95040 - First Level Russian

Learning outcomes

The course must lead the students to acquire the basic grammatical and lexical structures of the Russian language and to possess elementary oral and written linguistic competence which enables them to interact in a limited number of daily communicative situations

Course contents

PHONETICS

Pronunciation. Transliteration rules. Reduction of unstressed vowels. Voiced and voiceless consonants. Hard and soft consonants (palatalization). Russian orthography.

 

MORPHOLOGY

NOUN

Noun categories (gender, number and case). Masculine, feminine and neuter nouns. Animate and inanimate nouns. Hard-stem and soft-stem nouns.

Nominative singular and plural case. Irregular plurals of nouns.

Prepositional singular and plural case and its main functions (complement of place and complement of argument). Common verbs used with the Prepositional case.

Accusative singular case of inanimate nouns. Use of the Accusative case to express direct object.

Genitive singular case. Use of the Genitive case to express origin.

ADJECTIVE

Singular and plural possessive adjectives. Demonstrative singular and plural adjectives “этот” (this, masculine), “эта” (this, feminine), “это” (neuter), “эти” (these).

PRONOUN Subject and object personal pronouns. Forms of politeness. Demonstrative pronoun “это” (this). Interrogative pronouns “кто” (Who) and “что” (What). Interrogative pronouns “чей” (Whose, masculine), “чья” (Whose, feminine) чье” (Whose, neuter and “чьи” (Whose, plural).

VERB

I and II conjugation of verbs. Present indicative of regular and irregular verbs. Verb “быть” (to be) in the present tense. Construction with the verb “быть” (to be) used to express possession (“у меня есть”/I have). Transitive and intransitive verbs. Verbs used to express preferences : “мне нравится”/”мне не нравится” (I like/I don't like).

NUMERALS

Cardinal and ordinal numbers.

ADVERB

Formation and use of adverbs of time, place and manner.

 

SYNTAX

Simple affirmative, negative and interrogative sentences.

Readings/Bibliography

Main textbooks

1. D. Magnati, F. Legittimo. Davaite! Comunicare in russo. Corso di lingua e cultura russa. Vol. 1. Hoepli, 2017.

2. S.I. Chernyshov. Poechali. Lets' go! Russian for adults. A course for beginners - 7th ed. - St.Petersburg, Zlatoust, 2009.

3. Bonciani D., Romagnoli, R. Vse tak. Grammatica e lessico della lingua russa. Livelli A1-A2. Hoepli, Milano, 2020.

 

Additional resourses

1. C. Cevese, J. Dobrovolskaja, E. Magnanini. Grammatica russa. Manuale di teoria. Livelli A1-B2 del Quadro Comune Europeo di Riferimento per le Lingue, Terza edizione, Hoepli, Milano, 2018.

2. N. Nikitina N., E. Freda Piredda E. Grammatica d'uso della lingua russa. Teoria ed esercizi. Livello A1, Hoepli, Milano, 2017.

3. Il Kovalev. Dizionario russo-italiano italiano-russo di Vladimir Kovalev, Bologna, Zanichelli, 2014 (Quarta edizione).

Assessment methods

Assessments of learning will be implemented throughout the course based on exercises and progress tests completed during class time. At the end of the course students are required to take the exam which will consist of 2 parts:

1. The written test includes the assesment of the acquired lexical and grammatical skills. It will cover the topics detailed in the course programme. Specifically, comprehension skills, acquisition of vocabulary and elements of morphology will be tested;

2. The oral test focuses on evaluation of communication skills such as the ability to express oneself on the topics covered during the course. The students must be able to talk about themselves, their interests, hobbies and everyday life. Each test has a maximum score of thirty points. The final grade will be the average score of the written and oral test combined.

Teaching tools

PC, video projector, Internet connection

Office hours

See the website of Nataliya Litynska