Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Upon completion of the course students should be able to:

1. Communicate effectively in common interactions orally in predictable settings using expanded vocabulary, the present, imperfective past and future sentences with good accuracy, perfective past tense aspect with limited accuracy and all six grammatical cases with moderate accuracy.
2. Write more complex sentences and personal essays with several paragraphs using expanded vocabulary, the present tense, imperfective past and future tenses with good accuracy, perfective past tense aspect with limited accuracy and all six grammatical cases with moderate accuracy.
3. Identify culturally-grounded assumptions of one’s own culture and apply a basic understanding of Russian culture.
4. Describe and analyze, in general terms, 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. Apply strategies, such as cognates, context, inference, expanded roots and parts of speech, for understanding authentic reading and listening materials in the target language with moderate success.
6. Reflect on personal work or competencies to make connections between Russian language and culture and lived experience.

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, Russian will be used in the classroom at all times. Students should plan to spend about hour in preparation and practice outside of class for each class hour.

1.   Active participation in interactive class activities, including individual, pair or group activities

2.    Frequent contextual written tasks (in or outside of class) to assess reading, writing, cultural and aural competencies

3.    Oral interviews with instructor

4.   In class, interactive student role-plays and other pair activities

5.    Individual and partner presentations

6.    Class discussions to enhance cultural awareness and knowledge

7.   Self-reflection essays

Include all or most of the following:

1. Hobbies and interests-extended activity vocabulary
2. Use of infinitive verbs with хотеть, мочь, уметь
3. Review of present tense formation
4. Review of past tense formation
5. Impersonal expressions with dative case pronouns, singular and plural nouns
6. Instrumental case for singular and plural nouns and adjectives
7. Sports in Soviet realistic art of Aleksandr Deyneka 
8. Russian concept of friendship
9. Popular leisure activities in Russia
10. Environmental problems with littering in Russia
11. Russian verbal aspect infinitive pairs
12. Use of imperfective and perfective verbs in past tense
13. Review of nominative case adjective endings
14. Review of adverb formation and usage-adjectives versus adverbs
15. Review of direct objects in the accusative case for singular nouns and adjectives
16. Extended verbs that require direct objects in accusative case
17. Russian fables by Ivan Krylov
18. Russian children’s literature by Tolstoy, Dragunsky, Chukovsky, and Uspensky
19. Animal vocabulary
20. Describing animals and pets
21. Pets and problems with homeless animals in Russia
22. Animate accusative plural for nouns and adjectives.
23. Indirect objects in the dative case for singular and plural nouns and adjectives
24. Extended verbs that take dative case
25. Furniture and room vocabulary
26. Describing objects in a room using expanded adjectives
27. Review of stating possession and lack of with у меня есть/нет.
28. Genitive singular adjective endings
29. Housing in Russia
30. Urban versus rural living in Russia
31.             Prepositional singular and plural for nouns and adjectives

Competencies and Skills:

1. Manages common interactions and discussions about current and past interests and hobbies, animals and pets, housing
2. Speaks in the present tense with good accuracy
3. Speaks in the past and future tenses with limited accuracy for correct verbal aspect
4. Speaks using the six cases with moderate accuracy

E.    Communicates using significant repetition, rephrasing, and circumlocution

1. Comprehends slower native speech in a highly contextual setting
2. Writes a single paragraph on a variety of topics using present, imperfective past and future tenses with good accuracy, perfective past with limited accuracy and the six cases with moderate accuracy
3. Reads and understand the main ideas and details of limited authentic texts, including Russian fables and children’s literature
4. Uses contextual and linguistic clues to deduce the meaning of new vocabulary with moderate success
5. Recognizes and interprets, in general terms, cultural behaviors and attitudes about hobbies, friendship, nature, littering, pets, housing, and in relation to one’s own cultural perspective.
6. Describes and analyzes, in general terms, Socialist Realistic art by Denyeka and developments in Russian children’s literature

L.    Reflects on own progress and competencies