Spanish Conversation

Curriculum Guideline

Effective Date:
Course
Discontinued
No
Course Code
MODL 2250
Descriptive
Spanish Conversation
Department
Modern Languages
Faculty
Language, Literature & Performing Arts
Credits
3.00
Start Date
End Term
Not Specified
PLAR
No
Semester Length
15 Weeks
Max Class Size
22
Course Designation
Certificate in Global Competency
Contact Hours
  • Seminar: 4hrs/week
Method(s) Of Instruction
Seminar
Learning Activities

Class activities may include: conversational activities, discussions of readings and audio-visual materials, oral and aural comprehension and pronunciation exercises, interactive oral presentations, review of syntactic and lexical structures, vocabulary building activities, and one-on-one exchanges with native Spanish speakers.

Course Description
This course is designed to enhance oral communication skills in Spanish. It is aimed at developing speaking fluency and enhancing vocabulary learning by means of conversations, discussions, interactive presentations, readings, audio-visual materials and vocabulary building activities, among others.
This course is also intended to increase students’ community engagement and knowledge of the Hispanic culture and may include an experiential learning component.
Only Spanish is spoken in class.
Course Content

1 Participation in communicative activities in class: conversations, dialogues, group discussions, interviews and interactive presentations. 

2 Analysis of audiovisual materials (e.g. films, short documentaries, videos showing authentic language interactions) by completing comprehension and communication activities relevant to their content. 

3 Completion of oral tasks such as describing events, experiences and wishes, and expressing opinions and doubt, as well as agreement and disagreement. 

4  Study of the vocabulary in context, as well as idiomatic and colloquial expressions.

5  Brief review of grammatical structures as introduced by the materials presented in class.

6 Increase of cultural awareness through the materials analyzed in class and/or participation in a community-engaged learning experience.

 

 

 

 

Learning Outcomes

By successfully completing this course, students will:

1  Improve their oral communication skills, i.e., intonation, pronunciation and conversation patterns in Spanish and gain confidence when interacting in the target language.

2  Gain fluency in Spanish to describe experiences, events, wishes and to express opinions and doubt, agreement and disagreement.

3 Expand their vocabulary and knowledge of idiomatic grammatical structures in Spanish in order to apply them to a variety of conversational settings. 

4 Become familiar with different Spanish accents, social registers and regional uses and able to use intonation and pronunciation patterns appropriately. 

5  Expand their cultural knowledge of the Hispanic community and the cultures of the Hispanic world.

Upon successful completion, students are expected to demonstrate oral and aural skills and abilities as independent users of the language.

Means of Assessment

Evaluation will be based on learning outcomes and course content. Evaluation may include, but need not be limited to, the following tasks:

Class attendance and participation; individual or group oral presentations in class on an assigned topic; community engaged (experiential learning) hours and short reflections on the experience; vocabulary diaries and quizzes, and oral exams. 

Sample grade breakdown for this course:

Participation, attendance and preparation: 20%

Oral presentations: 20%

Experiential learning participation and reflections: 20%

Diary of Expressions/Vocabulary: 10%

Mid-term oral exam: 15%

Final oral exam: 15%

Total: 100% 

No single evaluation will be worth more than 20%.

 

Textbook Materials

The instructor may choose either an intermediate level conversation textbook such as:

Sandstedt, L and Kite, R. (2013). Conversación y repaso: Intermediate Spanish (Eleventh edition). Boston: Cengage Learning.

or compile his/her own materials.

Prerequisites

Minimum Grade of C in either Grade 12 Spanish or MODL 1152 (or Assessment).