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OVER the last several years, demands for an internationalized and more culturally diverse curriculum have been raised (Johnston and Edelstein), and the desire to incorporate more “content” into the language curriculum has become strong (see Musumeci; Swaffar). Recent research by specialists in content- and discipline-based instruction (e.g., Brinton, Snow, and Wesche; Kramsch and McConnell-Ginet; Mohan; Swaffar, Arens, and Byrnes) has focused on the value of learning from an active mode with attention paid to “language as meaning” rather than solely to “language as form” (Krueger and Ryan). The interest in linking languages to other disciplines at Agnes Scott College (ASC) is, in part, a response to these challenges.
New programs at Earlham College; Saint Olaf College; the University of Minnesota; the State University of New York, Binghamton; and other institutions have started to build bridges between foreign languages and other disciplines and have taken foreign language teaching and learning outside the foreign language department. Building on the experiences of these programs, ASC has been able to develop a program that is appropriate for a small liberal arts college.
Agnes Scott College, founded in 1889 as a liberal arts college for women, has an enrollment of around six hundred and sixty-six full-time faculty members and is nationally recognized for its academic rigor. The humanities are central to our academic program. The continued commitment to a strong liberal arts program and the goal of internationalizing the campus were reiterated in a 1991 strategic planning document.
Three factors were crucial in the development of a languages-across-the-curriculum (LAC) program at Agnes Scott: participation in the Spreading the Word foreign language instruction project, the establishment of a pilot program, and the receipt of an NEH grant to develop LAC courses at Agnes Scott College.
In spring 1992, ASC participated in Spreading the Word, a national initiative to improve foreign language instruction in colleges and universities, funded by the American Council on Education through a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. In that project, a team of two foreign language faculty members and one administrator was invited to participate in a working conference focusing on content-based language instruction, preparation of teachers for secondary and elementary schools, and instruction in less commonly taught languages. Our institution chose to focus on content-based language instruction. As part of this project, ASC was paired with Saint Olaf College, a nationally known leader in the languages-across-the-curriculum movement; we benefited from their experiences, and they helped us develop our ideas for modifying our foreign language programs and provided planning guidance.
One of the strong points of the conference was that the campus team gained firsthand insight and information together. This cooperative effort was valuable in the college's decision to go ahead with a pilot project. A pilot LAC course in German and history, Europe 1914–45, funded by the dean's discretionary fund, was developed in summer 1992 and was taught during fall 1992 with eight students enrolled. Feedback on this pilot project from both faculty members and students was enthusiastic, and the college decided to apply for an NEH grant to develop language component courses throughout the curriculum.
At ASC, the main emphasis from the start was on enriching the discipline, not on adding courses in foreign language departments. Having looked at various other programs, we decided on a format in which we add an optional hour each week to a regular course in a humanities discipline for reading and discussing related materials in the foreign language. A discipline faculty member and a language faculty member team-teach this hour and select and develop the course materials together. The language faculty member receives a one-time course release to sit in and observe the discipline course, and participating students receive one additional credit and a notation on their transcripts.
The pilot project and preparation for it showed that ASC students and faculty members were very receptive to the language component idea, that ASC had several discipline faculty members with foreign language backgrounds, and that the faculty members found the cooperation between languages and other humanities disciplines stimulating and rewarding.
In fall 1993, Agnes Scott received an NEH grant to develop and link eight courses in the humanities with language components in a three-year initiative focusing on faculty development, course modification, student recruitment, library acquisition, and program evaluation. With this financial support the college was able to spread the combination of discipline courses with language components further across the curriculum.
One we decided to establish a language program across the disciplines, we had to look at several factors and needs: the involvement of students, the development of course materials and teaching approaches, the development of language ability of discipline faculty members, library resources, and resources for faculty compensation. The development of the foreign language component raised a number of specific issues.
Which students can participate in LAC? We opened our foreign language component courses to all students who have completed four semesters of a foreign language, that is, our language requirement. The language requirement was usually seen by our students as an obstacle to get out of the way. Language component courses now provide an attractive option for students who have completed their language requirements but do not want to pursue a language major or minor, as well as for students returning from a study-abroad experience. These students now can apply their language skills in their disciplines of interest, such as history, political science, and music.
Are students with four semesters of language study ready to read authentic materials? Our pilot program, as well as the five courses we have offered so far, has demonstrated that students will be able to read, analyze, interpret, and discuss authentic texts if those texts have been carefully selected and approached with the help of a study guide and if students have received proficiency-oriented instruction in reading, listening, speaking, and writing.
