Watching the video again, I feel like I did a little better than I initially thought, but that's not saying much. I noticed several words that I butchered pretty badly, so I'm sure there were many more I didn't notice. I think I attribute that mostly to nerves, since I feel like if I focus enough I can say most things more or less correctly (minus a few specific sounds that I know I can't usually make well). I'm sure I have a terrible accent, but in the video there are definitely some words that I just flat out say wrong, as opposed to just with an accent. The main problem that I noticed both during the conversation and after was with grammar and specifically with syntax. I think this comes mostly from the fact that I would start to say something and then realize mid sentence that there was something else I wanted to add so I would have to thrown it in at the wrong place. If I have time to think through a whole sentence I'm pretty comfortable figuring out how it should be said, but when talking to someone you usually think on the fly so you don't necessarily know everything you are going to say before you start talking. I think this is one of the reasons my monologue is so slow and disjointed. I had noticed how many mistakes I had been making in the conversation so I tried to slow down and be more careful. I think it worked for the most part (along with the fact that it was rehearsed), but it made my delivery really awkward. This was made worse by the fact that there wasn't a clear progression to some of what I said. There were a few things I had wanted to say but forgot and then said later when I remembered, so there are some sentences that are out of place and don't seem to fit into any sort of logical train of thought. I tried to work in a couple less common tenses (like past imperfect) and I think I used them correctly for the most part, but I also wouldn't necessarily know if I didn't. Overall, I think I could have done a little better but I'm not surprised that I'm not at the level where I can really carry out a full conversation effectively yet.
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I was pleased with my performance, in the sense that I could understand and participate in a non-rehearsed conversation. There were certainly things that I wish I had done differently, such as say that I studied physics instead of eating them--but overall I was pleased. Regarding my monologue, looking back I wish that I had made it longer and incorporated more of the things that I had learned over the semester, but my nerves got the better of me, and I kept to a short script. The evaluation proved that I can both memorize necessary phrases, as well as use them in conversation, a good way to end the semester.
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Self EvaluationOverall, I was personally impressed with my speaking ability during the taped group conversation. There were certainly times when the conversation broke down, but overall I felt that it was a positive experience. I felt that I did my part to keep the conversation flowing when there might have been pauses trying to keep my other partners engaged. I was also proud that I understand everything that was being discussed even if a question was not being directed at me. Also, there were times when other members of the group did not ask a question properly and I was able to understand what they were saying and properly ask the question so the other group member could understand. There were times when the conversation broke down and that tended to happen after we had exhausted the basic topics of names, where we are from, our family, what day and time it was, and what classes we were taking. The part that I recall breaking down occurred at the end when we were trying to ask each other what we did last night, because one person in our group did not understand or remember the question.The difficult thing about the group conversation was that I feel like we were all nervous about being taped and thus the conversation did not flow as smoothly as it did earlier in the language lab when we were talking amongst ourselves. Also, it was difficult having three people and figuring out how to ask questions of everyone and be inclusive and who should be speaking or initiating questions. There were definitely times when we did not use proper grammar, but for the most part I felt that we were all able to get our point across. On a positive note, we were able to show what we had learned over the semester and I thought we did do a good job of making sure that everyone spoke and answered questions.In terms of my own monologue, after reviewing the tape I realize that there were lots of pauses between thoughts that I need to work on. It was not as smoothly flowing as I would have liked, but I was impressed that I could speak that long without really using my notes. I thought I conveyed a lot of ideas about who I was, my family, and what I had done that day demonstrating my ability to construct sentences and use both the present and past tenses. I also thought my pronunciation of many letters was very good, although there are definitely sounds that I still need to work on such as the kh sound. The only thing I think I would have changed would maybe be the order of my thoughts, such as injecting what I was wearing earlier in the conversation rather than at the end. Still, I was pleased with the way that yesterday went and I am proud that I accomplished as much as I did.
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