Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Eemz_Rr-GzU5VS9zA1AZtI1MTbztESIg/view
Introductory Video
SPAN 101F: Beginning Spanish
As the first course of the beginning Spanish language sequence, the primary focus in means to advance in fluency as well as communication involves task and content oriented based material. Subdivided into sections, subject material is transposed into a variety of learning mediums, including instructional videos, audio conversations and instructional works, as well as traditional textbook readings (digital and print). Included within these texts are vocabulary lists, examples of terminology and grammar use as well as cultural material.
Overall, early development incorporates reading, writing, listening as well as speaking. Students are also given the opportunity to convey their speaking abilities through the form of verbal/recorded activities as well as recorded conversations involving a classmate as well as tested verbal interviews with the professor. Furthermore, classmates were given the opportunity to communicate with each other through a discussion board on various related topics.
Exploring Culture
Throughout the course, students were provided with a culture section within each chapter, covering various customs/traditions of Spanish Speaking Countries.
One of the culture readings was about customary greetings amongst people in Spanish Speaking Countries. Throughout my readings, I learned that Spaniards and Latin Americans decrease their personal space compared to that of people in the United States. More specifically, I found interesting when people meet, even for the first time, females will accompany the other person with one or two kisses and men usually with a warm handshake or even a hug. At first, I wasn’t too sure of how I felt about this, but after giving it some thought, I came to realize how personable and kind of a gesture this is. Furthermore, I believe that greeting someone in such a personable way, might be a good way to open up the conversation on more of a positive note. Seeing this unique cultural aspect, allows me to consider the possibilities as to what it would be like here in the Americas. After just moving into the city, I realize that a portion of the people that walk by my house through my busy neighborhood do not even lift their head to speak and say hello. This is not everybody, but a nice “hello” or wave at least is pleasing and respectable in my opinion. I feel at least somewhat connected, trusting, and open to others in this manner of greeting. I can imagine following the cultural greetings of Spanish Speaking Countries could be even more powerful in having more positive social connections and outcomes.
A personal story that I can relate to this involves a good Latino friend of mine back when I was younger. One thing I remember was how personable and heartwarming their interactions with their family and even myself were. I remember both of my friends mother and father would always greet me with at least a hug or sometimes a warm handshaker and that always stood out to me how nice and personable that was. In comparison to some other friends of mine who were non-latino, I did not seem to have this connection. I felt more of a closer connection with my Latino friends’ family considering those aspects and with that, can definitely see the benefits of such warm greetings.
Engaging in Communities
Being involved within one’s community has always been a big thing for me. I actually and from a small town in Suffolk Virginia. Just 40-45 mins away from the city in Norfolk, it’s a hundred times different (and similar in many ways). My parent’s have run a pretty popular convenience store in the area as well, which over the years has become a central location for people in the community to engage with one another. With that, I’ve been able to witness the true benefit of community involvement within the store itself. I’ve spent a majority of my life living in this small town, but I can imagine this being so for other towns and cities. Within just our small community and inside of our store, the connection between people is vital for many reasons. A few to name could include updates on the health hand well being of others, word of mouth news updates within the county and surrounding cities, updates from various official and professionals.
Just in our store, we get a variety of officials who come in such as sheriffs, state policemen, firefighters and many more types of professionals and small business owners. Having seen this first hand over the years and showed me the pure benefit of being connected and the power of sharing information with one another. I believe the same can be said as far as benefits of being apart of a global community. However, such information and variety of sources can be held at a much larger scale with this type of involvement.
Interpersonal Communication
Throughout the course, students were often given the opportunity to work and interact directly with other students. Included forms of this was, a video introduction, where students could talk about themselves and discuss their interest in the course. Another was the student and professor interviews, in which both teach and student would hold a short conversation based on material learned from the chapter. In addition, a longer in depth interview was another opportunity we had to put our skills to the test, verbally. Lastly, students were able to contribute their thoughts and responses within a discussion board, in which we were provided as an assignment after reading a portion of material within the chapter, specifically within the topic of culture.
Included in one of the first assignments was introducing ourselves and discussing our interest in the course in further detail, through the form of video on the website FlipGrid. Following, was our next assignment which led students to be able to directly respond to other students. Seeing other students who were new to learning the language and had strong interests in learning was helpful and very motivational to me. I am glad for this form of introduction which allowed me to further invest my interests within the course.
