Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

Throughout the semester, in this class we did numerous exercises on exploring different Spanish cultures through Contraseña and LingroLearning. At the end of each unit, there is a section titled “Exploración cultural.” In this section, it gives students different perspectives on certain topics from different countries. For instance, it gives perspectives of the hispanic world on social networking, formality, nap-time, university life, and admiring others. At the end of this section, students are to participate by picking a Spanish-speaking country, and using the different methods given for each unit on how to research information for these countries. Questions asked were related to the topics covered in each unit.

Doing these practices allowed me to gain an understanding of how different cultures are in each country and provided me an opportunity to expand my knowledge. It gave me a chance to compare a Spanish-speaking country culture to my very own culture. They challenged my worldview by encouraging to step out of my comfort zone and try new methods and learn things that I wasn’t aware of at first. It gave me a broader understanding on Spanish cultures and proved to me how different they are from each other. One of the challenges that I faced while doing this was trying out the different research methods on the search engine. While doing this, I had a hard time doing something that I wasn’t used to doing and instead wanted to stick to my usual research method. However, as we progressed through the semester, I became comfortable with these methods and started using them on my own personal time. An example of these practices helping me work through a stereotype or a misconception would be in regards to social networking. I was not aware that social media use was so large in Spanish-speaking countries. It also corrected me on my thought that Instagram was a popular social media platform globally. Instead the popularity of platforms vary based on the country. For instance, I found out on a Statista data report in 2018, that the most used social media network in the Dominican Republic was WhatsApp with 77% of respondents. Instagram came in fourth place with 41% of respondents.

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Engaging in Communities

It is important for me to engage in my immediate community as doing so brings unity. It also gives me the opportunity to meet new people and expand my horizons. As for engaging in a global community, it allows you to be aware of different cultures and different lifestyles. It prevents you from being close-minded and making misconceptions. Overall engaging in communities brings people together and encourages sympathy for others and their situations.

An experience I have had in participating in these communities by talking to my neighbors and participating in campus events, such as going to the ODU homecoming football game with my friends. I also engage with the global community by being on social media through apps like Instagram and TikTok. Especially TikTok as there are a lot of people that use the app around the world.

Interpersonal Communication

In the course, I’ve completed some activities to assist in my interpersonal communication. These activities include doing discussion board posts and group projects (Conversaciones). I’ve also engaged in practicing my Spanish by talking to my friends and occasionally using it in everyday conversations.

Throughout the semester, for each unit, there was a discussion board that was due at the end of it. For the discussion boards we had to answer a question in response to either the lesson or a video. Afterwards, we were told to respond to at least one of our classmates. Towards the later discussion boards, it was required of us to write some sentences in Spanish in order to see if we can write in it. With each discussion board, I found myself getting better at my responses as they became more detailed and less vague. I had a difficult time responding to my classmates as I wasn’t sure how to exactly respond to them. But I soon began treating it as if I was having a face-to-face conversation which helped me overcome it. I excelled at my responses as I knew what to say and had an easy time understanding what was expected to me. This was due to the instructions being clear and straight to the point. I also had a difficult time in being time-efficient with my posts so what I would do differently is turn them in sooner to allow myself more time to give my best work.

The group projects were called Conversaciones and they were also given at the end of each unit. During this we had to meet with our partners on Zoom and do the assignment together. We had to record ourselves doing the assignment and had to strictly speak in Spanish with no notes. I had a hard time with doing them at first as I am someone who prefers to work individually rather than in a group. However, I had to get over this and push through for the sake of my grade and the class. Another thing that I struggled with was not using any notes as I had to remember what to say and make sure I was saying everything correctly. With the first group project I had a difficult time memorizing everything and relied heavily on my notes. However, throughout the semester, I began preparing myself for the projects and allowed myself more time to practice and memorize what I was going to say. At the end, I didn’t need my notes and was able to say sentences with confidence. I excelled at formulating my sentences on my own and relaying them to my partners with ease. This made it easier for me to do the group projects with my partners as I became more comfortable with working with them.

Presentational Speaking

Throughout the semester, we have utilized presentational speaking. We’ve utilized this specifically when we were practicing on our pronunciation of the alphabet, when we had to answer 6 questions in Spanish to introduce ourselves, and when we had to list and describe our favorite places on campus.

