This level is designed for students who have had no previous experience with German. By the end of the summer, students will be able to employ all four modalities to communicate in German about simple topics, such as information about one’s self and others, activities and events, occupations and pastimes, and the world around us. They will learn to interact in routine and familiar situations of everyday life and narrate events in present and past tenses. During the summer, students will learn to recognize and correctly employ the foundational structures of German grammar and will establish a basic vocabulary relating to the aforementioned topics. Special emphasis will also be placed upon developing students’ reading comprehension skills through exposure to a wide variety of textual genres from different disciplines. Finally, by making comparisons to current contemporary life and society of the German-speaking world, they will begin to develop intercultural literacy and an enhanced global awareness. One hour each day will focus on German for reading knowledge to develop successful strategies for reading German texts for academic and study purposes. Emphasis will be placed on recognition and interpretation of grammatical structures, vocabulary expansion, and analytical discussion. Students will be exposed to texts from a variety of genres and disciplines in order to advance their reading comprehension skills. Due to the Language Pledge, this course will not include applied translation. Upon completion, students can generally expect to achieve a solid A2 or ‘threshold’ B1 level.

Note: All students who have prior knowledge of German and want to be placed beyond the Elementary German level (101-102-103) are required to take an analytical placement examination involving all four skills. On the basis of the test results, students will be advised concerning their course selections.