Articles of Interest in Hispania 94.3 September 2011

by Ann Abbott


Although there are no articles in the latest issue of Hispania that are specifically about community service learning, I would just like to briefly point out a few items of interest.

*I have met Eva Rodríguez-González at conferences, and I was happy to see an article that she co-wrote with Martha Castañeda: "L2 Speaking Self-ability Perceptions through Multiple Video Speech Drafts." When I first began teaching Spanish CSL, my students did their reflections through "diarios digitales" that they recorded on a webcam. Although I don't do those anymore, I was very interested in the article's information about students' use of video speeches.

*"Profe, can we have an extra credit assignment, please?" How many times have you heard that? I don't give extra credit because I think students should focus on doing a good job on the regular assignments. Still, the title and abstract of David Alley's article--"The Role of Extra-credit Assignments in the TEaching of World Languages"--have piqued my interest. Perhaps I can find a good reason to give extra credit assignments that are truly about extra learning.

*My Business Spanish colleague and friend, Mary Long, recently co-edited a book titled Mexico Reading the United States, and I was happy to see a very positive review of the book and Mary's article in this issue of Hispania.

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