Proficiency-oriented teaching in the receptive and productive skills, therefore, became essential to our LAC component courses; to promote it, the college offered workshops on proficiency taught by Chantal Thompson. In addition, through the NEH grant, ASC offered an orientation workshop to all current and potential participating faculty members. It was taught by Wendy Allen, from our mentor institution, Saint Olaf, and all participants highly appreciated it. With the help of our study guides, through prereading activities, skimming, scanning, vocabulary exercises, questions, and glossaries, the students are introduced to the authentic text, are made to understand its most important ideas, and are prepared to discuss it with the discipline teacher and foreign language teacher in the foreign language component class. Moreover, in-house workshops in which the faculty pairs have an opportunity to assess student outcomes, to make revisions, and to share their experience continue faculty development.
Discipline faculty members often feel hesitant and insecure about their language skills if they have had little opportunity to practice them. The faculty development component within the NEH grant helps us alleviate these problems in different ways. Interested discipline faculty members can brush up on their foreign language skills in summer language programs such as the one at Middlebury College. Three of our colleagues have attended programs at Middlebury. One colleague in music attended a four-week intensive program at the Goethe Institut Atlanta in 1994 and an eight-week intensive session at the Goethe Institut Berlin in the summer of 1995. One colleague in art will enroll in a special course in Paris during the summer of 1996.
By spring 1995 we had developed the following courses: Native Peoples of the Americas, an anthropology course with a Spanish component, spring 1994; Medieval Art, an art history course with a French component, spring 1994; Women in Latin America, a political science course with a Spanish component, fall 1994; History of Art II, an art history course with a French component, spring 1995; and Europe since 1945, a history course with a German component, spring 1995. The following courses are planned for 1995–96: Women in Music, a music course with a German component; The African Diaspora, a history course with a Spanish component; and The Church in Latin America, a political science course with a Spanish component. What effects have language component courses had on discipline faculty members, on language faculty members, on the students? To what extent have they reinvigorated and revitalized humanities instruction at Agnes Scott?
Feedback from students in LAC component courses has been positive. For some students, the strongest asset of the component course was its enrichment of the discipline class. One student commented, “I could apply [the readings] to the anthropology part of the class; they were also fun and interesting.” Students found using a foreign language in a discipline context challenging, “like playing tennis where you must continuously stretch.” Yet another student experienced her participation in a LAC component course as “a double benefit of coming to grips with new material and learning to express myself in another language.” Some students believed the course affected them more deeply. One student felt that the course helped her “to make comparisons with translated work and see how choice of words changes meaning,” while another student stated that “it made me look beyond my limited beliefs.”
The evaluation of two courses by a small number of students is certainly no conclusive, but I hope it is indicative of what we have achieved: of twenty-three students in the discipline classes, twelve had participated in a language component course, six wished they had, and five remained not interested.
A summary of the student assessment tests indicated that of the twelve students who participated, six were seniors, two were juniors, and four were sophomores. Their majors included French, Spanish, art, history, Latin American studies, sociology and anthropology, psychology, English, international relations, and others. Eleven improved their understanding of concepts in length, linear reading, and vocabulary. All believed the LAC component course enriched the discipline course. All were intrigued by the idea of applying their foreign language proficiency outside the foreign language department. They all agreed that two hours of reading a week for the LAC component course was what they had expected.
The discipline and language faculty members offering the LAC component courses reported that the benefits of these courses extend to the students who did not take the component courses. Students in the language component classes volunteered information and asked questions more often in the discipline classes. The discipline faculty member in the art department remarked, “The student reports were wonderful and other students seemed envious as a result of this participation.… There was a special bond with the French students; they seemed more engaged in the course than the regular student.” The LAC students shared original materials with the rest of the class, enriching the class as a whole. The entire class developed a deeper understanding of the course content and realized an increased regard for the importance of the accuracy of text. The anthropology faculty member noted, “Spanish seeped over into the English course.… The discussions in the LAC and the material and ideas the LAC students brought to the discipline class were excellent. One of my best classes.”
All faculty members involved in LAC testified to the excellent interaction among colleagues and welcomed the opportunity to work with colleagues from other disciplines and to foster new linkages among disciplines on our campus. The discipline faculty members saw this program as an opportunity to enhance one of their courses, and they appreciated the opportunity to improve their foreign language proficiency. The language faculty members benefited from the opportunity to work with students in an applied foreign language setting.
