Tailored courses for Historians and Humanists Postgraduate Students

1. Tailored courses for Historians and Humanists Postgraduate Students Ideas of diversified activities according to students' needsStudy of one class, mix of humanists and historians

2. Presentation of the courses at the Language Center • These are department or faculty-funded classes which the Language Centre organises and runs for students of particular disciplines. • Courses typically take place once a week, in two hour sessions, over two or three academic terms. This can be altered to suit the needs of the department. • These courses are not formally assessed, unless requested by the department. • Students do not pay a fee for Tailored courses. Costs of courses are agreed with the department before the course commences.

3. 3 languages offered at 3 different levels • History • French for History Undergraduates (2 stages) • German for History Undergraduates (1 stage) • French for History Postgraduates (3 stages) • German for History Postgraduates (2 stages) • Italian for History Postgraduates Beginners (Stage 1) • Humanities • French for Humanities Postgraduates (2 stages) • German for Humanities Postgraduates (2 stages) • Italian for Humanities Postgraduates Beginners (Stage 1)

4. Guinea pig class: mix of historians and humanists • History of sciences, medicine and techniques • Sanskrit studies • Medieval English History • Medieval English • Philosophy, theology, religion • Chinese studies • Economic History • Modern European History • History of Art • Music • Literature and arts • Egyptian civilization

5. Initial assessment • Before planning whatsoever, it is mandatory to discover the needs of your learners. • It is possible to do an initial assessment aurally in the classroom through discussion, but my advise is to do it formally because you can keep a record that will sustain your reflexion throughout the course • Just design a form where you will ask them the field they are studying and if possible the title of the dissertation/thesis they are writing and their personal objectives/goal on the course • This will allow you to differentiate and make your teaching more relevant

6. Students’objectives • Read some academic texts • Solid understanding of grammar and syntax • Basic proficiency in Speaking • Basic proficiency in writing • Pronunciation • To hold conversations • Vocabulary for their research

7. Students’objectives

8. Reading: the pitfall of translation • Reading is different from Translating, that is a stage above. • But we do not form our learners to be translators, we would like them to be able to get knowledge in their field, through the target language, that what we call “Contend integrated learning”. • Do not fall in the trap where you think reading improves by just reading and conduct a lesson with only translating texts from A to Z

9. Reading for different purposes • Reading for scanning: you scan when you have a question in mind. Practise in scanning help to learn how to skip over unimportant words so that you can read faster • Previewing: to find out what you are going to be reading before you read • Reading for skimming: to get the general sense, not specific details. You do not read the whole text but your eyes should move very quickly

10. Reading strategies and techniques • Teach to students all the strategies they need to know to recognize words • Cognates • List of very true cognates (same spelling same meaning) • and true cognates (almost same spelling, same meaning) • Formation of words, patterns of endings, family of words • Verbs endings

11. Reading activities • There are a lot of activities we can do with a text, that are not just reading it and translating it word by word • Reading and listening • Reading and writing • Reading, listening and writing • Reading and discussing • Reading and filling gaps • Reading and replying to questions in English/French

12. Reading and listening • Reading may be a silent activity, the need to know how pronounce words appears very quickly. • Teaching pronunciation and sounds is important at the start • Try to provide an audio document with the text you provide (you can find novels in audio format, record yourself, write from a video….)

13. Reading and writing • According to research, writing can improve the reading skills. By trying to build sentences in the target language the learner manipulates the language and tape into his/her grammar skills • According to the level (beginners, intermediate, advanced) • Reading and replying to questions in French/English according to the level

14. Reading, Listening and writing • Recognizing words and grammatical patterns is also helpful to develop reading skills: an “old school” short dictation on a topic of interest to the learners can be helpful

15. Reading and discussing • In target language or not, according to the level • Can be about a text but also about an audio document with subtitles

16. Reading and filling gaps • This is where the lessons take a long time to prepare, because you will rarely find in the literature gap-fills matching with the topics that students are interested in • But who knows, exercises books of language methods are sometimes full of surprises

17. Reading and replying to questions • This is something you can find in exercises book of languages methods, some texts are relevant for historians and humanists • But more generally you can write yourself questions of understanding. • According to the level, you can write your questions in • English asking for a French reply, or in • French asking for a French reply, or in • English asking for an English reply

18. Reading and reconstitute the text • It could be at sentence level: reconstitute a full sentence • At a paragraph level: put the sentences in the right order • At a text level: put the paragraphs in the right order

19. Texts and resources • The challenge is to find written resources that are of interest for students in a specific field • History • Humanities (vast)

20. Texts and resources • And much more specific: • History of sciences, medicine and techniques • Oriental Studies: Sanskrit • Medieval English history • Medieval English • Philosophy, theology, religion • Oriental studies : Chinese • Economic History • Modern European History • History of Art

21. Texts and resources • The more you can get resources (texts) from your students, the more you will have chance to exercises them for the right purpose, that is to say, academic reading. When you have this content based teaching this is the ideal situation • That is why the initial assessment process is of a great importance to know more about your students and their specific field of interest • This can be a more challenging work for the undergraduate. Usually Postgraduate bring resources more easily • Each week we study one text suggested by a student

22. Texts and resources • But not all the students suggest texts, and you will have to find material by yourself. • This can be texts, or audio material with transcript or subtitles, but preferably revolving around the specific interests of their field of research

23. Texts and resources • When this is so tailored made, meaning your students brought all texts you can adapt for, teaching your course will not necessarily be replicable • It means each year you will have to recreate some resources for your students, because each group will be different

24. Historical topics • The must is to be able to chose historical topics, non necessarily related to what they studied specifically, but related (or not) to the culture of the language you teach. Think of “topics” instead of “texts”. • For example: the French Revolution, la Commune de Paris, The big plague at the 14th century in Europe, the Impressionist movement, the reign of Louis the 14th, Egyptian antiques, .... • Think of resources to teach History in the target language. There are plenty of resources for French • https://enseigner-lhistoire.zeef.com/fr/crid?ref=crid&share=234f7d47bf09406db93eaa926c1f287a • https://www.lepointdufle.net/penseigner/histoire-fiches-pedagogiques.htm

25. Speaking and communicating • What can be of interest for historians and humanities • First: ask what they want to be able to say • If they do not know there as some topics that you could build on • Enrolling at the library/Borrowing a book in a library • Greeting and Introduction • Talking about your research field (vocab) • Discussing understanding/commenting a written or audio document related to their field (or of interest from a humanist point of view) • Giving opinions • Talking about yourself and your personality...

26. Grammar • Micro-grammar: topic by topic • Macro-grammar: study of the features of sentences (recognition of the verb, the subject, direct object…) • A grammar point at each lesson, with exercises and ideally illustration of the topic through a text

27. Making use of the VLE • Use the flip approach where you pre-teach your students before the session and use the classroom as a space for collaborative activities • List of vocabulary (according to their needs) • Biographies related to author of interests • Enhance the space with visuals linked to the topics, videos in target language and/or English

28. Sources and bibliography • K.C Sandberg and all, 1997, French for Reading, Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey • C. Brickman, 2013, A short course in reading French, Columbia University Press, NY • A. Hemingway, 2012, Better Reading French, Mc Graw Hill, USA