Course Placement

Language and Literature Courses

AALL 121

Guidelines for Self-Placement in Language Courses

ACES

How to Use the Self-Placement Guidelines:

Your self-placement decision is only tentative and will need to be approved by the instructor before the semester begins or on the first day of class. Take both course descriptions and student profiles into account before making a decision. It is recommended that students with prior knowledge of Swahili take a placement interview with the course instructor.

Students who lived in a Swahili-speaking country into the teenage years and received schooling higher than the elementary level in a Swahili-speaking country are considered to be native speakers, and thus are not eligible to take Swahili 001-064 to fulfill language requirements.

The Guidelines:

SWA 001 Elementary Swahili (the first half,offered during Fall semester only)

This course is for students with no or minimal proficiency. The course focuses on:

1. developing oral and aural proficiency for survival communication;
2. fundamental grammar for simple sentence building.

Student profile:

• Students who have never studied Swahili.
• Students who studied Swahili in Elementary School but not in High School.
• Students who lived in a Swahili-speaking country for less than a year.
• Students of South Asian descent who speak a language other than Swahili.
• Students who have studied Swahili in college for less than a semester.
• Students of East African or Central African descent who have never been spoken to in Swahili.
• Students of East African or Central African descent who never speak Swahili

SWA 002 Elementary Swahili (the second half, offered during Spring semester only)

This course is for students who have successfully completed Swahili 001 or students with some prior knowledge of Swahili who can produce simple sentences. The course focuses on:

1. attaining oral and aural proficiency to function in daily communication situations;
2. developing reading and writing skills for functional literacy;
3. learning foundational grammar for complex sentence building.

Student profile:

• Students who have studied Swahili for one semester in college.
• Students of South Asian descent who are frequently spoken to in Swahili by family members but rarely speak Swahili back to them.
• Students who mostly speak English, French or Portuguese and only occasionally speak Swahili to family members and are occasionally spoken to in Swahili by family members.
• Students who have lived in a Swahili-speaking country for a year while conducting academic research and using Swahili as their instrumental language of communication.

SWA 063 Intermediate Swahili (the first half,offered during Fall semester only)

This course is for students who have successfully completed Elementary Swahili (001 and 002) or students who can converse on topics of daily concerns and can read in Swahili. This course focuses on developing and enriching literacy experience in Swahili. The course aims at enhancing skills for:

1. reading narrative and expository texts;
2. writing descriptive texts;
3. conversing appropriately on topics related to different situations;
4. acquiring analytical abilities to understand the structure of the Swahili language.

Student profile:

• Students who have lived in a Swahili-speaking country for two years while conducting academic research and using Swahili as their instrumental language of communication.
• Students who have studied Swahili for three semesters in college . Students of South Asian descent who speak Swahili frequently at home and with other Swahili speakers.
• Students who can comprehend simple texts in Swahili.

SWA 064 Intermediate Swahili ( the second half, offered during Spring semester only)

This course is for students who have successfully completed SWA063 or students who can converse well on a variety of personal topics and have some reading and writing experience in Swahili. This course aims at improving skills for:

1. reading expository texts and extended narratives;
2. writing descriptive informative texts;
3. verbal communication on a variety of topics;
4. expanding analytical abilities to understand the structure of the Swahili language

Student profile:

• Students who have studied Swahili for four semesters in college.
• Students who can read and write short texts in Swahili.
• Students of South Asian descent who speak Swahili on a regular basis at home and to other Swahili - speaking people.
• Students who have lived in a Swahili-speaking country for three years while conducting academic research and using Swahili as their instrumental language of communication