DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

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Speakeasy
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DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Sat Nov 14, 2015 8:17 pm

PART 1 of 2
I have separated this post into two parts. This first part describes the materials of the DLI GERMAN BASIC course that I am offering for hosting on the FSI Courses and/or DLI Courses websites. The second part discusses possible revisions to the transcripts of the pattern drills and the possibility of adding to recorded materials

DLI GERMAN BASIC COURSE
The Defense Language Institute published a new edition of the DLI German Basic Course circa 1967. I have printed copies this edition inclusive of the minor textual revisions to course cumulative through to 1978 along with the audio recordings accompanying these texts as well as the recorded pattern drills for which I have prepared a transcription. PDF copies of the Student and Instructors manuals may be downloaded freely from the U.S. Federal Government website ERIC (Education Resources Information Center). The “JLU Archives” website currently hosts material related to this course, but does not yet host the main Student Manuals, the Recorded Pattern Drills, or the accompanying audio files.

THE COURSE STRUCTURE and the MANUALS
From what I can tell, the printed materials include separate Student and Instructor Manuals, Student Workbooks, various Course Supplements, as well as Cumulative Word Lists. The total set of printed material for this course is in excess of 4,000 pages. The lesson units begin with a set of unrecorded Pattern Drills that were most likely practiced in the classroom. These Pattern Drills are followed by a situational Dialogue, a Prose Narrative expanding the events in the dialogue along with a series of questions based on the narrative, Homework exercises, a brief Review of the grammatical issues introduced in the lesson and a Glossary of the newly-introduced vocabulary. The authors state clearly that the student’s focus should be on the dialogues and the related prose narrative.

THE RECORDED PATTERN DRILLS
The Recorded Pattern Drills do not appear in either the Student or the Instructor Manuals. It is likely that they were published in a separate series of supplements that I have been unable to locate. I have prepared a transcript of the Recorded Pattern Drills to accompany the available course materials.

A surprising feature of the Recorded Pattern Drills is that they focus solely on the grammatical structures introduced in the lessons, use a only minimum of elementary vocabulary, and do not incorporate the ever-accumulating vocabulary of the lesson units as do, for example, the FSI language courses. This was most likely done so as to avoid distracting the student with attempts at integrating the new vocabulary into the new structures. This feature makes the Pattern Drills quite useful for students who are using other language methods and who are looking for additional practice material in grammatical structures. While this is a very interesting approach, it also means that in order to assimilate the new vocabulary, students working solely with these course materials must focus heavily on the Dialogues and Prose Narratives.

THE AUDIO FILES
The original audio tracks were recorded in circa 1967 for distribution with the, then, recently-published edition of the basic course manuals. Audio cassette versions were provided to the course participants for their evening study sessions. I have a collection of most, but not all, of the original recordings. Although the sound quality of cassette-to-mp3-converted audio recordings does not meet the standards of a commercial product, it is still acceptable. The Tracks contain one or two lessons, for duration of approximately 35 or 60 minutes, for a total time of approximately 45 hours covering the 92 lessons. To facilitate working with the audio, I split the tracks into smaller sections that contain, for each lesson unit: (a) the dialogue without pauses, (b) the dialogue with pauses, (c) the prose narrative, in sections, (d) the questions based on the prose narrative along with their corresponding answers, in sections, and (e) the individual recorded pattern drills. As an aside, the Pattern Drills are often separated by a “brrhhp” sound that I assume was inserted during the recording sessions to signal the end of a drill on the cassette tapes.

