You have decided to learn Czech. But which approach suits you better and how can you understand the depth of your knowledge in that field? We asked about it a professor, Sergey Sergeevich Skorvid, from Charles University in Prague, who are teaching Czech to Russian-speaking students in IGUMO.
- How do you do? Sergey Sergeevich, I know you have a textbook ‘Czech in dialogues’ consisting of 10 studies. Do you mean classroom hours? Is it possible to master the language in such a short time or is it just an experiment?
- No, it is not, even an hour and a half won’t be enough. But if you complete all studies in my textbook, remembering all words and phrases, and how they should be used, then you will manage to. But I don’t cover the whole material in 10 classroom hours as I have to recall the previous lessons.
- What difficulties do students find in studying Czech?
- The Czech language is something between Russian and European languages. For this reason, it’s necessary to balance, showing similarities to Russian and English. Such balancing is comparable with rope-walking that is definitely difficult.
- Which of teaching techniques do you consider most efficient?
- It depends. It’s enough for some students to learn 50 words, the most frequent ones, and some phrases with them. So, they just need to learn several dialogues by heart and that will be ample. But others need to understand the system of the language. Sometimes the familiarity with Russian helps, indeed, but sometimes it isn’t. That’s why I examine every group and choose the techniques individually.
- What won’t one understand and learn without the Czech language?
- The Czech have a proverb telling: ‘As many languages as you know, so many separate individuals you are worth’. Every new language helps you to get new features, a new way of thinking. Concerning Czech, I often provide an example, taken from the novel by Bohumil Hrabal. The old lady exclaimed: ‘Who will pay me for my sodden, wonderful fur coat?’, after being poured by water cannon during the crackdown in 1989. Now think, what would a lady say in your country? Would her behavior be the same?
- Do the students succeed in mastering the language?
- Yes, quite well. But we haven’t had even 10 hours and have just proceeded to the second study. My target is to teach them Czech at A1 level by the end of the courses. But, of course, that’s not the end, we will achieve more!
- Undoubtedly!
Aliona Glazkova, 4th year, faculty of Journalism
Translated by L. Skryabin
25.03.2016Ïðîñìîòðîâ:
Marina
Volynkina