ELEMENTARY FRENCH FREN F101-FE1, FALL 2014 - 5 CREDITS
Instructor: Dr. Yelena Matusevich
Office Hours: M&F 6-7 pm
Office: 609 C Gruening Building
E-mail: ymatusevich@alaska.edu
Phone: 474 5851
Course description and objectives
This course is a first-year college-level French course designed for
students who have never taken French before. French 101 presents an
introduction to the language and culture: development of competence
and performance in the language through understanding, recognition
and use of linguistic structures; increasing emphasis on listening
compre- hension and speaking; basic vocabulary of approximately
1,000 words; exploration of the cultural dimension, implicitly through
language, and explicitly through texts and audiovisual materials.
French 101 covers Chapters 1-7 of the textbook. French 101 combines
lecturing as well as a strong oral participation by the students.
Class procedures and evaluation
• Prerequisites: None, this is a beginner’s class for French. As a matter
of fact, if you already have some substantial knowledge of French, you
need to take French 201 or above. Please, contact the
instructor immediately if you are not a beginner.
B+ 87-89% B 83-86% B- 8082%
C+ 77-79% C 73-76% C- 7072%
A+ 97-100% A 93-96% A- 90-92%
D+ 67-69% D 6362%
F Below 60%
Table 1: Grading policy
• Attendance (10%): Attendance and participation are essential
components of any language acquisition class. Attendance will be taken
very seriously. Only absences due to serious illness, family crisis, or
university-sponsored non-social activities will be excused. Unexcused
absences will be tallied and used to calculate your attendance rate and
your maximum grade in the class in the following way. Your
attendance rate or one notch higher will be the top grade you may earn
in this course. We meet for 56 times over the course of the semester, so
for example, missing 6 times amounts a 89% attendance rate, and your
maximum grade for the class will be B+ or A- if all your other grade
components are A- or above. Another ”example” is that 23 absences or
more is an automatic F for this course.
• Homework (20%): Homework assignments (in the form of written
exercises from the Workbook) are to be turned in the day of the
chapter exam or the day after, including Monday after a weekend.
I will accept one late homework per student with no questions
asked, and no penalty. Each subsequent late homework will carry
a penalty of 5% per day late.
• Quizzes (15%): There will be quizzes. They consist of a short (5-8
min.) written drill at the beginning of class on current vocabulary
and/or grammar point studied. No surprise quizzes.
• Chapter Exams (30%): At the end of Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6,
there will be an exam covering that particular chapter; the date
for each of these is tentative on the schedule, as it will depend on
our progress. If you are absent on the day of the exam, you need
to make arrangements with me for a make-up one within a week
of the actual exam. If extra credit was available on the day of the
exam, it will not be for someone taking it late or early.
Final Exam (25%): A comprehensive, final examination,
covering Chapters 1-7 will be administered on Wednes- day,
December 15th from 5:45-7:45pm in Gruening 310. For those
unable to meet at that time, I will provide one alternate time &
place. You must however have contacted me at least 3 weeks
prior to the end of the semester, and we will schedule it then with
the group concerned.
• Resources: The students will be able to use the services of a free
French tutor at the language lab (Gruening 609) at hours yet to be
determined.
•
Disability Services: The Office of Disability Services implements the
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and insures that UAF
students have equal access to the campus and source materials. I
will work with that office (474-5655) to provide reasonable
accommodation to students with disabilities.