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THE “bridge” is an anomalous concept in Russian language teaching. Those of us in the less commonly taught languages (LCTLs) rarely talk about bridges; or, more accurate, when we do, we refer to something much more general than the organizers of the 1995 ADFL seminars had in mind. 1 We just do not have a counterpart to the Heinle and Heinle textbook series, although we certainly grapple constantly with problems of transitions, whether from elementary to intermediate, intermediate to advanced, or advanced study to life after graduation. 2
Presumably bridge courses are what we move to after having covered the basics in the three to four semesters. They serve as more specialized introductions to areas of serious learning and more intensive skill development, which are the principal concerns of typical, or perhaps ideal, majors. 3 In talking about what we move to (along the bridge), we should not lose sight of what we move from—the first two years of study—for in some sense elementary courses also serve as bridge work: most are designed not only to provide students with the fundamentals but also to prepare them for what will come.
Taking my cue and basic definition from the more commonly taught languages (MCTLs) I address here the issue of how the bridge might apply to our field, and along the way I say something about transitions that I hope will be useful to teachers of MCTLs and LCTLs alike. I recommended that we step back from the bridge for a moment and consider some broader curricular issues of technology, innovation, and outside pressures on language teaching in higher education. Finally, I suggest some priorities and indicate why the metaphor of the bridge may not be that useful, certainly in Russian and possibly in any context.
Generalization are hard to come by in Russian language teaching, where extreme variation in methodology is, for better or worse, characteristic. The methodological and textual diversity is even more pronounced after the second year. We have a few advanced texts, several readers, and several conversation texts, but nothing that comes close to serving as a nationwide standard text or curriculum for Russian teachers. Even at the beginning level, where some generalizations about textbook favorites can be made, methodology differs greatly. 4
If bridge courses are transitions, then they are courses designed to link required or basic language instruction with elective or major requirements. But the term bridge carries other associations as well. A bridge reaches over a divide separating the less from the more serious students (where serious is defined, really, by how these students feel about studying our language). These serious students are often (but not always) majors. Students cross the bridge toward the end of the second or the beginning of the third year—indeed, they do so almost by definition in most colleges and universities in the country, where, typically, two years serve to meet the language requirement. One could also say they begin crossing whenever they enter that vague area we call review, or reinforcement of fundamentals, after they have mastered the foundations and have become familiar with basic grammar and vocabulary (whatever that means).
Students in LCTLs like Russian confront at this stage a new terrain for which we hope they have the proper training and ability. And here the situation varies radically with the resources of the institution or department. Continuing with the terrestrial metaphor, this terrain has several characteristics.
I could mention another option that is useful at this stage: study abroad. But this choice is not usually well integrated in the curriculum—foreign study is perceived as a valuable enhancement that may garner some transfer credits, but not too many. 5
Some conceptual problems with the bridge emerge here. If the bridge is understood as the first serious course for majors, one step beyond intermediate study, then rarely will a single course serve as an all-purpose bridge. We in Russian programs usually have specialized courses on different tracks, all building on fundamentals mastered in the first three or four courses. The bridge, thus understood, could refer to the complex of third-year courses in many (larger) programs. But one could also accomplish bridgelike results in second-year classes that move into review and outward to increasingly authentic materials.
Program courses always overlap earlier study somewhat in this age of proficiency and functionality, and all instructors try to introduce real materials, real dialogue, and real language use in real settings. Indeed, in this sense bridging represents our necessarily limited attempts at authenticity, whether in reading or speaking at all levels.
Ignoring the conceptual vagueness for the time being, several qualifications can be made about the bridge characteristics listed above. Small programs cannot offer a great variety of courses, and small programs are the norm in LCTLs—indeed, some programs combine third-and fourth-year courses in the same classroom. Bridging in these programs is a matter of teacher strategy and pragmatism. Generally speaking, there is no single standard text used in third-year Russian that serves, or even could serve, as an effective bridge to advanced study: students simply move from the second to the third year. The only constant is the need for acquisition of massive amounts of vocabulary—a requirement for real progress in a language like Russian (but not, apparently, so important in MCTL bridges; see Hammadou et al.). The coherence of the curriculum design and the interests of the instructor alone provide the bridge. And teachers and catalog pronouncements are left to communicate that coherence.
