The first Czech textbook with horizontal explanation of cases

The textbook was the result of long-term work with foreign students since the 1950s. It was based on the method used in teaching foreign students in the first study centres and established the method of teaching Czech as a foreign language, which is applied in teaching materials in Czech classes for foreigners to this day. The textbook was very innovative, it did not use, for example, the nominative, it merged the dative and the locative singular and other things. It also did not contain a single grammar chart.

The course, which was developed as a result of the need to start teaching directly in Czech, especially in a situation where no mediation language is available, is still in use at UJOP, while being continuously improved and adapted to modern times, as it still offers fundamental benefits to students. Karla Hronová, together with Milada Turzíkova, also published a didactically well-developed Čeština pro cizince, základní kurz (nowadays Čeština pro cizince, Fraus), which was used primarily in the 1980s.

First specialized subject textbook for foreigners

"I said to myself: Why delay teaching specialized subjects until students learn some Czech, why wait? If they can say: a textbook is a professional book, why shouldn't they be able to say: history is a social science? And I wrote the first history textbook for beginners in the language." This pattern was soon followed by other colleagues, and a whole a range of materials focused on different fields (e.g. by Eva Streblová, Bohumila Sedláčková, Jaroslava Vesecká, Zdeněk Rubeš, Zdeněk Pressl, Michaela Straková Tomášová, Daniel Křivánek and others) started to appear.

The first communicative textbook in the Czech Republic

In the 1990s, Ivana Rešková, together with Magdalena Pintarova, responded to the methodological change with a set of Communicative Czech textbooks, accompanied by workbooks and audio recordings. It was preceded by their first textbook Come and Learn Czech. Communicative Czech brought an analytical approach to the interpretation of grammatical phenomena and focused newly on the development of communicative skills in individual speech skills. The textbook replaced the First 50 Steps set by Karla Hronová, which was designed as a "pre-textbook" for Czech for Foreigners by Hronová Turzíková, which was used in classes as a subsequent material after finishing Czech for Foreigners by Šára, Šárová and Bytel.

The first textbook using the method of language functions

For a long time, the Summer Schools of Slavonic Studies and other summer schools at UJOP were taught using the emerging material by Jitka Cvejnová, who had been working at UJOP for a long time, for a time as director of the Dobruška study centre. The result was the first volume of the innovative textbook Česky, prosím I. With the author's consent, the textbook Česky, prosím A1/2 was created from Česky, prosím I and Česky, prosím II in 2018 for the purposes of teaching at UJOP with modifications by Dana Hůlková Nývltová, Barbora Štindlová, Petra Jirásková and Lukáš Vaňous.

UJOP took the bold step and joined exams such as the Cambridge Exam, the Goethe Institute Exams, Instituto Cervantes, France Éducation international, The Certificaat Nederlands als Vreemde Taal and others by becoming a full member of ALTE. This was accomplished after several years of hard work and since 2009 UJOP has been providing internationally recognised certified exams in Czech guaranteed by 18 quality standards. Kateřina Vodičková, who led the team when the exam was created, also became the first auditor of the so-called small language in ALTE and a member of its Standing Committee. Subsequently, under the leadership of Pavel Pečený, UJOP obtained audited exams for all levels of A1, A2, B1, B2, C1.

Also, the successful series of textbooks Čeština pro cizince by Marie Boccou Kestřánková is associated with UJOP. The author Boccou Kestřánková was a member of UJOP team at the time of the first published volume of the B1 textbook, and the other co-authors are also from UJOP: Kateřina Vodičková (A1/2 and the planned C1, which will be published in summer 2024), Gabriela Šnajdaufová (B1). Also, the textbook for B1 and A1/2 level was supervised by Dana Hůlková Nývltová and all parts were pre-tested at UJOP. The B2 level textbook is the first Czech textbook for this level published in the Czech Republic.

Under the supervision of Dana Hůlková Nývltová, the team of authors Klára Vaníčková, Lenka Suchomelová, Kateřina Matuštíková produced a material for foreign students’ adaptation. The project was created as part of the Operational Programme Research, Development

and Education to improve teaching quality at Charles University and its relevance to the needs of the labour market, and it was supposed to establish an InterU Internationalisation Centre. This still remains to be fulfilled, but the resulting manual is available in both Czech and English versions.

In 2007, the authors Barbora Štindlová and Svatava Škodová published the first text on grammatical parcelling and brought the concept of grammar parcelling to the environment of Czech for foreigners. An example of work with the grammar parcelling method is, for example, the textbook Česky v Česku created under the main authorship of Barbora Štindlová (2007) with co-authors Ondřej Štindl, Petra Huková, created within the framework of the Human step project implemented by UJOP. Learn more about the publication.

The concept of the grammar map, the textbook map and teaching cases applying the circular learning method was born in connection with the redesign of the textbook Česky, prosím for the purposes of teaching at UJOP and is also applied for the first time in the supplement to the textbook in the form of a functional chart. In the context of developing the methodology of teaching Czech and the work on syllabus making and its theory, Dana Hůlková Nývltová also applied a target diagram, a methodological device for syllabus making and a course to use a backward design method of syllabus making based on learning objectives and results. Learn more about the publication.

For the purpose of teaching using modern methods, Petra Jirásková has created a special podcast that maps the progress in learning. It is therefore not only focused thematically on individual attractive topics, but also proceeds according to the gradually acquired level of knowledge

of Czech. She completed the project with the involvement of her own children and colleagues from UJOP. Subsequently, a series of worksheets were created for it. It was also broadcast by Radiotelevision Vojvodina in Serbia in 2023.

All episods on YouTube

All episods on Spotify

Hezky česky - worksheets

A number of textbooks by Lída Holá, author of Čeština krok za krokem (Czech Step by Step) and Čeština Expres, have been pre-tested at UJOP UK and have been actively used in some of UJOP's courses for a long time. Zdena Malá, author of the workbooks for Czech Step by Step 2 (level B1, 2012), the book Jazykové hry a aktivity pro výuku češtiny A1.1 (2019) (Language Games and Activities for Teaching Czech) and co-author of the new Manuály 2.0 for the textbooks Express 1,2 and Step by Step 1, has been working with Lída Hola for many years. Zdena Malá is one of the methodologists at UJOP, she is also an expert in online teaching and its methodology and games and drill activities in teaching.

Because pronunciation is an extremely important linguistic component in learning and using Czech, the UJOP team led by Barbora Štindlová developed a concept of incorporating special pronunciation lessons into standard Czech courses. These courses are taught by professional phoneticians such as Jaroslav Šimek, Dominika Schránilová and others, using tailor-made phonetic cards (2017).

In addition to textbooks of Czech for foreigners focused on the language for specific purposes and a number of teaching materials focused on physics, mathematics, social sciences, there was also a need for natural sciences. Jaroslava Bažantová created a six-volume series of textbooks for UJOP for those interested primarily in medical studies.

Sets of materials as outputs of methodological courses created by the community-based method (est 2007)

Since 2007, UJOP has been holding various forms of methodological courses for teachers of Czech for nonnative speakers from various target groups. In recent years, the courses are focused on community-based learning and community-based production, resulting in sets of materials, worksheets, games or textbooks created under the leadership of Petra Jirásková and Zdena Malá.

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