The connection of languages to other disciplines has sparked a new interest in approaches to teaching on campus. Faculty members now frequently discuss possible LAC components, new materials for LAC component courses, even additions that would make courses more compatible with LAC components, as well as general questions of pedagogy. This dialogue has increased collegiality and given us the opportunity to observe one another's teaching methods and approaches. It has enriched our teaching; we have learned from one another and have together achieved a new vitality.
No program is perfect, and some questions remain open.
We have looked at the effect an LAC program might have on the language departments and are carefully noting developments. Our majors are delighted with the LAC courses and see them as additional opportunities to use their language skills. The courses are not substitutes for regular departmental literature courses or replacements for the literature courses required for majors. We especially want to engage those students who otherwise would not continue language study and language use; it would be exciting if these students enjoyed component courses so much that they chose to take more language and literature courses. We have no data about LAC's influence on enrollment as yet, but we keep hoping.
Agnes Scott is committed to making LAC courses a permanent part of its curriculum. Faculty motivation and compensation are important to the LAC program's future. These issues were addressed at the beginning of the LAC project, especially since Agnes Scott does not alloy stipends during the academic year.
Two factors should help maintain the faculty's motivation to support the ongoing program of nine LAC courses after the three-year grant runs out: (1) participation in the LAC program is recognized and can count strongly, both as service to the college and as evidence of teaching effectiveness, in all midterm reviews, tenure reviews, and promotion reviews; and (2) within a department, course loads can be adjusted to compensate faculty members for involvement in LAC courses. The department of political science, anthropology, and sociology has already made such adjustments in its departmental review. In addition, faculty members can be offered institutional development grants during the summer to develop additional courses or to revise courses after the grant period and to brush up on language skills. The dean can grant course releases for language faculty members to observe discipline courses.
The concept of combining language components with discipline course has also been embraced by our classics department. Their courses in English are now accompanied by one-hour component classes in Latin or Greek for students with the necessary language qualifications. The same faculty member teaches both the discipline course and the component course. Similarly, the German department will offer two courses in English to reach a wider audience, and both courses will be accompanied by an optional additional hour for reading and discussion of materials in German.
By linking languages to other disciplines at Agnes Scott College, we are demonstrating to students that the achievement of foreign language competence is an integral part of liberal arts education that will deepen their understanding of the humanities as their mastery of the language increases. The use of primary texts in their original language and increased skill in research using foreign languages will benefit faculty members and enrich the courses they teach and will have far-ranging effects on the curriculum as a whole. We see our LAC program not as a means to language acquisition but as a means of inspiring students and faculty members to continue their language study, to increase their mastery of a foreign language, and to become involved in international and cultural studies.
Our institution is at present engaged in an academic review, and we are charged to refocus and to cut departments, majors, and courses. It speaks to the importance the whole faculty attributes to the LAC program that not one suggestion has been made to cut or discontinue LAC courses.
The author is Professor and Chair in the Department of German at Agnes Scott College. This article is based on her presentation at the 1994 MLA convention in San Diego.
Brinton, Donna M., Marguerite Ann Snow, and Marjorie Bingham Wesche. Content-Based Second Language Instruction. New York: Newbury, 1989.
Johnston, Joseph S., Jr., and Richard J. Edelstein. Beyond Borders: Profiles in International Education. Washington: Assn. of Amer. Colls. and Amer. Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business, 1993.
Kramsch, C., and S. McConnell-Ginet, eds. Text and Context: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives on Language Study. Lexington: Heath, 1992.
Krueger, Merle, and Frank Ryan, eds. Language and Content: Discipline- and Content-Based Approaches to Language Study. Lexington: Heath, 1993.
Mohan, B.A. Language and Content. Reading: Addison, 1986.
Musumeci, Diane. “Second Language Reading and Content Area Instruction: The Role of Second Language Reading in the Development of Communicative and Subject Matter Competence.” Krueger and Ryan 169–79.
Swaffar, Janet. “Constructing Tasks for Content Classes: The Case for Generative Iteration.” Krueger and Ryan 181–200.
Swaffar, Janet, Katherine Arens, and Heidi Byrnes. Reading for Meaning: An Integrated Approach to Language Learning. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1991.
© 1995 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
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