Reflection

This semester we built on the foundation of Spanish.  Last semester we focused on learning the basics such as vocabulary, tenses, grammar and sentence structure. Now we are focusing more on sentence forms such as how to directly talk to someone, past tense, present tense, and possessive adjectives. I started the semester barely being able to form a solid sentence. My comprehension has expanded. My ability to recognize what’s being said in Spanish recordings has improved for the more my speaking has gotten a lot better. Additionally, in my writing skills I’ve also improved.

Exploring Culture

Exploring the many cultures the world has to offer can be quite insightful. Not only to your development and understanding. It can also help you with understanding some of the costumes that come with learning a new language. Simple things like greetings vary from different cultures. Within Spanish culture greetings are a lot more intimate no matter if you know the person or not. Additionally, even the importance of sports is different across the world. In spanish cultures soccer is a widely played sport and is a delicacy. Lastly, by learning a different language and culture we come to appreciate both the similarities and differences that are across the world.

Engaging in Communities

A big thing we learned throughout Spanish is exploring the cultures can help improve are understanding of certain customs. This has been very intriguing, especially during our food unit as I made it a point to try some of the different foods that are offered in different countries. Food is a very important part of the culture because it connects the individuals and also explores the different ingredients that are available through that region. It also sheds light on the many things that are done across the world such as how veggies may be grown, how differently they care for their animals and even how different places process their food.

By going to different Hispanic restaurants, I understood the importance they have for their food. A lot of the time they make their bigger meals for their family so their meals are supposed to be more social interaction based. Where the family gets together to all eat and talk about how they are.  It also made me appreciate the importance of a family meal and actually getting together day by day to talk about everything that’s going on. The delicacy of having a family meal each day revealed how difficult it is to actually prepare and set up family meals. Each day typically the women set aside time to make the meal which can consume a lot of their time. The just demonstrates how important family is to them.

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Interpersonal Communication

Throughout the semester we have had different speaking activities, such as our talk abroad, our conversations with our instructor and our conversations via Flipp grid. Each activity has helped me develop my ability to speak and pronounce the words that I am learning. It was very difficult to communicate at first. I second guessed everything I was trying to say but, the more we were able to practice the more I felt comfortable trying new words and phrases. 

One of the activities that we did twice throughout the semester was our talk abroad conversations with our companion. The individual who I chose to talk to was Natalia. She is also a student and from looking over her profile I realized we had a lot of similarities. Only big difference is that she is a student from El Salvador and her first language is Spanish. She was very beginner friendly, which helped with me communicating with her, but I did find it difficult at times because she said different words from what we’ve previously learned. I had to use what she said around our conversation to get a gist of what she said. I found that I was really good talking about things I knew like my family and food, but I had a hard time trying to conjugate my words as I was speaking. One thing I learned is that speaking another language is very difficult but also it comes with constant practice. One thing I will say is that I could plan out my conversation a lot better, but also actively try to participate with somebody who could ask me questions that I can’t prepare for on my own.

Presentational Speaking

 In my presentation on speaking, I noticed that being properly prepared made me feel more confident when speaking in a different language. When I try to think of things on the spot, I feel like I tend to stutter or repeat myself. My ability to multitask has become a lot better due to the fact, since we are speaking in Spanish, we also have to be able to translate what is being said and what we are trying to say in English and then also make sure we have the formatting right in Spanish. 

Our biggest presentations were the flip grid conversations with our instructor and our taco Bri. For each speaking activity, we had to prepare what we were going to say and be prepared for possibly being asked. This involves writing out possible questions and answers for each possible question as long as reviewing the vocabulary that went along with each unit we were being examined on. I did really well in my preparation each time it came to my presentation speaking, but as much as that did help when my nerves got the better of me at times, it made it very difficult to remember what I studied. I think I need to study a lot more on the material to feel less nervous when I’m trying to speak to others. I also need to learn how to take a deep breath and focus on what’s being said to the best of my abilities rather than maybe one word I’m not able to understand.

Presentational Writing

This semester we completed some writing activities, such as discussion board post, writing assignments, within our workbook, and writing on some of the exams we were given throughout the semester. We did a lot of fill in the blank assignments that tested our knowledge.

 Even knowing the vocabulary, trying to write, was very difficult due to the different pronunciations and spelling. In another language their sentence structures and pronunciations differ. Additionally, at times I would remember the word, but forget that the word had an accident where exactly the accident was. I found that writing was a lot easier when I stuck with words that related more with me. I tried to focus learning word I use on a daily basis. It seemed to help me write better. I also took a lot more time to reread my writing to make sure that everything made sense. When it came to topics such as food, I really like food so writing about the different foods that I liked and what I wanted to try was a lot easier than writing about different topics. I do believe though to better develop my writing I could do things such as write a to do list in Spanish.

Interpretive Listening

Some of the stuff we have done throughout the course semester when it comes to listening is some of our listen and response answers going over YouTube videos, and even some of the listening I’ve done on my personal time which is listening to different music in Spanish. Our ability to listen and understand what was being said to us has been a constant activity that we have been working on. Even with communicating to other from different places there was a difference in the variety of words that were being said. I learned that translating what we hear is not simply translating what we hear but rather translating it and interpreting what the whole message is.

I made it a point to practice my listening through the material I was given but also seek further material, therefore, I took it into my own hands by constantly listening to Spanish music and making myself watch things in Spanish to develop my understanding of the language and allow myself to understand the surrounding text at times to breakdown words I was unfamiliar with. This allowed me to become very well rounded and understanding what’s going on in the conversation at first it was very difficult, and I seem to get frustrated a lot quicker when I couldn’t understand the full sentence of what was going on. I try to focus on a positive of understanding at least half of the sentence to get the gist of what was going on. I understand that at times I may not always know the full sentence, but it’s something I can work on and continuously do things to develop my understanding.

Interpretive Reading

Another thing that was constantly stressed was our ability to read in Spanish. Therefore, we had a lot of assignments based on reading material. From our workbook assignment to reading paragraphs on our exams from even doing some of the discussion boards in Spanish, which constantly caused us to break down the words and understand what was being said.

The work that challenged me the most was the interpretive reading assignments. Through the semester we have gone over articles fully in Spanish and have had to read and interpret them as well as answer questions to interpret what we have learned. This especially has been a difficult task because some of the material has exposed us to expressions and words, we are not familiar with. This has really tested our comprehension abilities. It forced me to really go over the materials I was learning to improve my comprehension. Additionally, I had to work on practicing a lot more to understand our readings. Overall reading is another key aspect of the language, and it requires constant practice, but it allows me to expand my knowledge in Spanish.