Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

In my Spanish class, I learned some of the cultures throughout the textbook articles and the Flash Cultura videos.

In one of the articles in the textbook, I learned that a normal greeting in Spanish culture is a kiss on the cheek for women and a handshake for men. I was used to seeing men doing a handshake as a greeting here in the United States, but I was not familiar with a kiss on the cheek as a greeting, which is why it interested me.

Engaging in Communities

I believe that engaging in other communities is very important because it is important to immerse yourself in other countries. Being well-rounded has taught me so many things and life lessons and it made me want to pursue a career involving global relations.

Interpersonal Communication

For my class, we did plenty of discussion boards to help us practice our writing. This has helped me learn more of the Spanish language because I am getting more familiar with accent marks. This is important because I am learning how to read and write in Spanish. Below is one of my previous discussion boards.

Discussion board 2

“¿Cómo te llamas?”

Me llamo Haley Stewart. 

“¿De dónde eres?”

Soy de los Estados Unidos. 

“¿Cuántos estudiantes hay en la clase de español?”

Hay veintitrés estudiantes en la clase de español. 

“¿Qué hora es?”

Son las once y media de la noche. 

“¿A qué hora es la clase de español?”

La clase de español es a la una de la tarde. at= al/ a las

Discussion Boards have helped me so much to immerse myself in the language. Learning to write with accent marks can be a challenge for me because I tend to forget which letter needs an accent mark. However, writing in the discussion boards have definitely made me more aware of the writing style for the Spanish language.

Presentational Speaking

In my Spanish class, our teachers will organize oral presentations. All of the students will have a certain schedueled time during class for each student to do an oral presentation in front of the profesor by ourselfs or with a classmate as a partner. This has also been a great technique to help me learn spanish because I am learning to pronunciate certain words correctly, and if not, then I am corrected by my professor.

During the entirety of my Spanish class, oral presentations have been a great help to me. I was a challenge sometimes because I tend to enunciate some words incorrectly or do not roll my “R’s” correctly (which I am still practising). Also, doing oral presentations with a partner also helps me because I get more practise having conversations with people in Spanish, which of course is essential. Without the oral presentations, I would not have improved as much in the language in a short period of time.

Presentational Writing

I have written a few compositions in my Spanish class this semester. Writing compositions has given me the ultimate amount of practice with writing in Spanish. Below is one of my compositions that I completed this semester.

Mi Familia 

Buenos Tardes, Mi familia es muy grande. Mi familia es divertida y simpática. Los nombres de mis padres son Annmarie y Steve. Mi mamá es de Granada y mi papá es de Ingleterra. Mi mamá está cincuenta y cinco años. Mi papá está cincuenta y cinco años. Mi papá es mechánico y Mi mamá es el doctor. Tengo cuatro hermanos y tres hermanas. Tengo cuatro hermanos menores. Tengo una hermana mayor. Mis hermanos está simpáticos y divertidos. Yo quiero mi familia mucho. 

Adiós, 

Haley Stewart

The compositions have given me more room to practice forming sentences in Spanish. Knowing nouns and verbs in Spanish isn’t difficult for me. However, putting sentences together was a little more difficult. which is why the feedback I got from my professor helped me advance more in my writing. One thing that I would definitely do next time is study more about forming sentences in Spanish so I can always remember what words I need to use to make my compositions better.

Interpretive Listening

For our daily assignments, most times, we had to listen to a recording of someone speaking in spanish and the assignment was to answer questions. The questions would either be true/false questions, multiple choice, fill in the blank or we would have to write a sentence answering the question.

The listening assigments were most likely my least favorite technique when learning spanish. However, it still helped me in a way. This technique also helped me learn how to pronounce certain words in Spanish, especially words I have not heard before. Although this technique wasn’t my favorite, it still helped me advance in the Spanish language.