As far as the interviews, this was proven highly effective in learning and applying any new material throughout the course. Challenges arose here at times, where simply, the solution to improving in future endeavors led was to increase studies and expose myself to repeated information as often as possible. I found that overall, that in addition to simply knowing and remembering the terminology and grammar, that actually being encouraged to verbally perform this in the form of a live conversation was the most beneficial in retaining what I’ve learned.
Presentational Speaking
Throughout the progression of the class, soon enough, we were challenged of putting our vocabulary, grammar, and verbal skills to the test in video interviewing with another classmate. Within this interview, we are to interact with one another as if we had just met and in order to get to know each other a little more, we are to communicate an effective conversation based on material learned from that specific chapter. Conversations included place of origin, asking about each others age, where one another lives as well as our concentration of study at the college.
Within the first interview, my partner and I decided to have our first video chat meeting on planning out the conversation. I came to realize that applying this method by planning ahead and forming the conversation with one another was an effective way of preparing for the final recorded interview. What contributed to our success was our previous chapter work and studies which prepared us in developing our conversation successfully, as well as correlating chapter terminology, related to the core topics required in the conversation assignment. There were some difficulties, in finding specific ways to respond to questions or responses in the conversation. However simply going back to read within the chapter and helping one another via VHL chat proved much helpful in solving any challenges along the way.
Provided below is a practice recording (please excuse the pauses) I created in means to prepare for the actual recorded interview between the two of us, which has been recorded and uploaded privately to the VHL Central website.
Below, you will also find screenshots displaying a portion of the same interview, in written form. Again, all of the content found within the conversation were composed in relation to the material found within the correlating assigned chapters.
Overall, I feel that this assignment has proven to be most beneficial. Furthermore, I believe being able to practice applying the words and grammatical principles you learn throughout the chapter within an actual daily conversation can be more effective in learning a language. Even compared to writing out an interview/question & answer conversation solely on paper, being able to do so and practice verbally has proven to me to be much more effective in contributing what I’ve learned to my long-term memory and overall understanding.
Presentational Writing
Within the presentation writing portion of the course, students were assigned to create a composition based on Ampliación sections from the Aventuras textbook. Furthermore, we are required to compose this writing without any outside resources. Following the “Escribir” portion of this section, my primary focus was to introduce myself briefly sa well as describe members of my family. This terminology was primarily obtained from studying chapter 3 material. In addition, I used material learned from Chapter 4 to describe a variety of activities held on campus. This screenshot specifically is a re-written form of my assignment, as I initially have submitted the original via a secured browser.
As this assignment was due within the end of the semester, it has become much use to me to have experience with much of the terminology and grammar learned from the previous chapters. Having practiced such material in advance and consistently viewing and listening to repeated information and vocabulary has proved beneficial in performing such assignments effectively. Furthermore, I can emphasize that even later throughout the end of the semester, going back to reread previous material from the earlier chapters is also beneficial as this material is dated and provides as a good refresher.
Below is a sample of my re-written composition:
Interpretive Listening
As far as Interpretive Listening goes, with the benefit of technology within this digital course, students were given the opportunity to listen to various audio recordings of conversations and interactions.
I remember specifically when first starting the course, I had challenges in learning how to be verbally sound, as far as being able to properly pronunciate various words and flow naturally within a conversation. The audio below is one of the first recordings I can recall which really stuck out to me and helped me initially understand the flow of conversation as well as the change of pitch within forms of conversing and forming questions. I believe that overall, being repetitively exposed to verbal communications held within various circumstances can prove to be highly beneficial in learning a new language.
Interpretive Reading
Within assigned readings, one that really stood out to me was our assignment to research about “El Paseo” a famous tradition held in Spanish Speaking Countries, which involves going out for a leisurely stroll with friend and/or family after dinnertime to help their food digest and burn off calories at the same time. During the “El Paseo” is a time to get out side of the house and spend time with family and close ones. It is a time for the whole community to be involved and can be practiced every evening.
Below is a link to one of the articles that stood out to me, upon researching “El Paseo”
All in all, I was much enthused to read about such a daily rituals and found it interesting to read and learn about different cultural practices. I believe that the best way to grow and find new enjoyable things in life is to expose yourself to new things such as this cultural tradition “El Paseo.” I’ve definitely been inspired just from this alone and look forward to apply this tradition to my own life and learning more of various cultural traditions for inspiration.