Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Instructions

Exploring Culture

Due to the military service of my father, I have encountered many different cultures. Since everyone grows up in a different way, I believe that keeping an open mind and the ideals of not passing judgment on others might help you understand cultural perspectives. By conversing with people and promoting smaller local/cultural enterprises, I have learned about other cultural viewpoints. My best friend Dre was in middle school when I was still in elementary school, so I feel like I matured at a young age. I also believe that my growth in understanding cultural perspectives came from spending a lot of time with my cousins and uncles and always hanging out with older people during my childhood.

Being blended with many different cultures and growing up in poverty, I myself went through challenges. The majority of my buddies in Hawaii were both African Americans and Hispanics. The best we can all do, in my opinion, is to be conscious of the diversity of cultures and to be understanding. I’ve always thought of the world as being filthy and depressing. You never know the struggles people deal with at home and in the outside world, so I’ve always just tried to be the guy who makes jokes and brightens everyone’s day. I consider myself fortunate to have grown up surrounded by so many different cultures, developing that understanding at an early age. My best friend and current roommate since seventh grade is Hispanic. This section of questions is difficult for me to answer because my understanding of everyone way beyond race and cultures has been the same way since my childhood. You never forget it when you help out small local companies and witness how happy they are when you give back. Because the world is so nasty, you start to want to always make people smile and give back as much as you can. I’ve always found relief from my personal issues through helping others. Nowadays, browsing the web and the wealth of books and articles available can teach you a lot about culture. The perspective of cultures and understanding came natural and was never a problem, I have never had any misconception towards any race or difficulties understanding various stereotypes because I knew they are just stereotypes and does not define all humans of that race or culture.

Engaging in Communities

The top priority, in my opinion, is being involved in your community. I experienced and have seen what it’s like to struggle because I grew up in a less wealthy neighborhood or area. I became aware of how cruel the world is at a young age and how simple it is to change things and make someone smile. My mom taught me at a young age that it is always best to try and help out others whenever I have an opportunity. There are a good amount of homeless that live in areas near me in Florida and every time I get an opportunity I make sure to hand out some cash to them, to try and make there day a little better and help out even if it’s just a little bit.

In my fraternity we try and help out the community in whatever way we can by setting up philanthropy events as often as possible as well as fundraisers. A tradition we do is that every year for halloween we team up with the United Methodist Church to help them unload an 18 wheeler full of pumpkins. Here is a photo I have of my fraternity brothers and I at the church last year after a long day of unloading some heavy pumpkins.

Interpersonal Communication

Talk Abroad is a website that matches those who are trying to learn a new language with those who are native speakers. This semester we had to complete 2 assignments on talk abroad where I had a 15 minute conversation with a Native Speaker on a certain topic. The first assignment was based around the topic of family and explaining my family. The second assignment was on mental health and my hygiene. We had to complete as well multiple oral assignments on lingro learning listening to a conversation then responding. We did numerous amounts of group discussion during class as well as with the teacher which improved the oral side.

My teacher did not have us do as many spontaneous group discussions that I had to do last year. I was honestly surprised by the amount of unplanned group conversations because I thought a higher level of Spanish would include more conversation to express vocabulary knowledge and understanding. The TalkAbroad assignments were on different topics but styled in the same way as they were in my last class. For projects that we did and turned in on lingrolearning we had to respond to multiple classmates in Spanish on how they did and how they could improve. These responses helped with a higher level of communication as well as learning new vocabulary. After every assignment/activity I walked away fixing a mistake I made and learning from that mistake or learning something new from what a classmate said or from a mistake that they made. I felt very strong on my conjugation skills based on the form used and the people being explained. After learning of conjugations of words based on the type of tense was very difficult to me and I still make mistakes on it. I overcame the difficulty by practice and the teachers explanations but sometimes I mix up the rules for each tense. I learned that asking questions pays off even if it may be annoying, next time I will not fail to ask or reach out to any students who want to practice.

