This is a graduate-level, 2-credit, 30-hour seminar delivered in Italy in the summer of 2025.
AUR's 1-week summer seminar offers professional development for teachers of Italian. Composed of 30 academic hours, the seminar helps participants improve their teaching strategies by studying innovative language and culture instruction methods and creative ways to tackle learning problems.
Participants will receive 2.0 graduate credits from The American University of Rome upon successful completion. This American institution has been operating in Rome for more than 50 years and is accredited by Middle States Commission on Higher Education. Participants can also choose to audit the course and receive a certificate of attendance.
This program is open to teachers of Italian at all levels (middle school, high school, and university), as well as graduate students and teaching assistants in the field of Italian Language Teaching.
All course activities and assignments will be conducted in Italian.
Pre-requisites: A bachelor's degree or 24 university credits in Italian.
Course Professor: Dr. Flavia Laviosa
Flavia Laviosa is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Italian Studies at Wellesley College. In her academic career, she has pursued two paths: one in Foreign Language Education, stemming from her Ph.D. at the University at Buffalo, and the other in Film Studies, resulting from her Master’s degree completed at the University of Edinburg.
Laviosa is an experienced foreign language educator and a certified ACTFL trainer and tester with extensive involvement in designing professional development programs for language instructors in North America and Europe. She has published widely on learning strategies in international journals.
As for her interests in film studies, she has taught courses on European women filmmakers and has published articles in refereed journals and chapters in edited volumes. Laviosa is the founding editor of the book series Trajectories of Italian Cinema and Media (2019-) and of the Journal of Italian Cinema & Media Studies (2012-) published by Intellect. She has also guest-edited the special issue of Studies in European Cinema ‘Cinematic Journeys of Italian Women Directors’ (2011) and edited the volume Visions of Struggle in Women’s Filmmaking in the Mediterranean (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).
Course Venue: The American University of Rome
Schedule:
Monday-Thursday
09:00 - 12:30 Instruction and class activities
12:30 - 13:30 Lunch break (lunch included in course fee)
13:30 - 16:30 Instruction and class activities
Friday
09:00 - 12:30 Instruction and class activities
12:30 - 13:30 Closing lunch (lunch included in course fee)
Topics:
- motivation
- creativity
- social-emotional learning
- intercultural competence
- stress and fatigue in teaching.
Course requirements and materials:
- Attendance
- Active participation during in-class activities
- Completion of written final projects
- Students will be provided with all course materials. PPT slides will be shared at the end of each class.
Syllabus
For further information, please email program director Professor Catherine Ramsey-Portolano at c.ramsey@aur.edu
For non-EU citizens, you can check visa requirements here or with your local embassy.