Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

In this course I was granted the opportunity to explore a different culture through articles, videos, and other interactive activities. Each of these focused on a different aspect of cultures in the Spanish speaking world such as family structure, LGBTQIA+ rights, food, occupations to name just a few. These helped to grow my understanding immensely because all of these were made by native Spanish speakers from a variety of backgrounds who were sharing their own lived experiences. For example, my favorite cultural analysis activity was when we did a discussion board based off of an article that delved into the topic of machismo, marianismo, and the traditional familial roles in Hispanic culture. This was a very interesting way to discover similarities and differences within the culture of the United States of America and theirs.

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Interpersonal Communication

An interesting aspect of this course was the use of TalkAbroad, this site gave me access to Spanish speaking strangers across the globe who could help me practice and cultivate my conversational skills. On the site I was able to see information about their personality and interests and then make appointments with individuals who I think I could enjoy conversation with. Throughout the length of the term I had 2 conversations and both were great, but I especially enjoyed my first conversation

TalkAbroad was an extremely effective tool in highlighting my speaking strengths and weaknesses. By using this I was able to find out that I struggled to think in Spanish and also come up with thoughtful questions to ask my partner as well. Over time, I was able to recognize and improve these difficulties that I had. Overall, I found the experience enjoyable and crucial to my comprehension of the language.

Interpretive Listening

In this course our listening activities were primarily through our online textbook or on Canvas for exams and quizzes.

I typically found these listening activities to be quite challenging. I found myself struggling to comprehend what the speaker was saying and be able to effectively answer questions based off of what I heard. Although, through practice and repeatedly listening to the activities I was able to slowly grow my skills in this department. For me, I feel as though listening to and comprehending what another person is saying in Spanish is the hardest skill to get down, but after this term I do feel much more capable.

Interpretive Reading

The interpretive readin activities were my favorite part of the course because I feel I am most proficient in reading comprehension in Spanish. This course made learning Spanish feel both fun and practical by giving us articles and research assignments that felt very connected to modern and mature topics and politics.

The part that I enjoyed the most was how quickly I was able to build up my reading skills due to the nature of the topics. For example, one of the first interpretive reading activities we did involved researching LGBTQIA+ rights in a Spanish speaking country of our choosing. By being able to lead my own independent research into a topic I was able to familiarize and introduce myself to a wide array of new vocabulary. This is because we had to look up articles in Spanish so I was able to not only see words I knew from the Unit but also learn words and phrases that are commonly exercised. This activity also helped me build up my ability to use context clues to figure out what an author or write was saying.

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