Experiments with Intensive Language Teaching at the University of Chicago

Abstract

TWO INNOVATIONS have recently characterized the foreign language program at the University of Chicago. The one, prepared by a committtee representing all language groups, is a general course in language. Introduced during the 194445 term, this course has now been made a degree requirement for all college students. Aiming to introduce the student to the problems of language in general, and to show the relation of language study to other fields of knowledge, it harmonizes with the Chicago college plan of emphasizing a well-rounded general education. The new course is in no sense a substitute for regular foreign language study, but is intended to parallel and supplement it. It consists of a series of lecture-discussions, one hour a week for twelve weeks, correlated with a series of readings. The discussions and readings center about the following topics: phonetics; the history of language and language families; grammar and syntax; semantics; problems of translation; the relation of linguistics to other fields of study. The selected readings, representing a wide range of ancient and modern authors, aim to show varied approaches to the study of language, so that the student may be conversant with the problems posed and the attempted solutions. A comprehensive examination at the end of the course tests the student's achievement. The course is still in the experimental stage, and further changes, both in the general plan and in the specific readings, will undoubtedly be made. In 1944-45, the course was offered parallel to the first quarter of foreign language study; later experiments, however, persuaded the committee to arrange the 1945-46 course to begin at the middle of the winter quarter, after a half year's work in the foreign language. This half year's experience should provide the students with a better background for the more general problems in linguistics. The second innovation has been an intensive twelve-week summer course in elementary German, offered for the third consecutive time in 1945; there have been similar courses in French and Spanish. Enrollment in German has consistently been larger than anticipated, and has consistently outnumbered that in the other languages; in