Russian 2

Course Objects

This course begins with the practice of pronunciation. Its primary objective is to develop the basic skills essential for the comprehensive and effective acquisition of Russian grammatical structures and for reading written texts. Moreover, the course will enable students to comprehend written texts with the help of a dictionary and to acquire the correct way of constructing expressions and sentences by themselves. This will be the basis and the first step for further learning and using the Russian language.

Key Features

This may be the first time that students learn a foreign language other than English. They will learn Russian from the very beginning. As there is only a small number of students in each class, the progress is comparatively fast. The classes are interactive and create the atmosphere of a play, in which students acquire the basic knowledge of grammar, construct sentences by themselves, and speak in the Russian language. Class assignments will be regularly graded. Four basic skills, namely reading, writing, listening and speaking will be developed through everyday practice.

Course Overview

The primary objective of this course is to develop the basic skills of the Russian language. Equal attention is given to four areas of learning, namely reading, writing, listening and speaking. Assignments mainly include dialogues and expressions used by Russian native speakers in everyday life. Moreover, the usage of audio-visual materials allows students to learn about Russian culture, customs, history and society and, thus to gain a better knowledge of the Russian-speaking countries and wider world.

Course Schedule

Session	Contents	Keyword
1	Alphabet, Letters and Pronunciation (1)	Alphabet, Letters, Pronunciation
2	Letters and Pronunciation (2): Consonant Assimilation, Unique Pronunciations, Infinitive forms of verbs, можно + Infinitive forms of verbs, How to Ask People's Names, Daily Greetings, Personal Pronouns, Possessive Pronouns, Noun Genders	Pronunciation, Greetings, Pronouns
3	Present Tense Verbs: Changes depending on Person, Possessive Pronouns, Interrogative Pronouns and Case	Verbs, Present Tense, Sentences
4	Verb Changes: Past Tense, Plural Nouns	Verbs, Present Tense, Nouns
5	Compound Future Tense, Adjectives, Imperative Form, ся Verbs	Verbs, Future Tense, Adjectives
6	Prepositional Case, Difference between prepositions в and на	Nouns, Prepositional Case Prepositions
7	Genitive Case, Prepositions that take the Genitive, Negative Genitive	Nouns, Genitive case
8	Accusative Case, Plural Genitive, Combining Cardinal Numerals and Cases	Nouns, Accusatives, Cardinal Numerals
9	Movement Verbs: Finite Verbs, Infinite verbs, Verbs of Movement, Prefixes and Finite/Infinite verbs	Verbs, Verbs of Movement, Finite/ Infinite verbs
10	Instrumental Case, Instrumental Case of Means, Dominant Instrumental Case of Verbs, Preposition ｃ + Instrumental Case, чтобы , Conditional sentences and Subjunctive Moods	Nouns, Instrumental Case,Subjunctive Moods
11	Perfective/Imperfective Verbs	Verbs, Perfect Tense, Imperfect Tense
12	Dative Case, Expressions of Age	Nouns, Dative Case, Age
13	Relationship Pronouns который , Adjective Short Inflections	Relationship Pronouns, Adjectives, Short Inflections
14	Adjectives' Superlative Degree and Comparative Degree	Adjectives, Superlative Degree, Comparative
15	Converbs	Converbs

Lecture Handouts

Note: All files are in Japanese

Lecture Notes

Assignments

Note: All files are in Japanese

Assignments

Assessment

The assessment for this course will be based on class participation/attendance and the final exam.

Related Resources

Dictionaries

Although it is well known that using a dictionary is essential when learning a foreign language, you will not need a dictionary at the beginning of the course. In Russian, word endings often change in a very complex way. So even if students are able to extract a necessary word from a dictionary, they may find difficulties in selecting the correct ending. Therefore, it would be more effective to gradually expand the use of dictionaries after making some progress in learning grammar. Thus, we advise students to make a list of new words by themselves.

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