The language courses in the Russian program at the University of Arizona, for example, are (1) advanced grammar and composition, (2) conversation, (3) reading, and (4) literature; moreover, within each category one can find cultural nonfictional materials. Like many other schools with full-scale Russian language and literature departments, Arizona has a survey of Russian literature in Russian (as well as variety of literature courses in English translation); other courses use more diverse material, from the social sciences, from the newspaper, and from the business world. Teachers determine student interests, clarify options, and recommended approaches to distinct areas of advanced study. Larger programs can offer separate courses in these areas; smaller ones rely on independent study. Our reading course emphasizes morphology and vocabulary building; along the way it introduces students to linguistics and literary study. In the typical Russian advanced program, reading is the most diverse area of course offerings, with readers of all sorts and approaches to match. Unfortunately, some of the best readers have suffered premature setback: the sudden collapse of the Soviet Union has made them dated (e.g., Thompson and Urevich). Some schools leave advanced content to teachers' discretion: materials and syllabi are matters of professional choice and can vary from term to term. Others try to establish a structure and a pattern and to enlist the support of the instructor. Wether we need or would use a standard bridge textbook is questionable.
Conversation courses at the advanced level become more sophisticated and rely more heavily on authentic materials from television, magazines, and the movies. Different institutions will have different emphases, and depending on their resources and personnel, they may have more or less to offer. As enrollments in Russian continue to decline (they have increased and decreased in cycles since the 1980s), resources will be stretched, and specialization at the curricular level is bound to suffer. 6
In advancing our curriculum and moving our students up the proficiency ladder we in LCTLs like our colleagues in the MCTLs, try to use the latest pedagogical discoveries (about communicative competence and about reading, speaking, comprehension, and grammar). And, of course, we follow the ACTFL proficiency guidelines, which are important to any curriculum today that has to provide outcome indicators and demonstrate that it yields quality products.
We in Russian and other Slavic languages establish priorities and strategies, and we use all the latest knowledge from the relevant disciplines. We try to incorporate discoveries in the neurosciences (about the differences between L1 and L2, about critical stage theory, about the skills adults find easiest to learn, and about memory and vocabulary acquisition). But these fields are not without controversy, as the leading applied linguistics and language pedagogy journals reflect. 7 There are disagreements, for example, over culture and literature in the curriculum, content across the curriculum, literature versus language in the degree program, and the relative importance of phonology, syntax, and vocabulary acquisition. We try to provide a solid theoretical framework—with goals, guidelines, outcomes, and rationale—for each of the skills we teach. Here the National Council of Organizations of Less Commonly Taught Languages language learning frameworks provide an opportunity for national discussion on key factors in language learning, with input from members of professional associations (the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages and the American Council of Teachers of Russian). Although the framework in Russian encompasses only the first few years, if we reach consensus on the foundation, opportunities and benefits will accrue for the whole curriculum. 8
We try to incorporate the most technologically sophisticated aids into our instruction, including satellite broadcasts and interactive CD-ROM—the big innovation in pedagogy. Such technology unites video, audio, graphics, and text in interesting and challenging ways, elicits responses, encourages learners, helps them set their own pace, and shows them how to learn on their own. Computers have been with us for more than a decade, and the hyperbolic promises made for technology have often proved untrustworthy. Nonetheless there has been progress, and there is empirical evidence that computers can help (Austin; Shute and Gawlick-Grendell). 9
The new developments in instructional technology can have a strong effect on the curriculum. I do not dispute their potential for beginning and intermediate study, but I believe they can be even more valuable in advanced study. Computers, for example, are ideally suited for the modular approach to advanced study suggested by Richard Brecht, in which serious, computer-literate students who have a clear idea of what they can individualize their instruction. Modules can be designed with any content and with a variety of presentation and interaction modes. They are especially well suited for programs that have limited staff or time for specialized study. There are of course many instructional technologies—for example, the video-disc, satellite transmission, and multifunctional overhead projectors. But the multimedia computer, with its Internet link, its presentation software, and its interactivity, is the most important and promising among them.