THE DLI GERMAN BASIC COURSE FOR SELF-STUDY
The DLI German Basic Course covers more-or-less the same material, in the more-or-less the same depth, as either the FSI German Basic Course or the combined Beginner-Intermediate-Advanced courses offered by Assimil and their competitors. A basic of vocabulary of 3,500-plus word groups is introduced with only minimal reference to military terminology. Only a few items in the vocabulary are no longer relevant. The Dialogues and Prose Narratives present standard language appropriate to routine situations of daily life in Germany. All of the major grammatical issues are covered in depth and the course notes are quite good. The Pattern Drills, whether recorded or unrecorded, focus solely on grammatical issues, using minimal vocabulary and do not incorporate the main course vocabulary. The audio recordings are divided into three major sections: (a) the dialogues, which represent approximately 15% of the total, (b) the prose narrative with questions and answers, which represent approximately 20% of the total, and (c) the Pattern Drills, which represent approximately 65% of the total. Note carefully that the apparent disproportionate allocation of recording time to the Recorded Pattern Drills is not indicative of course emphasis. The authors state clearly that the student’s focus should be on the dialogues and the related prose narrative.

Although the DLI German Basic Course was developed for classroom instruction, given sufficient application, an independent-learner could use it as a primary source of instruction and move towards the CEFR B1 Level of competence. While the Pattern Drills provide excellent support for learning the structure of the language, they do not incorporate the bulk of the vocabulary. Thus, anyone using this course for self-study must master the material in the Dialogues and Prose Narratives.

So, who might benefit from using the DLI German Basic Course? Students looking to practice the basic structure of German could focus solely on the Pattern Drills and alternate between these exercises and their main commercial course material. This approach might even benefit users of the FSI German Basic Course as, as was anticipated by the authors of the DLI German Basic Course, matters of grammar can be illusive in some of the more highly-developed FSI Pattern Drills. Independent-learners could also focus on the Dialogues and Prose Narratives to develop their listening and speaking skills and to validate or expand their vocabulary. Either way, assuming that the DLI German Basic Course will be uploaded, I suggest that you try it out. Play with it. Relish in its quirks. If you’re studying German, you’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain!

UPLOADING?
Would the administrators of the A Language Learners Forum, or someone else, please communicate with the managers of the FSI Courses and the DLI Courses websites and ask them to contact me so that we might arrange for the transfer and uploading of the materials?
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Speakeasy
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Sat Nov 14, 2015 8:19 pm

PART 2 of 2
This second part discusses possible revisions to the transcripts of the pattern drills and the possibility of adding to recorded materials.

ERRORS and OMISSIONS
As noted in Part 1, I have prepared a transcript of the Recorded Pattern Drills that accompany the DLI German Basic course. I am, quite literally, deaf in one ear and I have diminished hearing in the other. I am not a typist. My German is, at best, somewhere around the B2 Level. Consequently, there is a very high probability that the transcripts that I prepared contain errors. Should anyone detect errors or omissions in the transcripts that I prepared, I would greatly appreciate being advised via the Private Message function after which I will publish a revised edition of the document.

INCOMPLETE RECORDINGS
The collection of audio recordings that I have is “fairly” complete; however, unfortunately, it is missing some audio files. If a native German-speaking member were to record the missing files – using the text files as a point of departure -- and submit them either to me or to the administrators of the FSI Courses or DLI Courses websites, I am sure that users of this course would be very grateful.

UPLOADING?
I am reiterating my appeal to the administrators of the A Language Learners Forum, or to anyone else, to please communicate with the managers of the FSI Courses and the DLI Courses websites and ask them to contact me so that we might arrange for the transfer and uploading of the materials.
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Ericounet
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Ericounet » Sun Nov 15, 2015 7:50 am

hi

SpeakEasy, you already know, that I'm ready to upload on my server the material.

But, at this moment, I'm moving in another town (and going to work in another clinic) and I'll be really busy till end January (but I'll have time to upload).

You have my email address.

Best regards

Eric

ps: I don't join very often the forum at the moment .. sorry
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administrator of fsi-languages.yojik.eu;
French(N), German, English, Russian.
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Speakeasy
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Sun Nov 15, 2015 9:30 pm

@Ericounet
Thank you very much for confirming that the DLI German Basic course can be hosted on the FSI-Language-Courses website. I have uploaded the compressed files to a File Hosting website and have sent you an Email containing the links.

