German B1.2 Intensive Course — Courses Information & Content
With Goethe Institute Germany from 16.09.2024 to 07.10.2024
💡 Want to read more? Click here for the second part
German B1.2 Intensive Course — Personal Reflectionsor here for the Mandarin version
德文B1.2超級密集班完課心得
I’ve just finished the B1.2 German intensive course last Monday, so I wanted to jot down my thoughts while they were still fresh. I might write about the earlier levels later if I have the time and motivation. Let’s dive right in!
Background info: I started learning German in April this year (2024) when I went to Frankfurt, beginning from A1. So far, I’ve completed five intensive courses: A1, A2.1, A2.2, B1.1, and B1.2. The first three levels (A1, A2.1, A2.2) were in-person classes, while B1.1 and B1.2 were online courses.
Basic Information about the Course
School
Goethe Institute DE, if you need more info here’s the school website.
Dates and Times
2024.09.16–2024.10.07 (the course ended on 10.7 because 10.3 was a public holiday for German Unity Day)
The course ran for three weeks, Monday to Friday, every day from 9:00 AM to 1:15 PM German time (GMT+2), which is 3:00 PM to 7:15 PM Taiwan time.
Price
899 euros for the online intensive course (1099 euros for the in-person intensive course)
Instructor
Nina
Learning Materials
Menschen B1.2 textbook and workbook, along with the teacher’s slides and course notes.
Class Location
Online
Class Size and Student Composition
There were 16 people in total, with 1 teacher and 15 students. Classmates came from various countries including Sweden, Italy, Montenegro, Ukraine, Macedonia, Albania, Taiwan, India, Iraq, Peru, Brazil, Botswana, Tanzania, etc. Over half were from European countries. Many students had already lived in Germany for quite some time. The age range was roughly between 25–40 years old.
About the Course Content
Learning Topics
Entering B1.2, I was quite surprised initially. The topics in this level are more formal, serious, and substantial compared to the everyday life themes of previous levels. It’s evident that the learning objectives and expectations at the B1 level are: as a foreigner, to be able to independently complete more challenging tasks in Germany, to better understand and integrate into German culture and society, and to have the ability to engage in in-depth discussions on various issues.
The textbook topics for this level include: misunderstandings caused by language, adult continuing education, job application, biography, politics and society (discussing political stances, etc.), tourism, the history of Germany and neighboring countries, environmental conservation, and visions of the future.
I’ve attached the Menschen B1.2 textbook contents found online from the Hueber publishing house for readers who might need it:
My Thoughts on the Topics
Overall, I found these topics quite interesting, although they were more challenging to absorb compared to previous levels. Surprisingly, biographies, German history, and environmental conservation — topics I initially thought might be dull — turned out to be areas where I learned a great deal! Additionally, job application is a very practical topic. The course taught us about reading job listings and writing motivation letters. The German way of motivation letters writing is aligned with German culture: concise and to the point. It’s quite different from the Anglo-American style I learned in career coaching courses, which emphasizes using stronger words to highlight (or brag) one’s strengths and listing project achievements in bullet points. Overall, I think the topics and scenarios in the textbook are quite beneficial for foreigners who want to learn how to act according to German social norms.
I believe one can discern a country’s culture and values based on the course topic arrangement. I saw this most profoundly in the environmental conservation lesson. In Taiwan, although we discuss environmental protection and plastic reduction, and we do recycle, it’s actually rare to hear much discussion about it in daily life. In this class, the teacher led us in discussing various environmental issues-related vocabulary (such as carbon emissions, environmental pollution, renewable energy, etc.) and ideas, and even had us write a short essay on plastic reduction (which was quite challenging!). She also posed a thought-provoking question to me in class, as someone who loves to travel and flies frequently, asking “What are your thoughts on the carbon footprint of flying? Would you consider reducing your travel because of this?” All of this made me acutely aware of how much Germany and/or European countries value environmental protection issues. And I once again realized how different culture values are.
Teacher’s Teaching Method
Personally, I’m a student whose learning performance and motivation are heavily dependent on the teacher’s teaching method.
This time, our teacher Nina’s teaching method was very engaging. Her signature approach was arranging numerous group discussion exercises during class. Typically, in a 4-hour class, there would be 2–3 group discussions, followed by each group reporting their discussion results. This was the first time I encountered a teacher with this teaching style. It was novel and significantly increased the practice time for listening and speaking skills. It also made it less likely to become drowsy, although it could occasionally be awkward if you were paired with classmates you didn’t click with.
Another interesting observation — for Taiwanese people, when learning a foreign language other than English (except for Japanese and Korean), our English proficiency is generally quite good. However, in this class, I discovered that for many European classmates, German was their first foreign language. Essentially, they only knew their mother tongue and German, and many were much more proficient in German than in English. Consequently, in small group discussions, German remained the primary language used. When I couldn’t understand my classmates due to the fast German speaking speed or with accents, it was challenging to find someone could explain in English. This was partly because they felt that since it’s a German class, we should always speak German (which I totally understand and agree), but also because they couldn’t use English as fluently as German. This was quite surprising to me and an interesting observation of the differences. Because of this, when I didn’t understand, if there’s a classmate who was in the same boat and wanted to chat or discuss in English, or someone who understood German well enough and was willing to explain in English to those who didn’t, I immediately felt incredibly supportive and comforting.
Another characteristic of the teacher was assigning a substantial amount of homework (😆🤣). Besides the workbook exercises, the teacher would arrange writing homework almost daily for students to complete and then send to her for correction. There was also a major exercise every week. On Fridays of the first two weeks, we each had a personal oral presentation practice. In the first week, we reported on a biography of our choice (I chose Darwin), and in the second week, we selected a photo to introduce the landscape of our own country. In the third week, we were assigned to write a short essay on environmental protection and plastic waste. I chose the topic “The Impact of Plastic Waste on Marine Animals and Solutions for Improvement.”
In conclusion, I quite liked and appreciated Nina and felt I learned a lot in her class. 👍🏻
💡 Want to read more? Click here for the second part
German B1.2 Intensive Course — Personal Reflectionsor here for the Mandarin version
德文B1.2超級密集班完課心得