In my presentation of the alphabet, I excelled at pronouncing most of the letters. I had difficulty in pronouncing the letters x and w as their pronunciation was different from their spelling. I was about to overcome this though with practice and listening to more words that included these letters to assist in getting an idea on how they should be pronounced. Next time, what I would do differently is set more time aside for myself to practice these letters so that I don’t have as hard of a time as I did this semester. As for answering the questions to introduce myself, I excelled at answering the questions with minimum confusion. I was also able to say these questions with little mistake. Except, I struggled with coming up with detailed sentences in order to make my presentation more interesting. I overcame this by continuing with what I had, despite it being simple. What I would do differently is study different ways of introducing myself in order to improve my presentation and put more effort into it. Lastly, when listing and describing our favorite places on campus, I excelled at listing the places as I am on campus everyday, enough to help me identify where I like to go. I struggled with describing the places, though, because I struggled with figuring how to say some of the descriptions in Spanish. I was able to overcome this by looking in the Spanish Dictionary and the notes given in LingroLearning to help me find the words and statements I was looking for. What I would do differently, however, is be better prepared with the presentation. During the time I would say I didn’t have the time to put a lot of effort into the assignment, which is why I regret my lackluster attempt. The assignment as a whole seemed interesting to do but I wasn’t able to do it to its full potential.

Presentational Writing

Presentational writing has been used this semester when we do our individual projects (Proyectos). Proyectos are individual assessments that is given to us at the end of each unit to associate our personal experience with the lesson.

Instances where we’ve presented for proyectos would be when we had to create a social media profile in Spanish, when we had to provide our own scheduling of the day in Spanish, and when we had to write a letter to nominate someone we admired for a reward. It became easier for me to write what I wanted to write about in Spanish with the vocabulary and notes given. I had difficulty in limiting myself to only what we learned rather than trying to expand further on previous knowledge. I also had trouble with understanding what was expected of me. However, I was able to overcome this as I began paying closer attention to our assignments in LingroLearning and utilized that information to help me come up with detailed sentences. I excelled at completing everything I was told to complete because I paid careful attention to the instructions and what was expected of me. There isn’t anything I would do better next time as I am confident in my progress with the proyectos.

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Interpretive Listening

Some interpretative listening activities that we have done throughout the semester is listening to videos of our vocabulary for each unit and during our quizzes we had to listen to an audio in order to answer the questions. Listening to audios was also present during our exercises in LingroLearning.

This semester, we listened to videos that helped us improve our Spanish. It helped us with the meaning of Spanish words, how they are used, and how they are pronounced. Doing these activities made this class feel more like a synchronous class rather than an asynchronous class. It made sure that we had a grasp on the concepts learned in class. This was through quizzes being given based on the listening activities. What was unclear for me were the images in some of the videos as they didn’t have much to do with the meaning of the word. For instance, lunes means Monday in Spanish, but in the video, the picture given for lunes was the moon. This had nothing to do with the days of the week so that was a little confusing. However, I overcame this by already knowing what lunes meant beforehand so the image didn’t throw me off with what it meant. What I found interesting about these listening activities was that they were very easy and straightforward. Other than the confusing images in some, they still helped with learning the words. My takeaway from this is that listening activities are very helpful for me in learning Spanish. Hearing how the words and pronounced and the instances that they are used helps me get a better understanding of that word. It also helps me in using them in everyday conversations for practice. With each listening activity, I was able to get a better understanding of how the quizzes were graded which helped me get good grades on them.

Interpretive Reading

The main interpretative reading activity that I have read in class is reading the content in the textbook, Contraseña, and LingroLearning. I’ve also read articles when researching information for the “Exploracion cultural: Investigar” section in LingroLearning. In some instances, we would have to read an article for our discussion boards to help us answer it.

In LingroLearning, at the beginning of each unit, a reading exercise is given. Throughout the unit, we have to read these exercises to answer the questions asked. I had a hard time with reading some of these exercises as most of them included Spanish words that I wasn’t familiar with. To help me out with this, I used context clues and used the words that I did know and understand to help me grasp the concept of the exercise. What I found interesting about these activities were how different they were and diverse. They each taught the lessons in their own creative way rather than them all being the same. My takeaway from these readings is that they are much more complicated than the listening activities as they go more in depth and have much more detail than the listening activities. With reading, you have to read carefully to understand the meaning of the text. As for the articles given during discussion boards and articles used for research, I didn’t struggle as much with these as the information was in English and was right in front of me. In some cases, I struggled with finding what I was exactly looking for, but I was able to overcome this through deep research and highlighting key words in the search engine. These readings helped me expand my knowledge and get a better understanding on the topics learned in class. Especially when researching how Latin America is different from the United States. Specifically on how colleges in Latin America are different from U.S. colleges as they are cheaper, bigger, and traditional. This was something that I was aware of until after reading about it.

https://www.expatica.com/es/education/higher-education/study-in-spain-101452/

“Study in Spain.” Expatica, 29 Dec. 2020, https://www.expatica.com/es/education/higher-education/study-in-spain-101452/.

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