Go Back   Professional Soldiers ® > Special Forces > Base Camp

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 05-28-2009, 00:54   #1
Mitch
Quiet Professional
 
Mitch's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Texas, near Cow Town
Posts: 351
DLI vs. College Language Courses?

Quote:
Originally Posted by mojaveman
Hi Mitch,

I read one of your posts and noticed that you learned German at DLI Monterey. As I speak the language I was just curious how long the course was. I studied it for a year in college but the best teachers were all of the people that I spoke to in the Gasthauses.

Tschuss
That’s a good question – I’ll do my best to answer it. But let me warn you – I can get long winded.

The German Course I took back in 1971 was 32 weeks long. When I arrived there, having never taken any foreign language before, I had no clue what I was in for. During the orientation – they told us that we would be required to do at least 3 hours of study each night – I remember laughing at that statement – I considered myself pretty smart and just didn’t see why anyone would need to study that long for just one subject – I was wrong.

We were in class for six hours a day – we also had a nice long 2 hour lunch break – that was really helpful – good way to clear your head before you went back at it. The first hour was always reciting the dialog that you had learned the night before (I’ll come back to that). One hour during the day was usually (but not always) in the “language Lab.” Here you listened to tapes of exercise phrases, you could also record yourself and then play it back. We were all issued a tape recorder (reel to reel) that we kept at home for study during the night. All the other class room hours of the day, except the last one were spent learning grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, culture, history, social graces and manners, sing songs, Etc.

In the six hours of the day, we usually had at least 5 different teachers. There were never more than 12 students, so the classes were small and cozy. The teachers became our friends and mentors. They pushed us and pulled us and continued to teach with every word and with every breath – everything was a lesson. We had DLI text books that were about 150 pages long, soft cover; they had a comic book look about them with lots of pictures and graphically oriented exercises. I think that by the end of the course, I had about 20 or more of those books.

Now back to that Dialog – it started with the last hour of the day – and we were required to learn a new one each day. A Dialog is a conversation, usually between two people, talking about day to day life that you would, at first experience right there in the Language School, later on we talked about things we would see and do in Germany. During that last hour, we would become familiar with all the new words in the dialog, their meanings, and the special uses, etc. In the last five minutes of the day, we would get our homework assignments – usually a few written assignments, several word drills, and some fun stuff – and then of course the class, and the day, is over – well not really.

I lived in an apartment with my wife, just two block from the school so I just walked each day – we had two ocean views: from the living room we could see the Pacific, from the Kitchen we could see Monterey Bay - I was lucky. But, once at home, it was a quick dinner, and then on to study for the dialog and do the assignments. (BTW - that apprtment was furnished and cost me $145 a month - which I really couldn't afford - but try to get that same appartment today, I bet I still couldn't afford it!)

Remember, at the beginning, I said that I didn’t really think I would need to spend 3 hours studying. Well I didn’t at first, I tried to watch a little TV, enjoy being with my wife and baby son – it didn’t take long to get behind and once that happens it is very hard to catch up. If it hadn’t been for the help of a fellow student who just lived a block from me – I probably would not have made it. Greg was in the Air Force and was in his second language at DLI – his first was for Russian. He suggested that we study together – that made all the difference for me – no more TV, no more wife, it was just Vocabulary and Dialog, not 3 hours, but usually 4 hours every night – we made each other good.

The next morning when we were called upon, at random, to pair up with one of the other students, and do one of the dialog parts - we always aced it – we were good. Doing badly on the Dialog got you written up – getting written up three times got you in to see the Department Head (not a pleasant experience – I would know).

Bit by bit, less and less English was being spoken – we finally reached the point where German was the norm and English was just for when ran out of words. They stressed all language skills, not just speaking. We had lots of reading and writing, in fact, we had to write what amounted to a couple of Term Papers in German before that course ended.

At the end of the class, we took the DLI final exam – we needed to do well on that one in order to earn our “college” credit (up to 18 hours). We actually took a test every 6 weeks – you had to make a 70 or better to stay enrolled – that first six weeks, I barely got a 70; that was when Greg came to my rescue. Later on we took the DLPT – the goal was a 2-2, they said a 3-3 was near impossible, and a 1-1 was just really poor performance. I got a 2-2. That was a great score. I was happy with it.

So how does this compare to taking it in college – I don’t think there is any comparison – at least not in the short run – perhaps If you took a 3 hour German class, with a 1 hour lab every semester in a four year college program, that would work out to 32 hours. But I still doubt that the quality would be the same. I don’t know maybe someone else here does?
By the way, the 18 college credit hours they awarded worked for me many years later; the University of North Texas only gave me 15 hours, but it more than met their foreign language requirement.
__________________
Mitch

Last edited by Mitch; 05-29-2009 at 00:31.
Mitch is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-28-2009, 09:45   #2
f50lrrp
BANNED USER
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Monterey California
Posts: 392
I, too, took German for 47 weeks, at DLI but it was in D.C. and then I went to RVN. In 1965 I was assigned to the 24th Division in Augsburg. I went back to RVN in 1967-1969 and then transferred to Fort Ord as the SF Recruiter.

I could see DLI across the bay so at the end of the year at Fort Ord, I rewquested another language at DLI. At the time you had to state wether or not that you would accept training in the Vietnamese language. I put down that I would not accepth the Vietnamese language. My 1049 form was denied by the Army and I got orders to go to Fort Bragg.

My assignment at Bragg was to attend the MATA (Military Advisory Training Assistance ) Senior NCO Course. For 26 weeks we learned all about the Vietnamese Army and its weapons and tactics. From there we were assigned to the DLISC at Biggs Army Airfield at Fort Bliss, Texas to learn Vietnamese in a 12 week course.

An Intel Sgt (E-5) Watson became my training partner. We had 6 hours of class a day and 3-4 hours of homework each night. Watson and I went to Juarez each night and studied the "Midnight bull fights". In the morning we would go to class an hour early and memorize our dialogs. He would learn the questions and I would study the answers. When class began, we would sit at opposite sides of the classroom and when the teacher would call for volunteers we would both raise our hands. The class started out with 35 reluctant students and graduated 20. Watson and I both scored a 2-2 on our final exams ant the rest of the classes scored 1-1 on theirs.

I was subsequently assigned to be an advisor with the BDQ when I got to RVN.
f50lrrp is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply


Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump



All times are GMT -6. The time now is 18:21.



Copyright 2004-2022 by Professional Soldiers ®
Site Designed, Maintained, & Hosted by Hilliker Technologies