Multimedia modules provide one way to teach the more specialized advanced topics when there are too few students to constitute a class. In our department several of us have been working since the beginning of 1995 to create multimedia modules on various aspects of advanced language and culture study. Our target audience is not the beginning or intermediate student but the student who has moved beyond the fundamentals: the “bridge” student, familiar with basic grammar and vocabulary, who is ready to specialize.
We have developed a number of modules, but I mention only two here. One relates to literary study and the other to intonation, a topic that is often presented in simple terms in early years of language instruction and then treated in more detail, if at all, in third or fourth year. Each module makes a wealth of information easily accessible on a single compact disc, combining sound, text, graphics, and video in a format that allows interactive audio playback, delivery pace, and hypertext reading.
Here are some advantages of the modules:
The multimedia computer has an enormous potential for postelementary study. But how we use this potential depends on how we perceive the role of the computer in language learning and how willing we are to innovate with our curriculum. Peter Patrikis identified some trends in computer-aided learning and suggested we watch them as they begin to have an effect on what we do. Much of what he observed is still true: language labs are reorienting themselves as instructional technology centers and resource centers; computer resources continue to show the variety and flexibility necessary to engage a variety of learning styles. He urged then the need for cooperation and collaboration with other units because of the complexity and expense of the technology. Recent developments, however, may pave the way for the return of the individual instructor-developer, not nearly so dependent on specialists. Equipment prices are falling, and authoring programs (such as Asymetrix Multimedia ToolBook for Windows ) are radically cutting development time and the need for outside resources and programmers. And authoring programs are not locked into older drill-based technologies that, though they are valuable for what they do (usually drills of varying degrees of sophistication; e.g., Dasher for the Macintosh ), are limited in scope and portability. Although the role of the teacher may indeed change—from director to designer, with students managing their own learning—the shift need not be dramatic; students, after all, may resist taking responsibility and may need more direction than anticipated.
Patrikis mentioned how technological advances could liberate foreign language teachers from ineffective methodologies: “multiple resources allow multiple approaches and disengagement from methodological dogma and dogmatic methodology” (38). Without disputing this ideal, I would add that learning theory is reflected in whatever the designer does. And learning theory is bound to be reflected in strategies aimed at overcoming the greatest obstacle to success, no matter what the medium: boredom. The novelty and inherent interest of these computer modules may postpone or delay the inevitable, but twenty minutes of full attention may be all we can expect of any effective learning situation. 11
Technological advances make clear the need for aligning foreign language study with language-learning theory. One cannot emphasize enough the importance of research in second-language learning, especially in times of financial stress (like the present), when foreign language study may not always be a priority with university administrations, no matter how much lip service is given to multiculturalism and internationalizing the curriculum.
Consider, for example, some of the views of Alan Guskin, the president of Antioch College, who frequently speaks on the higher education lecture circuit. Guskin, whom I intend to portray not as a“bad guy” but merely as a representative of some disturbing trends, published several articles in Change last year and has been giving the same message in speeches all over the country—not to our AATs but to our institutions' president, provosts, and deans. His views are received very positively, so we need to be aware of and ready to respond to them.
The cost problems facing higher education are truly daunting: resources are shrinking and expectations growing. Most of the so-called solutions (e.g., increased teaching loads for faculty members, more temporary instructors) will reduce expenses only modestly. Guskin advocate alternative educational delivery. His program is more complicated than I present it here, but one of its radical components is enhancing student learning through technology and peer interaction. Under this program students would spend more time learning by themselves and with their peers and much more time engaged with powerful, interactive technologies; they would spend less time—but more creative, intensive, and focused time—with faculty members. Faculty members, in turn, would work with greater numbers of students but “teach” much less (in the traditional sense). The not-so-hidden message is that the program would mean cutting and combining faculty positions—that is how it would achieve significant cost reductions. Downsizing and restructuring are the game plan now, and we should be prepared for it and the rationales that support it.
