In "multicultural America" German is a "Heritage Language" of major importance. It allows doing research using authentic German texts in family, community, and nation. Our mainstream culture, our way of life, has been markedly influenced by millions of German-speaking immigrants and their descendants.

Students study German for many different reasons. They may want to enlarge and deepen their knowledge of the German-speaking countries and their peoples and gain a better understanding of their own ancestry and ultimately of themselves as individuals. Other's realize that learning German not only acquaints them with one of history's great cultures, but also gives them a new perspective on their own society and culture and thus helps them to become more aware of the world around them. Still others take German because they find the language essential for research in fields such as history, comparative literature, musicology, art history, anthropology, sociology, chemistry, physics, and mathematics.

The 3rd and 4th year of German is especially well suited for its inclusion as a "Heritage Language" in the instructional process, with the use of German-American Studies components and independent research projects. Since this approach is embedded in the historical American reality and provides independent study and research projects significant benefits can be derived for the students and for the field of German language and culture studies. Americans are interested in their roots and the lands of their ancestors. One fourth of all Americans claim some form of German ancestry.

A vast amount of early records, letters, diaries, etc. were written in German, and America's German-language press had an output that was greater than that of all other foreign-language presses combined. (Some newspapers, like the Nord-Amerikanische Wochenpost and the New Yorker Staats-Zeitung are still available today.) Both the written and the printed legacy are important sources for an understanding of local, state and national history and culture.

In some of our most successful programs in Indiana (and in other parts of the country), teachers are integrating the "natural approach" to language teaching into their instruction. This language acquisition theory stresses communicative competency, where communication is fostered by texts, rooted in a local/regional cultural reality. Research projects are usually a part of 3rd and 4th year German instruction, and follow an emphasis on mastery of language as form, and expressions of everyday culture, emphasized in the earlier grades.

The "natural approach" integrates different sources of German text. It places the language in meaningful contexts close to home, using authentic texts, such as letters, travellogs, diaries, proceedings of town and church meetings, hymnals, bibles and other books, and of course, newspapers and journals, written or edited by German-Americans. Included are also photographs, artifacts and cemeteries. Activities in the classroom focus on topics which are of local, regional, and national relevance. Use of texts based on the authenticity of situations in which the language is produced (Wallenberg) has a high motivational val and leads to a better retention rate in the language classroom.

In the Midwest and other German-American settlement areas, German- language texts, first-person accounts of the immigrant experience, the history and culture of the immigrants, abound in local historical and heritage societies, at Max Kade institutes, in churches, basements and attics of Americans of German descent. They provide fascinating teaching materials.

Most German handwriting prior to 1941, was done in "old German script." At the 1996 Society of German-American Studies Symposium in Madison, WI, teachers presented units involving German script. They used fonts and applications based on the work of Prof. D. A. Becker who makes available for a nominal sum Suetterlin TrType font for Microsoft Windows. It provides the capability of creating exercises for teaching and learning of script. Becker describes applications and instruction of Suetterlin and Fraktur for computer in an article on Silicon Suetterlin (see Donald A.Becker, Dept. of German at University of Wisconsin-Madison, in Unterrichts-praxis, 1995, No. 1.)

If you would like to have some of our teachers' models on how to infuse heritage research projects into your classroom send us your school address and we will send you materials free of charge.

Eberhard and Ruth Reichmann

Heritage Language Research Priorities and a related workshop

Last updated September 14, 1996.