Beginning Spanish

This course, conducted mostly in Spanish, is for students with little or no previous knowledge of Spanish. It provides the linguistic, communicative, and cultural foundations to engage in basic daily life interactions in oral and written Spanish. Students gain an overview of the history of the Spanish language and the different ways it blends European and indigenous cultures in art, music, clothing, and family traditions. Through music, visual arts, videos, and short readings of authentic texts, students gain a new perspective of Spanish-speaking cultures. By the end of the course, students have the linguistic elements to describe and narrate in the present, future, and past tenses, and engage in different types of basic interactions and conversations about everyday topics. They learn strategies to work through texts, unknown vocabulary, and grammar, and are able to identify informal from formal discourse and learn its importance in Spanish-speaking culture. Moreover, given the prominent place of technology in our lives, students also gain vocabulary for technology and learn what happens to English technical words when adopted or borrowed by the Spanish speaking world. Note: this course is the equivalent of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences course Spanish 10.