Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

In Spanish 101F, We used Lingro Learning to help us understand Latin-speaking countries’ cultures and languages. It showed stuff about social media, Latin traditions, and more. I personally used an app called Duolingo, which is an app that helps you learn Spanish. It ranges from all topics like food, family, activities, and more.

I have discovered from our study of civilizations that our nations have many differences, but they also have a lot of things in common. We connect over the same social media platforms; yet, some of these platforms are more common in Latin American nations. For instance, WhatsApp is a highly significant communication tool outside of the US but is not as widely utilized there. On the other hand, other social media platforms like Instagram are universally used, and in places like these, where social media and culture mix, interesting things happen. When researching customs, I found out that many of those in Spanish-speaking places are transforming and disappearing as a result of globalization and keeping up with the workload.

Engaging in Communities

I believe It is very important that people are engaged in their communities. Being engaged in your local community is important because it makes your community a nicer place to live by doing things such as volunteering, community service, and more. I also learned that a global community is important because it allows other communities to come together and learn about each other’s cultures.

Above is a video of me speaking in Spanish talking about my local community (Old Dominion). This video included vocabulary we learned in Spanish 101. This was an enjoyable project to make because I was able to show my favorite places around campus and what I like to do in those places. This exercise made my Spanish speaking better because it made me memorize places and directions that I would apply in real life.

Interpersonal Communication

Our class had conversational exercises where we would follow a prompt about a specific subject like activities we like, the University, and more. We also had a speaking project about classes and subjects we take in school. I really enjoyed this project because I was able to utilize the knowledge I gained from the course. We also had interviews with our teacher where she would ask questions in Spanish then we would respond in Spanish. This was my favorite activity in this class because I was able to use my Spanish skills to the best ability I could.

At the beginning of the semester, I had zero clue about how to use Learning Learning. This affected my grade heavily. As the semester progressed, I was able to learn how to use the website thanks to my Spanish professor who was very sweet and helpful. I was able to fix my mistakes and raise my grade. Over the period of the semester, I found myself retaining more knowledge about the language and it was the most satisfying thing ever. below is a description of myself in Spanish.

Presentational Speaking

Over this semester, we had numerous amount of projects that helped develop our presentational skills. We made videos outside of class about specific topics to show that we are learning Spanish. In class, we did a lot of practice by being asked a question in Spanish and then asked to respond in Spanish.

Above is a video of me talking to my Spanish fluent friend talking about my classes. This was one of the first recorded projects we had to submit for the class. During this time, my Spanish skills were very low so it took a while for me to practice and get the video right. My friend in the video has been speaking Spanish in his home since birth and he helped me a lot and made me grow in my Spanish speaking abilities. I found our relationship very beneficial because he would show me Hispanic culture and help me understand it more.

Presentational Writing

We had a couple of written projects over the course that was really helpful. It showed that we were not only speaking Spanish but were able to read and write the language. 

Above is a written project about my school schedule written in Spanish. The written projects we did in this class were a huge challenge for me because my writing skills aren’t the best in English. As time progressed, my writing skills increased because I was able to get help and practice as time went on. These written projects also helped me with the days of the week and time. Now I’m able to tell the time, know the days of the week, and the months all in Spanish.

Interpretive Listening

Our class had many listening activities in Lingro Learning where we had to listen to nouns, verbs, grammar, and phrases in Spanish. Listening to these activities was very important because listening to Spanish is way more different than speaking it. 

The video shown above is a speaking/ listening activity similar to what we did in Lingro Learning. You hear sentences and phrases in Spanish and then figure out what the person is saying and then respond to it. These listening activities were very difficult for me because, in all the videos in Lingro, the person would speak very fast. Something that helped me with this problem was I would find videos on youtube talking about the same topic and make the video playback speed .50 so the person would talk slower and allow me to understand the material better. As my skills increased, I was able to speak simple Spanish to my friends and it felt very satisfying.

Interpretive Reading

On our class canvas page, we had a link to a resource called, “Real Academia Española.” This resource is a Spanish news website that had articles that were real and fully in Spanish. These articles are pretty fun to read if you understand them, but I had to translate some stuff to do so.

The article shown above is one of the articles I grabbed from Real Academia  Española. These articles are very Interesting to me because I like figuring out what the article is about. The knowledge I learned In Spanish 101F helped me understand these articles because now I know the basics and can use context clues to figure out the main point and then use help to understand the rest. The article shown above is about the Royal Spanish Academy and how they are hosting one more event. I am glad I took Spanish 101F because figuring out these articles is very entertaining to me.