Guskin's recommendation for language teaching is to use the Peace Corps as a model: to have relatively inexperienced native speakers and upper-division students supposedly fluent in the language coach foreign language classes and provide continuous feedback, encouragement, and demonstration. Why should we put highly paid faculty members in these classes? That would be less effective and more costly than a “skill-oriented, spoken language program” on the Peace Corps model. “The key to the program's success [at Antioch College] is its conception of language learning: the focus is on students' ability to use the language, and native speakers' following a well-thought-out linguistic method that emphasizes communication” (“Restructuring” 21). Simply stated, peer coaching, with a communicative emphasis, is cheaper, and evidence presumably shows that it is better. 12
I do not dispute the specifics of Guskin's model here, other than to indicate that it is simplistic and flawed. To say that the model has problems is not to deny the efficacy of peer coaching and alternative technologies as learning enhancements; what is problematic is putting them at the center of our methodology. What should be obvious is that we need to be concerned about models and methodology, that we need to know and be able to articulate what second language learning is and what it requires, and that we need to do all this in a language that nonspecialists can understand. We need to counter gross fallacies about language learning and to show how oversimplified theories just do not work. We need to defend our profession as never before from those under the spell of “efficient” but flawed models. And thus we need to innovate judiciously, utilizing technology appropriately to ensure that our students get the best possible instruction.
I could add that in advocating technology as a way to lessen the need for faculty members, Guskin shows little awareness that technology cannot work by itself (without expert design and outcome measurement), that at best, so far, it is a supplement or enhancement to class instruction. His views set an important task for all of us: we need to get the message out to our students, colleagues in other departments, administrators, boards, and legislators. We must make clear that we have a methodology (or methodologies) and that what we do works. The best model for foreign language instruction is not one built on a bunch of advanced students and natives rapping together but professionally designed curricula well grounded in research from a variety of disciplines. To support our arguments we can call on the intellectual rigor and seriousness of our research in the area of foreign language learning, the successes and personal testimony of our alumni, the high quality of our students' portfolios, and our students' proficiency in a variety of skills as measured by standardized evaluation procedures.
The challenge presented by Guskin and others is to innovate effectively and efficiently. The main practical problem with maintaining and developing advanced curricula—which seem ideal on the surface (technologically sophisticated, career oriented, grounded in authentic materials, progressive, and proficiency oriented)—is that this activity depends on people: a faculty that is up-to-date, sensitive to student needs and goals, and familiar with the latest developments in pedagogy. Most important, this faculty must agree on what constitutes the best curriculum and must be committed to teaching it. Often faculty members have difficulty reaching such consensus, because of their long history of academic freedom, individualism, and a confidence grounded in tradition. At worst, a faculty may have already made up its mind about what language teaching is and ought to be , may resist change, and may have little regard for broader issues—current student issues as well as issues confronting higher education in America. If there is a common theme among ADFL Bulletin articles, it is theme of faculty resistant to change.
Design implementation depends on personnel buying into their role and responsibilities (taking ownership of them in Total Quality Management-speak, the language of administration on most campuses today). But teaching in higher education has always been like the Wild West: our faculty members—except for the powerless and tenureless—have independent minds, are always in quest of the truth, and have a strong sense of what is pedagogically best.
Of course many of us can on occasion be resistant to change and cantankerous. The only consolation is that even the most resistant faculty members share a sincerity and a commitment to foreign language education that surely benefit our students and help to overcome the obstacles our biases present. But we can take steps to increase curricular coherence and agree on program goals. Sometimes, help can come from the forces above us in the institutional hierarchy.