@Forum Members
The splitting of the audio recordings of the 92 lessons into segments generated approximately 1,500 separate MP3 files. So as to facilitate working with the audio files, I assigned names, or groups of names, as illustrated below. This particular grouping helps me work with the audio files on my Sony Digital Media Player (MP3 Walkman). Should you have your own preferences, you can change the names or reassign the groups via Windows File Properties. Here is an example of the groups that I have assigned:

Genre/
Language German

Contributing Artist/
DLI German Basic Course 1967

Album/
Vol 1, Lesson 01
Vol 1, Lesson 02
Vol 1, Lesson 03
Vol 1, Lesson 04

Vol 9, Lesson 91
Vol 9, Lesson 92

Title/
Dialog – Listen
Dialog – Practice
Lesestück
Lesestück Fragen
Lesestück
Lesestück Fragen
Pattern Drill 01
Pattern Drill 02
Pattern Drill 03

Pattern Drill 13
Pattern Drill 14

DLI German Basic - Partial View of Tags.JPG


EDITED:
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Last edited by Speakeasy on Sat Dec 22, 2018 8:31 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Ericounet
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Ericounet » Mon Nov 23, 2015 11:35 am

hi,

I uploaded on my server.

No fancy webpage for the moment .. will do it later!

fsi-dli.yojik.eu/DLI/German/Basic

[ur]lhttp://fsi-dli.yojik.eu/DLI/German/Basic/[/url]
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administrator of fsi-languages.yojik.eu;
French(N), German, English, Russian.
Chinese and Korean beginner

Speakeasy
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Mon Nov 23, 2015 11:46 am

Vielen, vielen Dank!
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karmamen
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby karmamen » Wed Nov 08, 2017 9:10 am

I'm sorry for bumping old topic, but where can i find DLI German basic course?
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Speakeasy
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Wed Nov 08, 2017 1:23 pm

Welcome to the forum! I look forward to following your participation in the numerous, wide-ranging discussions in this forum. By the way, I am quite impressed by your ability to track down such an old discussion thread. Now then, ...

Fellow member Ericounet is the owner and administrator of the FSI-Languages-Courses (Yojik) website, which was launched, I believe, some 10 to 15 years ago for the free-to-the-public hosting of the FSI and DLI language courses that had been produced in the 1960's - 1970's. Here is the LINK to the website: https://fsi-languages.yojik.eu/

Ericounet uploaded the DLI German Basic course to the website in November, 2015 and I recall seeing it there at the time. I have just visited the website and it seems that it is not presently available. I will send an Email to Ericounet asking him reload the files. If he no longer has them, I will re-send him a complete copy. This might take a few days. If there are protracted delays or insurmountable problems with this, I can always send you a copy via a file-sharing website. However, before going that route, I would prefer to have the course made available to all potential users via Ericounet's website. I will monitor the progress on this matter and, if there are hiccups, we can meet in the “Private Messages” part of this forum so as to arrange for a private transfer of the files.

In the meantime, I suggest that you have a look at the FSI German Basic course which is also available on the above-named website. The first two of Units are a little unappealing and are not fully representative of the veritable treasure that this course represents. Fortunately, as of Unit 3, the authors seemed to have hit their stride and the course becomes much more palatable, meiner Meinung nach. You might wish to know that an “updated” version of the FSI German Basic course is presently in preparation, the first few units are presently available via the Amazon/Audible website. Here is the LINK to the discussion thread "FSI Basic Courses (Updated): Dr. Brians Languages" https://forum.language-learners.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=6400
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karmamen
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby karmamen » Thu Nov 09, 2017 7:41 am

Thank you for a quick reply Speakeasy. If Ericounet can reload the course it would be great, not just for me but for everyone who wants to learn German. If this is not possible I will gladly take you offer for uploading the files via file sharing. I will take a look at FSi and Dr. Brians while waiting for DLI , thanks for the suggestions.
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Speakeasy
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Re: DLI German Basic course (circa 1967)

Postby Speakeasy » Thu Nov 09, 2017 1:36 pm

Update-1 (Re-loading of the Files)
Hello, Karmamen. I have had a brief exchange of Emails with Ericounet and have begun transferring the files of the DLI German Basic course which he will reload to the FSI-Languages-Courses (Yojik) website.

