Welcome to the Department of Modern Languages

The program of language studies at Grove City College has been developed to enhance the communicative, cultural, and vocational benefits of language study. Thus the Department provides courses to increase language proficiency, courses on the literature of great writers, courses dealing with history and civilization, and courses to illustrate the expanding role of language in the social, political, and commercial areas of today’s world.

General Goals

Degree Offerings

Course Evaluation

General Objectives

General Goals:
To accomplish these general goals Departmental majors, minors and concentrations are designed to promote:

the ability to understand lectures and conversation at normal tempo.
the ability to talk at normal speed with reasonably good pronunciation and with a command of vocabulary, syntax and grammar sufficient to express the student’s thoughts in conversation.
the ability to read and analyze prose and verse of average difficulty and mature content.
the ability to write a simple “free composition” such as a letter or message, with clarity and accuracy in vocabulary, idiom and syntax.
an awareness of language as an essential element of culture; an awareness of cross-cultural similarities and differences; a first-hand knowledge of some literary masterpieces; and an acquaintance with the geography, history, art and social customs of the French-speaking peoples/the German-speaking peoples/the Spanish-speaking peoples.
an understanding of the differences between the sound systems, forms and structures of the foreign language and English—and, for the Modern Language/Education Major, the ability to apply this understanding to modern foreign language teaching.
a knowledge of the commercial and translation terms, procedures and usages necessary to the conduct of business in the foreign language. (Especially pertinent for the International Business major.)

Degree Offerings

The degrees and offerings are: B.A. in French and French/Secondary Education; B.A. in Spanish and Spanish/Secondary Education; and minors in Chinese, French, German, or Japanese.

Course Evaluation

Proficiency evaluation takes place in each course through the use of essays, quizzes, oral reports, written examinations, daily observation, term papers, highly individualized oral sessions tailored to the needs of the individual student, etc. The program is arranged so that the courses are sufficiently stringent. The requirements seek to properly address the many facets of language proficiency. Our assessments are proficiency-based and inspired by the Provisional Proficiency Guidelines as drawn up by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) and the Educational Testing Service (ETS). Our tests allow the students’ communicative competence in all four skill areas (plus culture) to be evaluated in a wide variety of situations and modalities.

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General Objectives

The general objectives of the programs in Modern Languages are:

Students who pursue a Modern Language/Secondary Education major will demonstrate successful performance on the Pennsylvania Certification examinations.
Students who wish to pursue graduate school opportunities will be competitive for admissions to such programs and for financial stipends.
Students who supplement or combine their language studies with work from other departments (as in the case of the International Business major) will be well-prepared for careers in the modern global world.