Most institutions in recent years, in their pursuit of Total Quality Management, have asked for mission statements and strategic plans that relate to these statements. And curriculum—the determination of what is to be taught and how to organize and teach it—needs to be part of the plan (Lange). The imputes and pressure from above enhances development of and commitment to curriculum. But there are other ways, direct and indirect, of uniting a philosophically diverse faculty behind a curriculum—the what and the how.
One can do it directly, by talking about curriculum constantly and making it permanent agenda item for department meetings. Or one can work indirectly, by making offprints of relevant articles a available or distributing them to everyone. Our professional organizations help by giving prominence to pedagogical innovations. Inviting faculty members to workshops on instructional technology also effectively brings attention to curricula matters. A new office computer along with instruction (with appropriate attention to pedagogical applications) could serve as a strong incentive. And it helps to present oneself as an example. Computer expertise can be a positive force. (I have a huge monitor in my office on which I show everyone who comes in the latest development in a computer project I am working on.)
Introducing new technology and curricula change to meet the pressures from above and without, we have much to be concerned with. What does the bridge have to do with all this? Obviously guiding our students with a minimum of frustration toward higher and higher skill levels can be enhanced by good transitions and a coherent, focused curriculum. The first reason I am uncomfortable with the bridge metaphor is that I think it oversimplifies the language-learning experience: one road in (from the beginning and intermediate levels) and one road out (to the advanced level, whatever that means). The situation for more advanced learners is not one road out but many choices: various skills and various contents. The second reason is that the focus on where the bridge leads tends to diminish the importance of the early years—the ones that count so much in public relations. We have all heard aphorisms that explain negative attitudes of administrators by referring to their unhappy undergraduate experiences with foreign languages.
Let us not let the bridge metaphor take our attention away from the required courses. The most urgent task now for some of us in the LCTLs is survival. But even those languages attracting enormous numbers now need to stay alert to public relations and the new priorities of higher education. We need to make a significant learning experience of those two to four semesters. We need to tell our students that, although there is much they cannot do after two years, they can do some things well, and they know a lot about learning languages and about what they will have to do to learn one really well, either on their own or with the help of formal instruction. We need to encourage them: all they need is more time, more vocabulary, a firm commitment, and perhaps a trip.
The model of the bridge does not capture what we do or need to do. Of course we need to instill in our students a desire to master the language, or at least to value the experience of becoming familiar with it. A bridge implies obstacles, gullies and ravines, or rivers to cross. But if the road to mastery is a continuum and is not broken in places, then there is no need for a bridge and no need for the metaphor. 13
The option we present our students is not to cross a bridge to mastery, but to achieve mastery along any number or all of the roads leading from the center that transverse numerous wonders—the many purposes that knowledge of a second language will help us accomplish. So let us not forget about our student-customers. No matter how far they choose to go along the road, they will talk about us later. And this is the final message of the bridge metaphor: it may be fine for Robert and Francesca, but it doesn't do anything for us. We should be valuing the road to and the roads from.
Chairs have two responsibilities: (1) remaining alert to oversimplified and flawed conceptions of foreign language learning advocated by often well-meaning but desperate deans, provosts, and presidents facing truly staggering economic challenges and (2) publicizing—with our faculty members and students—the latest and most effective techniques and rationales for language instruction. United by a sound curriculum and commitment to teaching, we can confidently answer our deans and provosts and use the best that technology can provide to empower our new learner-managers.
The author is Head of the Department of Russian and Slavic Languages at the University of Arizona. This article is based on his presentation at ADFL Seminar East, 15–17 June 1995, in Charleston, South Carolina.
1 The sense of the term bridge we are more accustomed to hearing is that found, for example, in Schulz, where the word simply refers to transition, not to that intermediate-to-major transition in particular.
2 The transitions between years of study is frequently a topic of formal and informal discussion at our national professional meetings. Questions such as “What do you do in the second (or third or fourth) year?” are common, and the answer do not easily fit into patterns, although they often relate to textbook choices (or lack of choices) for the preceding years. Recently Russian has witnessed an explosion of new textbooks at all levels, paradoxically occurring at a time of national decline in enrollments. One of the goals of the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages—American Council of Teachers of Russian database project, funded by the National Council of Organizations for Less Commonly Taught Languages, to serve as an easily accessible source of information on enrollments, textbooks, and staffing in Russian in the United States.