Further Comments on FSI/DLI German Basic Courses
The following is an extract from one of my posts, earlier this year, in response to a question concerning resources for learning German:

FSI German Basic / DLI German Basic
I do not wish to initiate yet another seemingly unresolvable debate on the usefulness of the FSI and DLI courses. However, in my opinion, a failure to mention these materials would be an unpardonable oversight. In the period from the 1960’s through the late 1970’s, the U.S. government produced a series of language courses for the instruction of their diplomatic or military personnel. The basic materials are now in the public domain and are freely available to the public. While there are several courses in the collection, I would draw your attention to the FSI and DLI German Basic courses only as these are the more complete versions. Generally speaking, despite their age and the inclusion of some less-than-current vocabulary, these courses are still very highly-regarded.

The mp3 audio files presently available were digitized from audio cassettes that did not age very well, thereby yielding a sound quality that does not meet commercial standards; however, for many people, this fact does not detract from the usefulness of the materials. In all cases, the audio recordings are those of native speakers of German and, upon listening to the speakers, it becomes readily apparent that they are not voice-trained professionals. For the FSI German Basic course, the delivery of the dialogues and exercises is almost shockingly rapid when compared to that of commercially-prepared audio tracks. This is not at all the case for the DLI German Basic course where the dialogues and exercises are delivered at an artificially slower cadence, reminiscent of the Linguaphone German recordings.

It should be noted that the FSI and DLI basic courses were designed for classroom use. In the case of the FSI Basic German course, the accompanying notes can seem somewhat sparse and, for this reason, I would suggest that one accompany this course with a simple grammar. In contrast, the notes accompanying the DLI German Basic course are complete in every respect, much more so than any commercially-prepared course that I have ever encountered. In addition, the DLI materials include a separate series of some 43 short guides each of which addresses a single issue of German grammar.

While both courses were conceived when the “audio-lingual” method enjoyed support in American academic circles, there are significant differences in the texts and exercise materials. Both courses introduce the language through the presentation of a series of situational dialogues, twenty-four in the FSI course and ninety in the DLI course. In addition to the dialogues, the DLI course includes third-person narratives based on the lessons’ dialogues.

The courses differ remarkably as to the recorded exercise sets that support the dialogues. The FSI course includes a wide variety of sentence-pattern drills (substitution, replacement, transformation, variation, etcetera) designed to reinforce the grammatical structures and the vocabulary of the individual lessons. I will be quite frank here: I found the first two units of the FSI German Basic course so horribly boring that I almost abandoned the program. However, I persevered and discovered that, as of the third unit right through to the end of the course, the authors of the sentence-pattern drills displayed much more creativity, so much so that I came to enjoy working with the exercise sets.

In contrast, the recorded sentence-pattern drills of the DLI German Basic course were designed to illustrate solely the specific grammatical structures deployed in the individual lessons, using the absolute minimum of common vocabulary that was introduced in the initial lesson units. While this approach does, indeed, isolate the grammatical issues from issues of newly-presented vocabulary, the resulting sentence-pattern drills lacked the "je ne sais quoi" to maintain my interest. That is, they were so tedious, dull, repetitive, unimaginative, lifeless, insipid, uninspiring, and unrelievedly boring that I found it difficult to repeat them, thereby defeating their inclusion in a supposedly audio-lingual program. Nonetheless, the sentence-pattern drills aside, the DLI German Basic course is “worth the detour”, particularly once gets beyond the first 30 lesson units.

Having said that, I still prefer the FSI German Basic course, most particularly for the drills.
Last edited by Speakeasy on Sat Nov 11, 2017 1:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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