Course Syllabus

CHIN 1020 Elementary Chinese II

Course Description

This course is a continuation of CHIN 1010 and provides additional exposure to the Chinese language and the cultures of Chinese-speaking peoples. It is designed for students who have completed CHIN 1010 with a C- or better, or for students with equivalent experience. During the course, students continue to develop basic oral and listening communication skills by participating in activities that require them to use Chinese in a variety of situations. As a result of developing these skills, they also acquire the ability to read and write Chinese at a basic level. Students learn to communicate about topics that are most familiar to them (e.g., self, family, home, school, daily and recent activities), and they learn to appreciate ways of life different from their own. This course is interactive with a focus on learner participation, basic conversation practice in Chinese, and additional focus on reading and writing. Successful completion of this course fulfills the foreign language requirement for the Associate of Arts degree at Snow College.

Justification

This course satisfies the foreign language requirement for the Associate of Arts degree at Snow College. It is also a prerequisite for intermediate and advanced study of the language. Students are introduced to the language, cultures, and values of Chinese-speaking peoples, one of the largest linguistic groups in the world and a major contributor to Western thought and culture. Learning Chinese, particularly in combination with studies in other fields, such as art, music, philosophy, history, business, medicine, political science, social science, and technology, can provide a valuable and employable life resource.

Student Learning Outcomes

1. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to understand everyday Chinese words and phrases. They will be able to answer questions about themselves, their personal experiences, and their surroundings with greater capacity.
2. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to understand familiar words, phrases, and some more advanced sentences, building upon those reading skills acquired in CHIN 1010.
3. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to interact with each other using words, phrases, and some memorized expressions. They will be able to answer simple questions on familiar topics and form questions to create a more realistic dialogue, while expanding the range of their ability beyond the beginner level. They will be capable of describing events not only in the present, but in the past as well, with the ability to speak with anticipation of future events, as well as conjecture upon things that would happen given a certain set of circumstances.
4. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to provide information about themselves and their immediate surroundings using words, phrases, and some memorized expressions. They will also be able to acquire information from others by forming proper sentences and questions, including topics that address events in the present, past, and future.
5. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to provide some basic information on familiar topics in lists, phrases, and memorized expressions.
6. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to seek opportunities to learn about and experience new cultures outside of class.
7. Upon successful completion of CHIN 1020, students will be able to demonstrate a basic knowledge of cultural traditions, customs, and values in one or more Chinese-speaking countries.

Course Content

Through lecture, one-on-one sessions with the instructor, class discussion, and activities, students will learn and demonstrate: basic interactions like greetings, asking and answering questions, describing people and things, expressing preferences, inviting, accepting, refusing, making purchases, giving directions, requesting information, telling time, and recounting past events; interpretation of basic or simplified texts (e.g., calendars, biographical information, menus, cultural information, poems/songs, maps, advertisements, film reviews, instructions, schedules, websites, surveys); basic expressions and vocabulary (e.g., greetings, school, home, family, possessions, numbers, days, months, public buildings, food, weather, sports); demonstrative adjectives and pronouns, future tense, imperfect tense, passive constructions, present perfect tense, preterit tense of irregular verbs, the subjunctive mood, and the use of prepositions; agreement (e.g., subject-verb, adjective-noun); cultural practices and products of China (e.g., food, music, transportation, film, housing, media); cultural perspectives in China; regional identities; and daily life in China. This content is delivered through interactive lecture, multimedia presentation, partner and group work, and instructor modeling of concepts. This course addresses cultural differences overtly during cultural lessons (see topics above) and indirectly via images presented to the class during everyday lessons that represent Chinese-speaking people from different ethnicities, genders, sexual orientations, abilities, etc.