionally one of the major foreign languages other than English taught from primary through to tertiary levels. The course will deal with the most important results of research and practice of German as a foreign language, which has been an academic discipline in its own right in German-speaking countries for the last quarter of a century. After completing the subject, students will have gained an insight in the fundamental features of and differences between first and second language acquisition and foreign language learning, as well as in the didactics and methodology of German as a foreign language, particularly in the different teaching approaches which can be roughly grouped under the headings of 'communicative' respectively 'cognitive' approach. Also, students will be able to critically appraise recently developed teaching resources as well as secondary literature on the subject.

Assessment

A 1000 word class paper and an essay of 3000 words for third year, 4000 words for fourth year.

Prescribed Texts

Materials supplied by the department.

• Introductory reading: H L Kretzenbacher, For the LOTE was an EBGerP, you see: A critical appraisal of the curricular framework for teaching and learning German in schools in Victoria, Australia. Zeitschrift für Interkulturellen Fremdsprechenunterricht 3.2, 1998 http://www.ualberta.ca/˜german/ejournal/kretzen4.htm.