Presentational Speaking

We only had to complete 1 presentation this semester with a powerpoint as well as an interview with the teacher. We did not have to complete as many presentational speaking activities as I imagined. On lingrolearning, we had to complete numerous activities that was a voice recording and we would have to respond back with an audio.

I only had to complete one presentation this semester, which was on the topic of my family. I had to create a presentation on my family and I as I explained their characteristics and the numerous hobbies they enjoy. With the pictures of my family on the presentation the point was to use the vocabulary and expand our ability to explain hobbies and characters of an individual. What challenged me was trying to not repeat the same vocabulary words when explaining my family members, I overcame that challenge by thinking outside the box and not just doing what may be the easiest the say and remember. I excelled at pronunciation, of the vocabulary and in general, the teacher said I spoke very well. Next time, I will design my presentation differently and add more photos to better represent the characteristics of my family members.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nO1jiIRRzDl9_2_X9RmlGZ_K_-9yAYD5/view?usp=share_link

Presentational Writing

I had to complete an assignment where I had to create a flyer for a club of my choice that I am trying to persuade others to join and why. The only other presentational writing assignment we had to do was creating an infographic and explaining it and how it ties to mental health. A copy of my flyer for the club of baloncesto is included.

The most recent presentational communication assignment we had to complete was the infographic which was a set of images that we brought to class to write a paragraph on and how they relate to mental health. The assignment I did well on and enjoyed was the flyer I created for the basketball club that I was representing. I grew from this assignment because that was the first time I have ever created and wrote out a flyer in Spanish. The difficult part was writing out what I would say in English and converting it to Spanish, it was hard because I had to dig deep in vocabulary for the best explanation. There were words I did not know how to say in Spanish leaving me stuck. I was able to overcome this by asking classmates as well as the teacher, I used resources the teacher provided to search for words but I didn’t want to rely on it. I excelled with the explanation of the basketball club as well as creating a flyer that would catch someones eye. I made sure to pick a sport that I had enough knowledge on myself and a sport I could actually present in a way that would make people want to join. I could do better next time by going above and beyond with the document design.

Interpretive Listening

Besides group discussion and the discussions with the teacher by her asking us a question then us responding we didn’t complete any interpretive listening activities. In lingrolearning, there were multiple assignments throughout the semester where there were audios of sentences or even a paragraph and you have to click the right choice of the question based on the audio. Besides the homework, we didn’t complete much listening activities in class.

I listened to paragraphs as well as other small readings on lingrolearning that covered the topic of the module to further test our understanding. There is one thing about understanding Spanish and there is another with responding to what you heard and keeping up the conversation. I am unable to add a recording because they are on a website of assignments that are scattered and the audios are not retrievable. The only other audio recording I plan on adding is the conversation on Talk Abroad I had with a native speaker, it made me listen to what he was saying and respond in a conversation matter. Some parts were unclear because some of the vocabulary used I did not understand but I was able to pull myself together and continue on the conversation. I overcame this difficulty by using hints of words used to try and gather the idea he was compelling, I used key words to stay on topic. I found most interesting how many paths can be taken depending on the use of vocabulary. My takeaway from the listening experience is that you must be clear, be engaged and focused. I have grown massively in my understanding and ability to respond and use vocabulary.

Interpretive Reading

The material of the cultural study assignment on Lingrohub is entirely in Spanish, with the participants discussing their life or the nations they are from. I had to translate what they were saying and then respond to inquiries about what they had discussed. The assignments would have a description of a person and we have to link the following answer choices that would fit best to the individuals. There are also sections that show us professions and gender roles in the Spanish-speaking world which I will be providing an example of from the website. There are different correspondents from each country giving us an idea of their daily lives and what they do living in that country.

This improved my ability to apply context cues and helped me comprehend the terminology I was learning in that unit. Some of the words they used in their text were not words I have studied. As a result, in order to comprehend what they are saying, I would need to refer to the relevant language that I was already familiar with.

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