This study was undertaken to provide recent and comprehensive information on the state of Chinese studies in the United States. An extensive questionnaire was completed by 111 American institutions of higher education offering Chinese instruction. Overall enrollments and enrollment trends are discussed, and the degrees awarded in 1978 are…

A study was undertaken in order to provide current data and comprehensive information about Chinese language instruction in United States higher education. This report is based on the responses to a survey in 1979. In addition to the discussion of the survey responses, an examination of changes that have taken place since a previous report in 1969…

The study was designed to test the effects of a limited amount of sentence-combining practice on the syntactic development and overall writing ability of foreign students. Participants were freshmen studying English as a second language during an eight-week period. Twenty-four students were divided into a control and an experimental group. The…

Discusses the role of qualified native speakers of Spanish beginning work as teaching assistants in the University of Virginia's intermediate Spanish civilization course. The course focuses on Latino culture and civilization and offers American students the chance to interact with a "real" Latin American. (CB)

The "teaching spectacle" approach (where the teacher is the major and only character involved in teaching and learning) often observed in university-level English as a second language classes in Indonesia must be abandoned in favor of a "learning festival" approach, which encourages complete involvement of both teachers and…

The University of Oregon offers summer institutes designed to help secondary school teachers of foreign languages to gain new perspectives on the interdependence of humanistic disciplines and lead to much-needed curriculuar changes in the schools. The summer programs offer interdisciplinary study in foreign languages, literature, and history. (CB)

First-year students of French at the University of Wisconsin at Madison had 50-minute classes five days a week, meeting in large groups with a professor twice a week, and in small groups with teaching assistants three times a week. The team-taught model helped reduce problems experienced in teaching load and class size. (CB)

Describes advantages and disadvantages of computer-assisted foreign language testing, including unique capabilities of the computer, types of tests possible, limitations, problems, and language skill testing. The Spanish Computer Adaptive Placement Examination, developed at Brigham Young University (Utah), is described. (CB)

A midwestern college's foreign language program restructured some of its courses to address students' interests in learning to read a foreign language for graduate school or other purposes. The description of a class in theological German illustrates the varied cultural, professional, and personal reasons students may have for choosing such…

Utah State University changed its "potentially...boring and probably...useless" French civilization course (taught in French and required of majors) to an English-taught course for French majors and majors in business, economics, political science, and prelaw. The new course focuses on stereotypes, cultural differences, and current…

Structures of first-year French courses in Canada are similar except for contact hours. Enrollment is generally increasing, despite staff funding problems. Textbook choices change slowly, and eclectic methodology predominates. Institutional enrollments, trends, class hours, and course types are charted, and a list of textbooks is included. (MSE)

A cooperative program of the economics and foreign languages departments offers three undergraduate majors: an economics B.A., with two foreign languages; a B.A. double major of economics and either French or Spanish, complemented by a second language; and a B.S. in business administration, individually designed, with one modern foreign language.…

A restructured core curriculum at Saint Anselm College includes an interdisciplinary humanities program incorporating a required foreign language sequence. Introductory courses use native speakers in weekly informal conversation sessions to prepare students for a later required culture and civilization course taught in the foreign language. (MSE)

The initial phase of an intensive language proqram relying on emotional involvement and close, interpersonal teacher/student contact is described. For duplication elsewhere, an overview is provided of the curriculum, syllabus, Master/Apprentice teaching team, student input, teacher evaluations, and funding. (PMJ)

Describes a one-semester conversational course taught at Harvard University designed to teach basic oral communication skills in French with the main emphasis on teaching students to pause while speaking. (AM)