3 The actual definition or content of the bridge, as described in the Heinle and Heinle texts, is somewhat problematic, which perhaps reflects the different interests of the many authors involved. Hammadou et al., for example, privilege certain kinds of theoretical orientations (self-expression and personalization of meaning yet also, paradoxically, common purposes, sharing with peers, and cooperative activities). Kulick's position is much more starkly presented: skill courses are taught the first year or two, content courses are taught later, and the bridge eases the transition from the one to the other. The bridge's role in facilitating this transition is unclear.
4 Russian-Language pedagogy includes two notable collections: Lubensky and Jarvis and a survey article (with bibliography) by Chvany and Perkins. See also the special issues of the Slavic and East European Journal and Phillips.
5 As an example, the Arizona Russian Institute offers students a variety of study-abroad experiences that it integrates into the BA and MA. The benefits of study abroad are discussed in Brecht, Davidson, and Ginsberg. See especially the sections discussing the evidence of the link between study of the fundamentals (not only functional competency and proficiency but also grammar) and successful study abroad.
6 Declines in Russian tend to be cyclical; such declines, coupled with minimum-enrollment policies, ultimately mean that students who want to do specialized work must instead do independent study; they also may lead to advanced classes with, for example, third- and fourth-year students in the same classroom. Enrollments in LCTLs are much more fragile and more susceptible to social and political changes than those in MCTLs. We language teachers may all be colleagues, but those of us in LCTLs are much more concerned with survival, and our fundamental attitudes about students, language requirements, and grading may differ considerably from other academics'. For a recent discussion of the state of Russian language teaching in the United States, see Brecht, Caemmerer, and Walton.
7 The principle United States professional journals and newsletters are the AATSEEL Newsletter , and the ACTR Letter , the Slavic and East European Journal , and the Russian Language Journal. Russianists also publish in the general pedagogical and theoretical periodicals (e.g., Modern Language Journal and Applied Language Learning ).
8 Work on LCTL learning frameworks is supported by the National Council of Organizations for Less Commonly Taught Languages (Lekic and Merrill). Also in progress is a framework for Polish, directed by Leonard Polakiewicz, at the University of Minnesota.
9 For an example of the use of CD-ROM technology in MCTL textbooks, see the Heinle and Heinle French texts with a CD, developed by Robert Ariew, that has just become available (Bragger and Rice). British studies, particularly those appearing more recently in Computers and Education, provide much of the solid, experimentally based support for the use of computers.
10 In our projects we assume that most students will not need a laboratory or learning center but will have their own computers with CD-ROM drives and sound cards. Some earlier multimedia materials, such as A la recontre de Philippe , which still have enormous value, rely on laser disc and interconnected computers. Other projects produced at the Laboratory for Advanced Technology in the Humanities are Dans le quartier St. Gervais, No recuerdo, Berliner sehen, Tanabata: The Star Festival (in Japanese), and the electronic archive and classroom presentation system Shakespeare Interactive Archive. Those seeking information on these projects can contact the director, Janet Murray (jhmurray@athena.mit.edu).
11 The challenge of sustaining interest remains with us; many teachers, acknowledging the tedium potential, limit student computer activities to fifteen minutes. The creators of modules face a wide array of other fascinating issues, including questions of gender and learning style, which also relate closely to attention span. That some students can use a computer program for hours at a time gives an indication of the range of attention; but the issues of quality and of active versus passive learning are surely relevant as well. Undoubtedly judicious mixes of passive- and active-learning material will be required. Our department projects emphasize interactivity and integration of sound, text, and video (videos show faculty members and native speakers). The intonation module (designed by Del Phillips and Phil Hammonds), for example, demonstrates the different intonation contours of Russian, with explanations and numerous examples students can easily replay, record, and compare. The literature module (designed by Hammonds and me) presents a native speaker reading a Pushkin text; students can follow the text, listen to and watch the reader, read the text themselves, research the text, examine the academy edition, read about Pushkin and his works, and consider study questions.
