Lassiter High School

Reaching Excellence and Climbing Higher

Department of Foreign Languages

2016-17

Honors Spanish 4 Accelerated

Michael Raburn

Helpful links:

blog – http://lhsblogs.typepad.com/raburn/

www.conjuguemos.com

www.wordreference.com

Course Overview

Honors Accelerated Spanish 4 at Lassiter High School emphasizes the use of the Spanish language for active communication in all its forms. This course, the equivalent of a 2nd year university course, is taught almost exclusively in Spanish and the expectation is that the students participate enthusiastically in the target language in all classroom discussions and activities.

This course seeks to develop language skills (reading, writing, listening and speaking) that can be used in various activities and disciplines rather than to cover any specific body of subject matter. More specific course goals include 1) build and expand communicative activities; 2) emphasize oral proficiency; 2) expand options in a situation and handle unexpected events and difficulties; 4) deepen understanding of the target language and culture through interdisciplinary connections; 5) expand each student’s ability to participate in communities in the U.S. and abroad through the use of the target language; 6) listen to and demonstrate comprehension of a variety of spoken texts; 7) read and demonstrate comprehension of a variety of texts; 8) develop skills for placement and proficiency testing in target language; 9) maintain existing strengths of previous skills developed in the target language while expanding an in depth knowledge and use of vocabulary and advanced grammatical structures. The integration of these four skills is one of the major focuses of the course.

Students are encouraged to think independently, to learn to find information and to react and respond to others. Many activities emphasize the analysis, synthesis and evaluation levels of Bloom’s taxonomy. The activities lead the students to product flexible and original ideas. Students work independently, in pairs, in small group and in large groups. They are encouraged to evaluate their own work and the work of others.

There is openness, acceptance and flexibility in the classroom. Students are encouraged to appreciate new ideas, diversity, risk taking and complexity. The teaching schedule will be modified to meet the needs and interests of the students.

Textbooks

Imagina, español sin barreras

Selections from texts such as Encuentros maravillosos, Gramática a través de la literatura,

Album, and from many others

***As well as additional resources such as newspapers, magazines, radio and television, web sites.


GRADING POLICY: A cumulative point system:

All graded work 85%

(Including class participation and language use)

Final exam 15%

MATERIALS NEEDED:

WRITING UTENSILS!!! ***All essays will be either typed or in blue or black ink depending on whether an at-home essay or in-class.

Three ring binder/paper ***Or some method that works for you to organize yourself

***Additional materials may be necessary as the course progresses.

I always appreciate tissues and baby wipes for the language lab, etc.

ATTENDANCE AND MAKE-UP POLICY:

See student handbook

CLASS PARTICIPATION: Participation is essential and mandatory! This is a college-level course and students are responsible for their own participation and work.

LATE WORK POLICY:

See student handbook

TARDY POLICY:

See student handbook

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY:

Cheating is considered a serious matter. The parents of a student who has been involved in cheating will be notified and the student will receive a grade of zero for the test or evaluation period, and a grade of U in conduct. . Please be aware the Honor Society memberships will be affected as well as a loss of honor cards.

For this course, cheating is defined as, but is not limited to, the following acts:

§  Copying anyone’s answers to questions, exercises, study guides, class work or homework assignments

§  Taking any information verbatim from any source, including the Internet, without giving proper credit to the author, or rearranging the order of words and/or changing some words as written by the author and claiming the work as his or her own, i.e., plagiarism.

§  Looking onto another student’s paper during a test or quiz.

§  Having available any study notes or other test aids during a test or quiz without the teacher's permission.

§  Collaborating on assignments when independent work is expected.

§  The use of on-line translators to translate more than one word.