French makes the grade for students this summer |
Melissa Underwood |
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French students will have a chance to experience the culture of France firsthand during a summer course. The foreign language 491 class will meet only once on campus for an informational meeting. The second class meeting will be on the May 5 flight to Paris. Over two weeks, students will earn three credit hours by studying in both a structured class format and through diverse activities in a strictly French-speaking environ-ment. From the moment the students meet, the class will be conducted entirely in French. According to the syllabus, the course is an "immersion language and culture course in which students will develop individual fluency in French while learning about contemporary France and French culture." The Ecole Superieure des Sciences Commerciales d'Angers will provide the traditional classroom in which students will study from two required texts and practice conversation skills. ESSCA in Angers, France, is a French exchange school with SIUE. The students will spend a couple of hours on each of five mornings at ESSCA. The remainder of the time will be spent visiting the main tourist areas in Paris, Angers and the Loire Valley. The students will deal with practical situations in French and experience French culture up close. Frederic Leveziel, a foreign languages and literature instructor, will serve as a tour guide at all times to avoid English-speaking guides. "I have already done research on all of the places we're going to visit," Leveziel said. In addition to visiting famous castles, the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre, students will be able to practice their language skills in restaurants, hotels, a movie theater, the subway, a hypermarket, an outdoor market and a department store. The trip will be taken in conjunction with a School of Business trip with more than 20 graduate business students. Leveziel said the English-speaking graduate students will meet the French class occasionally during the trip, but they will not be traveling together or staying in the same hotels. The price of the trip is more than $2,000 per person. The College of Arts and Sciences is assisting students with $600 each through the CAS travel fund. The class is closed for this summer, but Leveziel said he intends to offer the trip again next summer for interested students. The prerequisite for the class is French 202, the fourth semester in a series of beginning and intermediate classes. For more information, contact Leveziel at 650-2313 or via e-mail at flevezi@siue.edu. | |