Interpretive, Interpersonal, and Presentational Modes of Communication

Exploring Culture

Some things that I learned in Contraseña that helped me gain knowledge of Hispanic countries were the Exploración cultural sections in the unit’s. Different cultural collaborators from Spanish speaking countries would make videos explains their take on the topic. After there would be questions in the Aplicar section that would test to see if we were paying attention and understand what the person was saying. In the first unit the Exploración cultural was about social media and which ones were used the most in Latin America.

One of the people in the four videos, Mario Enrique Pedro Mateo from Guatemala,/ said his preferred social media is WhatsApp. He uses the app to communicate with his co-workers, friends at school, and his family members. He uses the app 6 hours a day because it’s very useful to him with communicating to people he works with and people he knows at school.

Along with learning about what individuals use in Latin America, I learned that the most used social media app is Facebook.

The Aplicar section also helped make sure that I understood what was being said in the 4 videos.

Interpersonal Communication

During this fall semester I did one interview with a fellow classmate.

Before we created the video, we practiced our vocabulary and how to form the sentences. Doing this interview helped me get used to having conversations in Spanish and not just having to rely on vocabulary to figure out what the other person is saying. While I still have some trouble forming more advanced sentences, I have learned and grown so much in the language since making this video.

Presentational Speaking

During this semester I also had to do a video presentation about my university. I talked about the multiple places there are and which ones are my favorite and least favorite.

What challenged me the most with this assignment was remembering to switch the genders of words. Most of our Spanish vocabulary ended in -o, the masculine form, and since i’m a girl I had to change it to the -a ending. This was a challenge for me because I would always study and remember the words with -o endings so when I would talk about myself I would forget to switch the ending.

Interpretive Listening

As stated in the Exploring Cultures section, in the Exploración cultural section on Contraseña we were assigned to watch videos that were completely spoken in Spanish.

At the beginning of the semester I’d watch these videos with the subtitles on because I don’t fully understand when hearing Spanish and I’m better at reading it. When reading the captions I was able to break down what they were saying by isolating certain vocabulary that I knew to infer on what they were saying.

Interpretive Reading

In Unit 3, our text was reading a schedule and text messages between two friends.

Using the texts I was able to learn how to better read Spanish. Most of the time I can figure out what is being said bye using context surrounding the sentence. But there are other times that I have to use a translator in case i’m not sure of what i’m reading.