Exploring Culture

Napping, taking naps when I could benefited me a lot especially when you’re trying to take in some much knowledge at a time. After learning about cultural perspective I picked up on the fact that that is a normal thing in other cultures. I know a few other people in class that also practice this and it has benefited them as well. At first like others who don’t regularly nap I was skeptical of how much time it’s taking out of my day. I’ve never really been a nap person until this year but after seeing the benefits of what it does to me and my other classmates I have to start making it a normal practice. I am glad to have gained this knowledge and this tool from another culture. 

PDF Embedder requires a url attribute

Engaging in Communities

Engaging in the community is a big thing because it introduces people to a wide variety of cultures and backgrounds and people you never thought you would meet. You gain a lot of friends and strong connections with other people in your communities from being engaged. Engaging in a different community is a whole other thing though. Engaging in a different community is probably one of the coolest things you could do. I dont happen to have any pictures but last Thanksgiving we spent it with one of our family friends who has a huge family who are all from Mexico, and being able to see their culture in their food and how they spoke to each other and engaged was a wonderful thing. 

Interpersonal Communication

During our semester we had a lot of classes that involved speaking to either the teacher or eachother. Our instructor made sure we spoke at least once a class. It was a good way to prepare for upcoming homework or oral assignments or oral exams. 

Personally speaking is my biggest issue. I have a lot easier of a time being able to read or to write and just flow with the words but when it comes to speaking I would always freeze up and forget what I wanted to say even though I studied and knew what to say. I get nervous too quickly being put on the spot when it comes to speaking. Definitely need to keep practicing and working on my speaking so it’s not as much of an issue in future classes. 

Presentational Speaking

During the course we had a few video recording projects but one of them was to explain areas around your home. It was interesting learning things about my house in Spanish like words for certain things and I definitely still need to work on my speaking. 

Then, in a paragraph, write a reflection that includes each presentation you completed in which you explain what challenged you and how you grew and overcome those challenges.  What did you excel at? What/how would you do differently next time? 

During our presentations there weren’t really many challenges to face. I enjoyed having ultimate attempts till I was satisfied. One challenge I did face as I keep mentioning is my speaking and pronunciation of spanish words is still a struggle for me. You can see in my video the way I pronounce words isn’t always correct or I forget words. Definitely still needs improvement and still needs work but hopefully I can get there eventually. 

Presentational Writing

During our semester we had to recreate our school schedules in spanish. We had to write our day schedule in paragraph form. It was honestly pretty difficult trying to remember all of the times but I got it done. I took spanish throughout grade school and have learned this stuff before but since i don’t practice it never stuck. 

Learning how to make a schedule definitely added to my spanish skills. My understanding has grown and it’s getting easier over time. Glad to finally be able to know the days of the week and the times on a clock. 

Interpretive Listening

The listening we participated in was within oral assignment videos, we had a few Lingo assignments with speaking. I had some struggles with speaking like I mentioned. I had trouble understanding other people at first but it eventually got easier for me and I got a little better understanding. Some of the listening took me a couple times but with time it got better. 

Interpretive Reading

A lot of our reading activities were trying to understand and read text, emails and other stuff in Spanish to help us gain a better understanding of the language and of the culture. 

The text messages were the easiest because they were shorter and not as lengthy or complicated. Emails were more formal so it was harder to understand at first but eventually I got it done pretty good. After this semester I definitely feel most confident in my reading and hope to keep improving and gaining knowledge on it.