Irene Motyl-Mudretzkyj
“As a foreign-language teaching expert, textbook author and mentor, I ground my work in the following factors: desire for growth, curiosity, insight, reflection, integration and expansion. I am happy to report that, since I started to teach at Barnard in 1998, I have found and still find these qualities unchanged in my students, in myself and in my teaching.”
Irene Motyl-Mudretzkyj, Senior Associate in German and Language Program Coordinator, joined the faculty of Barnard in 1998.
Specializing in innovative foreign language education on the post-secondary level Prof. Motyl-Mudretzkyj co-authored three editions of the textbook, “Anders gedacht”, conducted over 50 professional development seminars and conference presentations and led numerous teacher training internships and mentorships. At Barnard, she recently developed and implemented “Vienna Stories: Filming Identities and Voices”, an advanced German language course integrating digital story-telling, cultural literacy and linguistic competency with a travel abroad film project. During the one-week stay in Vienna, students put their German-language, filming and digital technology skills to use and gathered ethnographic material to produce a short German-language documentary film on identity, the notion of homeland and stereotypes.
Prof. Motyl-Mudretzkyj’s responsibilities include curriculum and language program development, teaching, mentoring, advising and working with students in the Ambassadors for German program, which she founded in 2014, as well as the Barnard Deutsch Club, founded in 2016. Over the past years, Prof. Motyl-Mudretzkyj consistently developed content-based language courses, such as “Vienna Now and Then”, “News and Views: Reception, Reporting and Video Production”, “Current Issues: Media and Politics in Germany and Austria” and “Telenovelas”. In all of her courses, classroom communication and collaboration, dialogue, discussion and film production are based on German and Austrian internet sites, television programs, films, current art shows and cultural events in New York City.
Prof. Motyl-Mudretzkyj has served as consultant for the AATG Professional Development Program and as teacher trainer for the Goethe Institute Teacher Training Network. She has served on numerous task forces, such as the Deutsche Welle/AATG/Goethe Institute Task Force on classroom use of television and the AATG/Goethe Institute Project, “Going the Distance (Long Distance Teacher Training)”. She has also directed intercultural teaching practicums at NYU for graduate students from the United States and Germany.
Author of lesson plans and classroom strategies for the broadcast “Die Deutschstunde,” published by Goethe Institute New York, 1997
- MA, University of California, Santa Barbara
- Vienna Teachers College
- Innovative foreign language pedagogy and curriculum development
- Intercultural awareness and multiple literacies
- Collaborative learning
- Effective and creative use of technology for language learning
- Digital Story Telling
- Duden Award in recognition of outstanding effort and achievement in German instruction, 2008.
- Certificate of Merit for outstanding achievements in furthering and encouraging the study of German language and culture in the United States, American Association of Teachers of German and Goethe Institute, 2005.
- Teaching Excellence Award, Austrian School Council, 1977, 1978, 1979.
- American Association of Teachers of German (AATG), Chapter President, Metropolitan New York, 2001-2003, Secretary and Treasurer, 2016-2018
- American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL)
“Experiencing Intercultural Awareness through Collaborative Learning Projects,” Conference presentation at ACTFL in Nashville, 2017.
“Accessing Texts through Art and Music with Collaborative Learning Strategies,” Conference Workshow at Internationale Deutschlehrer Tagung, Fribourg, Switzerland, 2017.
"Multiple Ways to Incorporate Collaborative Learning in the Foreign Language Classroom,” German School Conference, New York, 2017.
“Edit the Task, not the Text,” Conference presentation at ACTFL in Boston, Massachusetts, 2016.
“Creative approaches to teaching German literary texts from Austria, Germany and Switzerland,” Conference presentation at ACTFL in San Diego, California, 2015.
“The history of Viennese Coffee houses: a teaching unit for Advanced German language learners,” Conference Presentation at ACTFL in San Antonio, Texas, 2014.
“Teaching the 68-er movement in Germany in content-based language classes,” Conference Presentation at Internationale Deutschlehrertagung in Bolzano, Italy, 2013.
“Video projects in the foreign language classroom,” presentation at Barnard’s Faculty Reflections on Teaching with Technology seminar, 2010, 2012, 2016.
“Anders Gedacht” Teaching demonstration and follow-up discussion,” University of Pennsylvania, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, November 201
“Reading and Viewing – literature for children and young adults,” Conference presentation at ACTFL Conference in Boston, November 2010.
“Telenovelas in the Foreign Language Classroom,” Half-day workshop at the Professional Development Conference, AATG (American Association of Teachers of German), Syracuse, New York, March 2010
“Telenovelas in the Foreign Language classroom? Why not?” Conference presentation at Internationale Tagung der Deutschlehrerinnen und Deutschlehrer, August 2009.
“Teaching Cultural Awareness through the Integration of the Arts,” Half-day workshop at the Professional Development Conference for Teachers of German at Rutgers University, April 2009.
“Verliebt in Berlin – Understanding Language and Culture through Telenovelas,” Conference presentation at ACTFL Conference in Orlando, November 2008.
“Television-shows in the Narrative form and their Integration into German language teaching,” Post-Conference Workshop presentation at ACTFL Conference in Orlando, November 2008.
"Teaching about the Holocaust,” Conference presentation at ACTFL Conference in Nashville, November 2006
Publications
Anders gedacht- Text and Context in the German Speaking World. Third Edition. Boston: Cengage Learning, 2014. With Michaela Späinghaus
Anders gedacht- Text and Context in the German Speaking World. Second Edition. Boston: Heinle, Cengage Learning, 2011. With Michaela Späinghaus
Anders gedacht- Text and Context in the German Speaking World. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005. With Michaela Späinghaus
Learning Scenarios (textbook for Intermediate German). New Haven: The Consortium for Language Teaching and Learning, 2000. With Michaela Späinghaus.
Deutsche Welle – Aktuelle Fernsehsendungen im kommunikativen Deutschunterricht (Teachers' Handbook on Using German Television in the Classroom). New York: Goethe Institute, 1995. With Johanna Whiteman.
"Television in the Classroom," Die Unterrichtspraxis (Journal of the American Association ofTeachers of German), spring 1998, pp. 159-166.
In The News
Faculty and students spent the summer dancing in Paris, discovering astrophysics in a city by the banks of the Loire River, and connecting through culture and language in Vienna.