12 Guskin gives no hint as to where that evidence lies. He displays no awareness of what recent studies of cooperative education with foreign languages have shown—that the approach is limited and that it tends to result in fossilized errors. And he gives no hint that there might be curriculum issues at the advanced levels that the peer-native collaborative effort cannot address.
13 If one must have a metaphor, I would suggest a web (even at the risk of disturbing arachnophobes), for webs are marvelously suggestive of the sometimes varied levels of skill we reach in a foreign language. Moreover, webs are designed for a purpose and are useful and adaptable. Nonetheless, we should be careful with our metaphors (Danahy).
Austin, Mary. “A Comparison of Three Interactive Media Formats in an RTV/DVI Computer-Mediated Lesson.” Computers and Education 22.4 (1994): 319–33.
Bragger, Jeannette, and Donald Rice. J'veux bien! Boston: Heinle, 1995.
Brecht, Richard D. “The Inevitable New Shape of Language Learning in Higher Education: Lessons from the Future of the LCTLs.” ADFL Summer Seminar East. Charleston. 15 June 1995.
Brecht, Richard D., John Caemmerer, and Ronald Walton. Russian Language in the United States: National Capacity and Changing Needs. Washington: Natl. Foreign Lang. Center, 1995.
Brecht, Richard D., Dan Davidson, and Ralph Ginsberg. Predictors of Foreign Language Gain during Study Abroad. Washington: Natl. Foreign Lang. Center, 1993.
Chvany Catherine, and Ann Weiler Perkins. “Language Pedagogy: The Teaching of Russian.” Slavic and East European Journal 31 (1987): 196–225.
Danahy, Michael. “On the Metaphorical Language of L2 Research.” Modern Language Journal 70 (1986): 228–34.
Guskin, Alan. “Reducing Student Costs and Enhancing Student Learning.” Change 26.4 (1994): 23–29.
———. “Restructuring the Role of the Faculty.” Change 26.5 (1994): 16–25.
Hammadou, Joann, et al. Bridging the Gap: A New Curriculum for Post-intermediate to Advanced Level Courses in French/German/Spanish. Sample. Boston: Heinle, 1994.
Kulick, Katherine. “Introduction to the Bridging the Gap Series.” Hammadou et al. 79–80.
Lange, Dale L. “The Curricula Crisis in Foreign Language Learning.” ADFL Bulletin 25.2 (1994): 12–16. [Show Article]
Lekic, Maria D., and Peter Merrill. “Uniform Guidelines for the Management of Russian Language Learning Careers in the U.S.” Unpublished manuscript, 1994.
Lubensky, Sophia, and Donald K. Jarvis. Teaching, Learning, Acquiring Russian. Columbus: Slavica, 1984.
Patrikis, Peter C. “Where Is Computer Technology Taking Us?” ADFL Bulletin 26.2 (1995): 36–39. [Show Article]
Phillips, Delbert. Volume I: Methods of Teaching Russian Language and Literature in America. Saint Petersburg: Syntaxis, 1995.
———. Volume II: New Approaches to the Teaching of Russian Language and Literature in America. Saint Petersburg: Syntaxis, 1995.
Rosen, Leonard. “The Way to Design Creative Software in the Humanities.” Chronicle of Higher Education 2 June 1995: A48.
Schulz, Renate A. “Literature and Readability: Bridging the Gap in Foreign Language Reading.” Modern Language Journal 65 (1981): 43–53.
Shute, Valerie J., and Lisa A. Gawlick-Grendell. “What Does the Computer Contribute to Learning?” Computers and Education 23 (1994): 177–86.
Slavic and East European Journal 19.1–2 (1975).
Thompson, Irene, and Emily Urevich. Reading Real Russian, Books I and 2. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1992.
© 1996 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
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