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German III
  

German III

Recommended Prerequisite:  German I & II
Grades Offered:  9-12
Credit:  1/2 to 1
State Code:  3053
MNPS Course Code: FLA1350


Course Description
The Course continues to expand the student’s control of the language with emphasis on written and oral production of German.  All four skills – reading, writing, listening and speaking will be strengthened. The students will review the grammar from level I and II, and extend their knowledge to most of the major grammatical and structural items in German.  Reading, writing, speaking and listening skills will be enhanced using books, tapes, videos and narratives from authentic sources appropriate to their level. Conversational skills will be strengthened through partner work, extemporaneous speaking, and class discussion on a variety of topics.  Students should be able to write short anecdotes, critiques, three paragraph essays, and letters. Oral production skills could be improved and evaluated using audio-taping of story telling via pictures and group and individual video work.   Culture will be presented in context and will include some exposure to the history and current political realities in both German-speaking countries and within the European community. Students should reach intermediate low to intermediate-mid levels on the ACTFL's scale in all areas.

 

Course of Study

Standard Conventions of German Grammar: Using the German language, the student is able to use, understand and answer…

  • Interrogative questions with the question words: Wer, Wen, Wem, Wessen, Was, Wann, Wie, Wo, Woher, Wohin, Was für, Wie viel, Wie viele, and Warum.
  • Yes/No Questions
  • Present tense use of regular, irregular, and modal verbs
  • Conversational past and narrative past of regular and irregular verbs.
  • Future tense both with werden and with an adverb of time.
  • Subjunctive II tense in expressing unreal, wishful, and polite thinking and speaking.
  • Some basic idiomatic expressions
  • Word order – verb second and last position except after subordinating conjunctions.
  • The five coordinating conjunctions: und, aber, denn, oder, and sondern.
  • Expanded subordinating conjunctions:  besides weil, dass, and question words used as subordinating conjunctions, the difference between als, wenn, and wann.
  • Relative pronouns as subordinating conjunctions in describing a modified noun.
  • All commands: du, ihr, Sie and the inclusive wir.
  • Some differentiation of adverbs and verb prefixes showing location versus motion.
  • Flavoring particles: “denn, doch, mal”
  • Case with declination of articles for nominative, accusative, dative and genitive cases.
  • Use adjective endings that are dependant upon the case, including those preceded by ein words, der words and unpreceeded adjectives.
  • Comparative and superlative of adjectives and adverbs.
  • Pronouns – Personal and reflexive pronouns in nominative, accusative and dative cases.
  • Numbers – cardinal numbers in counting, in amounts, time expressions, and ordinal numbers in dates.
  • Prepositions – recognition of prepositions requiring accusative, dative, and genitive cases and the prepositions that can be either accusative or dative.
  • Verbs that require specific prepositions – many idiomatic.
  • Plurals – recognition and use of the various formations of plural nouns.

 

Standard German III functions: Using the German language, the student is capable of functioning successfully in…

  • Doing everything from level I and II and.
  • Introducing not only self, but also others and can give more details to include adjectives and adverbs about present and past activities for two to three minutes.
  • Giving detailed information about a variety of topics including: vacation, interests, their home, city, and state, movies, music, health, future plans and goals, and careers.
  • Expressing likes, dislikes and favorites and why they feel the way they do.
  • Answering and asking others questions about most topics in present and past.
  • Describing a series of pictures orally and written to tell a story.
  • Following instructions and commands in the classroom.
  • Taking notes on what the teacher and others students present in German in order to answer questions later or write a summary.

 

Is capable of performing the following tasks:

  • Listen and take notes to longer recorded or video passages.
  • Summarize both orally and written what was read, recorded or on video.
  • Listen to a passage and answer more complex written questions and pick out important information.
  • Correctly read aloud with accurate pronunciation.
  • Analyze a reading passage and give the major points of the article even if some vocabulary is unknown.
  • Correctly answer a series of questions and elaborate on the answers they give.
  • Read short stories, newspaper articles, anecdotes, and fairy-tales and condense and rewrite in their own words.
  • Read a basic novel written for their level. 

 

Thematic Vocabulary

  • Can recognize, use, and elaborate on basic vocabulary associated with daily functions of life in situations such as health, relationships, school, sports, hobbies, and eating giving detail with adjectives, adverbs and prepositional phrases.
  • Can recognize and use vocabulary for most situations to include: city, clothing, entertainment, weather, shopping, health, house, vacation, and professions.
  • Can recognize and use some idioms, slang, and colloquial expressions.
  • Recognize German word building strategies including: compounds, prefixes and suffixes used to form nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.
  • Recognize that there are many synonyms and expressions for expressing the same or a similar meaning and be able to give a similar word for the same idea for many of the basic verbs and adjectives.

 

Standards

Standards are based on the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG) and American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language (ACTFL) standards.

AATG: http://www.aatg.org/

ACTFL: http://www.sil.org/lingualinks/LANGUAGELEARNING/OtherResources/ACTFLProficiencyGuidelines/TheACTFLGuidelines.htm

Tennessee: http://www.state.tn.us/education/ci/ciforeignlang/ciflmodern1.htm

 

Textbook

Wolfgang Kraft.  Deutsch Aktuell 3 St. Paul, Minnesota: EMC Publishing, 2004.