Italian 112

Required Texts: (available in the textbook section of the Penn Bookstore, 36th & Walnut)

Gruppo META, Uno, libro dello studente
Gruppo Meta, Uno, libro degli esercizi
An Italian Dictionary

Recommended text:

Proudfoot & Cardo, Modern Italian Grammar

Course description:
Italian 112 is an intensive elementary language course for students who have never studied Italian before but who have demonstrated a certain facility for learning languages and who have already fulfilled the language requirement. This course may not be taken to fulfill the language requirement or by students with previous knowledge of Italian. The course is designed to help students to develop functional ability in the four skills and gain familiarity with Italian culture. The primary emphasis of the course is on the development of the oral-aural skills, speaking and listening. Readings from authentic material on topics in Italian culture as well as frequent writing practice are also included. Like other Italian courses, the class will be conducted entirely in Italian. Your listening skills will be well developed for you will be exposed daily to authentic language spoken at normal speed by native Italians. Among these are conversations, both brief and lengthy, songs, letters and poems. You will be guided through a variety of communicative activities in class which lead you from structured practice to free expression. You will be given frequent opportunity to practice your newly acquired vocabulary and grammatical structures in small group and pair work which simulate real-life situations. Your class work will be supplemented with homework using a cassette with a workbook, to further enhance your listening skills. You will also be exposed to authentic Italian texts so that your reading skills will be developed. These texts include articles from newspapers and magazines as well as literary pieces. They will become more complex as you acquire the vocabulary necessary to read at a higher level. You will also be challenged to work on your writing skills, for you will be given ample opportunity to write about diverse topics.

Goals:
By the end of this course you can expect to be able to handle with confidence the functions covered in the four skills: you should be fairly fluent in describing people and things in your immediate environment, talking about your family and home, your daily routine, your likes and dislikes, not only in the present time sequence but also in the past. You will also be able to talk about your plans for the future. You will be exposed to a lot of vocabulary and so will be able to give quite detailed descriptions and function quite ably and with assurance in day to day circumstances: meeting friends, shopping, planning events, eating out, etc. You will also start to deal with the use of language in hypothetical situations, stating suppositions, agreeing and disagreeing with opinions, explaining your point of view, expressing doubts, making comparisons. With the aid of a dictionary, you will be able to read articles from the Italian press about familiar topics and excerpts from literary texts. You will also develop reading strategies to enable you to infer meaning from context and to feel confident reading texts written for native speakers. By studying cultural phenomena of Italy, you will gain insights into your own culture. You will also show an increased ability to write in different time frames and some progress towards the use of complex sentences and paragraph expression.

Required Work:
Attendance: Regular attendance in class is required. Roll will be taken on a daily basis. You are allowed a maximum of FIVE absences during the semester Your instructor will talk to you after four absences and send a note of warning to your school office after five absences. After six absences your grade will be lowered. If you are absent it is your responsibility to find out the assignment for that day and be prepared for the next class. Students are expected to come to class on time. Repeated tardiness will be counted towards an absence.
Class Preparation: Daily preparation of assigned work using the Libro degli esercizi and the exercise cassette is essential. Because of the heavy emphasis on the development of oral and listening comprehension skills in this course, it will not be sufficient to study the assignments silently from the book at home. Cassette work can be done either in the Multi-Media Center or you can make a copy of the exercise cassette to work with at home. The cassette is also accessible on line, at the Romance Language home page. You can expect to do up to 1 - 2 hours homework for every hour in class.
Written homework: All written homework (exercises and compositions) must be handed in on time. They will be accepted late only if you are ill.
Video Day: After a few weeks, on video day you will be working with the film Stanno tutti bene. Your performance on exercises related to the film will be graded.

Unità tests: At the end of every four units you will have a written test.
Oral tests: You will have a midterm and a final oral test which will be individually scheduled with your instructor.
Informal quizzes: You will also have short in-class quizzes which may or may not be announced in advance.
Final: a Reading comprehension, Composition and Cloze exam.
Note: There will be no make-up tests. If you miss one you will receive a 0. The lowest of your lesson tests will be dropped in averaging your final grade.

Final Grade:
Written homework, mini-quizzes - 25%
Class participation - 20%
Unità Tests - 30%
Oral Tests - 10%
Final Exam - 15%

Grading Scale:  

MMETS (Multimedia Center):
MMETS is located in the basement of David Rittenhouse Lab (33rd and Walnut). Teachers may assign listening or recording work in the MMETS center. As a Penn student you also have access to a variety of Italian instructional videos, movies and cassettes for additional listening comprehension practice. A large collection of Italian movies is also in the Van Pelt Library.

The Department Home Page:
Consult the Romance Languages Department Home Page for information on additional resources, such as local radio and TV programming in Italian and sites where you can practice your Italian, pick up an Italian newspaper or magazine or get an Italian cappuccino! The page also has links to selected WWW sites which can enrich your study of the language. The cassette which accompanies Uno, Libro degli esercizi is also on line, for use at home on your computer, or in one of Penn’s computer labs. Each Italian 112 section will have a class session scheduled into a computer lab at MMETS at the beginning of the semester where you will be introduced to these resources.

La Casa Italiana:
La Casa Italiana, part of the Modern Languages Residential Program of Gregory House, is located in the Class of 1925 building, 3940 Locust Walk. It sponsors a program of Italian films as well as a weekly coffee hour in Italian which are open to the whole campus. It is also possible to join the residents for dinner. For further details on their activities visit their home page.

Tutoring Support:
Students who wish to have additional help with their language studies should contact the Penn Tutoring and Learning Resource Center at 3820 Locust Walk.
The Center organizes regular sessions for walk-in help in a number of residences in addition to providing one-on-one tutoring.

Language Direct:
This is a new effort of the Wheel Project sponsored by the Modern Languages Program which will provide on-line tutorial help. Students can seek help on their study of Italian by e-mail at any time of day or night and receive a response within 24 hours. Language Direct will also organize on-site tutorials in the Modern Languages House, particularly keyed to major exams such as midterms and finals.

Study Abroad:
The University of Pennsylvania strongly encourages study abroad opportunities for its students. A variety of summer, semester and year-long programs in Italy are sponsored by Penn-Summer-Abroad (3440 Market St., Suite 100, Tel: 8-7028) and the Office of International Programs (133 Bennett Hall, Tel: 8-4661). The Penn-Bryn Mawr summer program in Florence offers Language, Literature and Art History courses. Among the Language courses is an intensive intermediate course (Italian 134) which affords students who have completed Italian 112 an attractive option for attaining proficiency in Italian in a six-week summer course in Italy.

Italian Language Program Director:

Italian 112 Coordinator:

Dr. Helen McFie Simone
Williams 446
898-8449