Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

Products and practices that helped me gain an understanding of cultural perspectives was a lot of material and activities in LingroLearning. Each module had a preparation activity accompanied by videos in Spanish that was designed to help me understand the text. For example, one of the first lessons learned was understanding fact or opinion within Mexican culture. I learned the difference between the two along with analyzing the vocabulary given.

Within the Hispanic culture, I understood the values and attitudes by reading each chapter in the textbook along with completing the weekly constrasenas activities. When it comes to my culture, I was able to explain the stereotypes within my family along with my family custom and traditions. My worldview was challenged because I had to think about situations from daily activities along with the influencers of my community. For example, when I was younger I was taller than the rest of the student’s in my class; therefore was picked on due to it being a physical trait .I was viewed differently and understand that people didn’t know any better. This class identified challenges that were used in real life scenarios through video content and also real life.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VP3UAd9TbqJN0p-V53wnWE8coegSqjyH/view?usp=drivesdk

Engaging in Communities

It is important to engage in your community because you get to explore different cultures along with different nationalities of people who are from different places around the entire world. Although we may not come from the same background, Community engagement inherits transparency and helps you identify road blocks that can be improved.

Interpersonal Communication

TalkAbroad is a website that provides a conversation with individuals from across the world. There are different languages such as Spanish, French, Italian, German and more along with many countries including Columbia, Bolivia, Argentina, and more. Conversations encourage students to interact with real life people.

TalkAbroad was very helpful throughout this semester because it was a way to have conversations with someone you don’t know from a different Spanish speaking country. The best thing about it was the fact that you can pick who you would like to converse with. Before having a conversation there is an option to select which country you would like the individual to be from. Then, you are able to read a short biography that tells you more about their background, which you can use to talk about in your conversation.

Presentational Speaking

In relation to the Spanish I have learned, I have had conversations with the Professor, a classmate, and Spanish speaking individuals from TalkAbroad. The conversations with all 3 related to influencers, stereotypes, and identities. I have also completed projects that includes conversations in Spanish explaining customs and traditions, a transformative moment in my life, poems and more. I also work with a Spanish speaking native from Bolivia/Honduras who also helps me with context clues and words I may have trouble with.

Speaking Spanish with the professor gave me an opportunity to be comfortable and loose because I am shy. If I had any trouble or didn’t understand some words or even got stuck, the professor was very patient and didn’t rush me or fully expect me to know the material 100%. As long as I gave it my all and knew that at the end if I had any questions that he would proudly answer them.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1difqMlT6sznsWs77m56FLLDOLgnLaddT/view?usp=drivesdk

Presentational Writing

I have deeply grown to understand how Spanish natives feel when they have the opinion of them not “fitting in.” I had an assignment where I examined a poem. Within the poem “My Spanish by Melissa,” she compared her Spanish to certain problems she was having in life. It was very interesting because she is Spanish but can’t speak the language.

Interpretive Reading

For Project 19, I had to reflect on a transformative moment in my life. I reflected on the time I moved and switched elementary schools. I was about 8-10 years old and I was used to the same school for 3 years and for the last two I had to go somewhere else. Although this transformative moment doesn’t relate to Spanish, I had the opportunity to do my project on a student who transferred universities in his Spanish country.

As a reflection, talking about a transformative moment gave me the opportunity to think about times in my life that I didn’t notice was such a huge transitioning period. Each time you move towards a different opportunity in life it is a transformative moment. Just like when I transferred from a community college to a university. At first it was challenging to figure out a moment until I started to analyze different parts of my life. The biggest takeaway from this class was me having the opportunity to represent Spanish with my own words verbally with Spanish natives who were able to help and be patient within my responses.