NCSSM COURSE CAtAlOG - North Carolina School of Science and ...

CN305a/CN305b/CN305c Introductory Chinese
One year
Credit: Three units core World Language credit.
Meeting pattern: Four periods per week.
Introductory Chinese is designed to provide students with the fundamentals for
learning to understand, speak, and begin to read and write Mandarin Chinese.
The course focuses on developing accurate pronunciation and tones, learning
to understand the spoken language in context, and developing a foundation of
basic sentence patterns, questions, and everyday vocabulary. The writing
system (radicals and stroke order) is introduced and computers are used to help
students develop their character recognition skills. The course is proficiencybased
and focus is on the development of aural and oral skills. By the third
trimester, class is conducted entirely in Chinese.
CN307a/CN307b/CN307c Intermediate Chinese
One year
Credit: Three units core World Language credit.
Prerequisite: CN305 Introductory Chinese or equivalent, or permission of the
Dean of Humanities.
Meeting pattern: Four periods per week.
Intermediate Chinese is designed for students who are able to carry out simple
conversations about everyday topics in Mandarin. Students are expected to
have mastery of pinyin, knowledge of stroke order, and recognition of
approximately 45 radicals and 200 characters. The focus continues to be on the
development of aural and oral skills, with the specific goals of expanding
vocabulary, strengthening listening and comprehension, and exposing students
to more complex sentence patterns. There is an additional focus on
word/character analysis and reading strategies. The course is proficiencybased
and class is conducted entirely in Chinese. This course is generally not
suitable for Chinese heritage speakers, those who grew up speaking or hearing
Mandarin, who attended weekend Chinese school, or who are able to
converse comfortably in Mandarin for ten minutes. Such students should select
to study a different language at NCSSM or, if they wish, apply for exemption
from the NCSSM World Language graduation requirement.
FR305a/FR305b/FR305c Introductory French
One year
Credit: Three units core World Language credit.
Meeting pattern: Four periods per week.
Emphasis in this first-year course is placed on the acquisition of basic language
skills: speaking, listening, comprehension, reading, and writing. Students acquire
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