The Cactus Course Outlines provide a learning framework for the Cactus Foreign Language Evening Courses. They are designed to provide you with a good idea of what you might cover over a 10-week period, and include typical themes, grammar and vocabulary fields. They are flexible rather than prescriptive, in that our teachers may decide to adapt their learning plans to the specific level, aims and interests of their classes. Use the tabs below to view the relevant Croatian course outline for your level.
Croatian Beginner 1
Topics & Vocabulary:
- Introductions – where from, family
- Checking in
- Greeting people
- Eating & drinking
- Jobs
- Likes & dislikes
- Travel and getting around: simple directions
- Places – shops, important buildings
- Describing things and paces: size, shape, age, speed, colour, etc.
- Numbers 1 – 10
Grammar:
- To be
- Present – simple simple/continuous
- Past – simple
- Future – going to + infinitive
- Pronouns – subject, object, possessive
- Singular vs. Plural
- Articles
- Word order – sentence, question
- Questions – yes/no, wh-
- Giving instructions – using the imperative
- Key cases and prepositions
Cultural Content:
- Invitations, offers, suggestions, requests
- Everyday Croat Culture
- Everyday speaking and polite forms of speech
- Seasonal festivals, Saints’ days
- The Croat diaspora
- Idiomatic expressions
- Facts about Croatia : property, holidays, climate, etc
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Alphabet / Writing / Reading
- Lots of listening
- Pronunciation – key sounds
Croatian Beginner 2
Topics & Vocabulary:
- Talking about self & others, inc. family – key personal info
- Who/which/what/how/when/where/how much/many
- Jobs
- Travel and getting around – Directions
- Holidays
- Hotels & restaurants
- Leisure Time
- Money & shopping, Some/any
- Describing people
- Town & Country
- Home
- Common feelings & emotions
Grammar:
- Review & practise level 1 grammar (eg. through mixed tense work – present/past/future)
- Present Perfect
- Past Continuous
- The future
- Ability and permission
- Possessives
- Cases and prepositions – place and movement
- Adjectives & adverbs
Cultural Content:
- Meeting and greeting people
- Agreeing and refusing
- Croat / Serbo-Croat – language and history
- Seasonal festivals, Saints’ days
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Lots of listening
- Pronunciation – key sounds
Croatian Beginner 3
Topics & Vocabulary:
- Talking about self & others, inc. family – key personal info
- Who/which/what/how/when/where/how much/many
- Jobs
- Travel
- Holidays
- Eating & drinking
- Health/illness
- Meetings
- Leisure Time
- Money & shopping
- Describing people
Grammar:
- Verb tense, aspect and mood: aspect prefixes, etc.
- Modality
- Adjectives and adverbs
- Case, number and agreement
Cultural Content:
- Geography, cities and accommodation
- The cultural of dining out and visiting
- Sports and leisure
- Serbia and Ex-Jugoslavia: religion and politics
- Seasonal festivals, Saints’ days
- Common signs
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Lots of listening
- Pronunciation – key sounds
Croatian Elementary 1
Topics & Vocabulary:
- Geographic terms, points of compass
- Excursions
- Booking flights-boats-trains
- Booking hotels
- Telephone conversations
- Talking about the weather
- Reporting on events
- Expressing opinions
- Expressing agreement-disagreement
Grammar:
- Subjectless sentences to describe weather conditions and subjective states
- Past tense / affirmative-negative-questions
- Future tense / affirmative-negative-questions
- Word order in the past and future tenses
- Introduction to enclitics
- Reported speech-reported questions
- Personal pronouns – nominative-genitive-accusative-dative
- Imperfective/perfective verbs – pairs
- Indefinite pronouns and adverbs created from interrogative words / tko, što, gdje, kako and kada with the addition of prefixes ni-, ne- and sva-.
Cultural Content:
- Croatian geography, main rivers, mountains, islands
- Geography of the Balkans, main countries and capitals
- Staying in private accommodation in the Adriatic
- Visiting northern Croatia
- Visiting Dalmatia and the islands
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Lots of listening
- Writing short essays
- Improving comprehension
Croatian Elementary 2
Topics & Vocabulary:
- Summer holidays, beach life
- Talking about the weather
- Talking about dates, seasons of the year
- Clothes and fashion
- Expressing feelings, moods
Grammar:
- Expressing dates
- Numbers and agreement with other elements in a sentence
- Further work on adjectival declension
- Idiomatic use of the instrumental
- If clauses
- Further work on verbal aspect
- Imperfective-perfective verbs of movement
- Future Exact
- Potential mode
- Declension of interrogative pronouns tko and što and indefinite pronouns netko, nitko and nešto, ništa.
- Personal pronouns – instrumental
Cultural Content:
- Croatian vs Bosnian, Montenegrin, Serbian
- Iyekavian, Ekavian and Ikavian pronunciations of the BCMS language system
- Listening to ex-Yugoslav music
- Daily life in former Yugoslavia
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Lots of listening
- Writing short essays
- Improving comprehension
- Expanding vocabulary
Croatian Elementary 3
Topics & Vocabulary:
- How are you feeling?
- Visiting the doctor
- Talking about ailments
- Return to work after holidays
- Business negotiations
- Business trip
- Chatting to colleagues about work
Grammar:
- Comparison of adjectives and adverbs
- Relative clauses
- Interrogative and relative pronouns – koji, čiji, kakav, koliki
- Irregular plurals for dijete / djeca; brat / braća and gospodin / gospoda
- Revision of all grammar covered in Complete Croatian
Cultural Content:
- Ex-Yugoslav music
- Ex-Yugoslav culture
- Food in the Balkans
- Childhood in former Yugoslavia
Skills Work:
- Lots of speaking/active practice
- Lots of listening
- Writing essays
- Improving comprehension
- Expanding vocabulary
- Proficiency in the use of grammar patterns / cases and verbal aspects in particular
- Translation exercises