I began learning Spanish in middle school. I chose Spanish, because our school had many Spanish-speaking students. Since most of my exposure to a foreign language was with Spanish, I chose to study it. I am a pretty firm believer in the teacher having a huge role in whether or not the student becomes interested in the topic. I was fortunate enough to have extremely enthusiastic teacher in middle and high school.
When I came to U of R, I kind of knew I wanted to continue studying Spanish due to a couple of reasons. I thought it to be pointless to have studied the language for six years and then just stop. Being able to learn a new language is a privilege, and I did not want to throw that away. I also knew I wanted to study abroad in Spain, so I would need to be able to converse fairly well in order to feel comfortable and experience the culture more. Lastly, I want to be a dentist, and since Spanish is the second most-spoken language in the US, I wanted to be able to serve them as well, if they are only able to speak Spanish. After volunteering at the CrossOver clinic in the Southside area of Richmond where around 80% of patients only speak Spanish, I knew I needed to excel in the language. I want to be able to provide a comfortable atmosphere for all patients whether I work in a private practice or a clinic.
In terms of learning, I believe my middle and high school classes built a very sturdy base for grammar. I learned just about every tense we went over in LAIS 221, so then taking 221 was a great review. We also listened to songs in Spanish in our classes, which has always been enjoyable. Even if I do not understand what they are saying, I like to still be able to hear the language. That brings me to another point: in classes, we use very proper Spanish. I wish I were able to learn more common sayings or just a more natural way of talking with Spanish speakers.
Based off of the surveys, I am a kinesthetic learner that thrives with intra and interpersonal communications. I do like to move and take breaks when studying. It was surprising to get kinesthetic as a main learning intelligence. I definitely agree with the intra and interpersonal intelligences. I tend to like studying by myself, rereading and retaking notes, and after, discussing with other classmates. I enjoy group activities, however, I do not enjoy group work. Even if I am in a productive group, I still get very stressed. The second survey talks about my being 40% auditory, 20% visual, and 40% tactile. I would say I agree for the most part. I do like a combination of the three in order to nail a subject down.
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Thanks for posting, Alana. In the interest of keeping the assignments organized, I'm going to re-label this submission as Reflection Paper #1. Please be sure to follow the nomenclature listed in the syllabus to help keep the two sets of assignments clear.