Students majoring in French, German, Japanese or Spanish must:complete all of the following field experiences courses (60 contact hours):FETE 201 Field Experience I (1 credit hour)

Prospective teachers will participate in a service-learning experience in a diverse community and examine their beliefs and attitudes about working with others who are different from themselves.

FETE 302 Field Experience II: Secondary (1 credit hour)

Field placement in a middle level or high school. Focus is on reflective teaching  and assessment decisions.

FETE 402 Field Experience III: Secondary (1 credit hour)

Field placement in a middle level or high school with a diverse student  population. Emphasis is on developing literacy in diverse populations and adapting instruction to individual student needs.

AND

complete and document 40 additional hours of level- and subject-matter appropriate pre-student  teaching experiences.

When requested, the methods professor takes an active role in advising students on their selection of  FETE and pre-student teaching placements.

Although the methods professor is a tenured, full professor in the Department of Foreign Languages and Bilingual Studies (College of Arts and Sciences), approximately half of her time is paid by the Office of Academic Services (College of Education) and is devoted to supervising foreign language student teachers and to supporting special projects (i.e. revisions of the student teaching handbook, revisions of student teacher evaluation forms, portfolio development workshops). Because of her close connections to the College of Education Office of Academic Services, the methods professor and, as a result, the foreign language methods students and student teachers, routinely participate in pilot projects, including our current Teacher Quality grant.  This level of commitment from, and collaboration between, both colleges appears to be quite unusual among our peer institutions and is one of the major strengths of our foreign language teacher certification program.

The Spanish program maintains important contacts with area (feeder) high schools where Spanish faculty regularly make presentations to student groups interested in learning about the programs of area colleges and universities. Dr. Voght has served in three capacities at East Middle School in Ypsilanti.   Dr. Cere has given over 27 presentations (1995-2002) at Michigan high schools on foreign languages and careers.  Among these schools are Ypsilanti High School and Plymouth-Canton High School.

As noted in the EMU College of Education web page, “Programs in Teacher Education maintain close ties with schools and community agencies through a variety of partnerships. These partnerships foster an active exchange of ideas, ensuring that real-life uses of knowledge are emphasized in schools. As students and faculty work in partnership with these groups, both the agencies and the EMU programs are renewed.”

The College of Education has established consociate schools in the following districts: Farmington Hills and Ypsilanti.

The foreign language teacher certification program maintains official partnerships through the College of Education in those consociate districts and also has unofficial partnerships with the following  schools and districts where we place student teachers each year:  Ann Arbor Public Schools, Dexter Public Schools, Garden City Public Schools, Livonia Public Schools, Northville Public Schools, Plymouth-Canton Public Schools, and Van Buren (Belleville) Public Schools.  These partnerships are due in large part to the number of foreign language teachers who have been certified through EMU, who teach in those school districts, and who maintain contact with and request student teachers specifically from our program.

Members of the Spanish faculty are actively involved with such entities as Jackson, Hillsdale, and Lenawee counties (regarding Hispanic concerns), International Business Association, Latino Student Association, and service as courtroom translator/interpreter for the Washtenaw County (Michigan) court system.

As shown on the attached curriculum vitae, faculty in each language section have close connections with their respective language-specific associations (AATF, AATG, AATSP, AATJ).

The foreign language teacher education faculty have collaborated with faculty from the University of Michigan - Dearborn, Michigan
State University, the Michigan Department of Education and the Michigan Foreign Language Association in a three-year Foreign Language Assistance Project grant, Mich-I-Lifts (Michigan Improving Language Instruction for Teachers and Students).  The Mich-I-Lifts project was designed to help teachers learn about and integrate standards-based teaching in their classrooms, to improve their language proficiency, and to develop their technology skills. Faculty at all three institutions share lectures, activities, and materials created as part of the Mich-I-Lifts  project in their undergraduate methods classes and with their student teachers.