Spanish & Illinois Blog

Spanish Community Service Learning Students Need to Know about the Dream Act

2012-01-26T23:28:00.001-06:00

by Ann Abbott
When our Spanish community service learning students work in the community, they are confronted with the realities that immigrants in our community face. Many times my students work with children in schools, helping them to enhance their academic skills. By the end of the semester, my students come to really like and respect the children and adolescents with whom they work. But until I bring it up in class, most of my students do not know that those same children--if their parents brought them here undocumented--who they are helping to excel in school will not have the opportunity to go to college. Because they are undocumented.

My students research the Dream Act on-line, but this film--Papers--would also help them understand the issues. It will be shown as part of the Social Justice Forum and here are more details:

Channing Murray Foundation
1209 W. Oregon
Urbana, IL
February 1
7:00 pm
Free and open to the public
Light refreshments will be served
Q&A discussion afterward

Framing Community Service Learning through a Business Lens

2012-01-26T21:37:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

These are all things I do in my courses. In part, I teach this way because I keep up on pedagogical advances. But in part, I teach this way because this is simply how I like to do things. I can't imagine teaching concepts without the community context. I can't imagine teaching about immigration myths and facts without sending students to websites that have data for them to analyze. I can't imagine not asking my students to put that information in a poster and present it at a poster session on campus. I can't imagine asking my students to do a "fake" marketing activity instead of asking my friends with businesses what information they truly need from my students. Etc.

How do you implement the video's concepts in your teaching?

University of Illinois: Teaching Workshops Pertinent to Community Service Learning

2012-01-26T11:10:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

The Center for Teaching Excellence is a wonderful resource for all faculty at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and Valeri Werpetinski makes it a top-notch resource for those doing community service learning and public engagement in general. Please take a look at some of the events they are offering this semester:

Specifically about community service learning
1. A workshop on "Case-based Teaching for (International) Service Learning."
2. A poster session titled "Social Entrepreneurship and Service Learning Showcase." Not only is this a good place to promote your own community service learning course, program or research, it is also a great forum for your students to present. I have a student team present here, and they are excited by the energy that surrounds the event and surprised to see how many other students on campus are doing service learning.

Not specifically about community service learning but supportive of the work we do in a CSL course.
1. Making Content Memorable and Transferrable using Narratives. Our students change their hearts and minds about immigration once they are exposed to the "stories" of the individuals they connect with in the community and the stories behind our government's immigration policies and realities. I use stories frequently, but I think this workshop would help me do so in a more deliberate, theory-based way.
2. Using Students' Prior Knowledge to Help Learning. I find this interesting because what we often have to do in a Spanish community service learning is correct students' prior "knowledge" because there is so much misinformation about immigration. I think this approach, however, could help us know--and even publish--what students do bring to a Spanish community service learning course.
3. Building Community in the Classroom - an Intercultural Approach. I think this is great! Our students absolutely need to do this during their CSL work, By talking about it explicitly and reflecting upon it in the classroom we can help them better achieve it in the community.
4. Creating Effective Student Teams and Team Assignments. I took this workshop with Cheelan a few years ago, and it changed the way that I thought about teams in my courses. I highly recommend it.

Opportunity for College Seniors

2011-12-27T10:14:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

One of my former students, Sandra Mazuera, was involved in this program so I feel very recommending it to all my students and all my students to this selective program. See message below:

Hi Professor Abbott,

Thank you again for your help spreading the word about the MATCH Corps this fall!

To refresh your memory, The MATCH Corps is a highly selective one-year fellowship program that allows recent grads to tutor inner-city kids in Boston for a year. After the year, fellows usually go on to top grad schools, work in public policy, or become full-time teachers in inner city schools.

I just wanted to check in and see if you have any students or recent grads you’d like to nominate for the 2012-2013 cohort. We are still accepting applications! Please feel free to pass the following blurb along to any students who might be interested. Students are welcome to contact me directly for more information.

Happy holidays!

Colin Bottles, Director of Recruiting

MATCH Charter Public School

www.matchschool.org

The MATCH Corps, a highly selective one-year urban education fellowship, is looking for top-notch seniors who are interested in joining next year’s Corps. To apply, just fill out this form: http://apply.matchschool.org/apply.php.

The MATCH Corps program began in 2004 and is the first of its kind in the nation. The Corps is a group of 140 top recent college graduates who work one-on-one with six to eight MATCH High School, Middle School, or Elementary School students each day for an entire academic year. Corps members live together in apartments nearby the Middle School and Elementary School, and in a dorm on the top floor of the High School. All three schools are open-admission Charter Public Schools in Boston, MA. This full-time service year program is designed to fully close the academic Achievement Gap between minority students and their non-minority peers, one student at a time. Each Corps member works to guarantee the academic success of MATCH students while building personal relationships. Corps members also undertake secondary projects such as serving as teaching assistants, and may also coach teams and power extracurricular programs.

We also offer an optional teacher training program called MATCH Teacher Residency. In MTR, Corps members receive additional training on the weekends with the aim of becoming unusually effective first year teachers in high-poverty schools. Graduates of MTR go on to teach at some of the most highly regarded charter schools in the country and tend to outperform other rookie teachers in the classroom.

To learn more about MATCH, check out this ABC News special: http://bit.ly/qxvhbX

For more information, have a look at our website: http://www.matchschool.org/index.htm

Student Spotlight: James Peters

2011-12-15T13:46:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

So many of my students know that they want to live and work abroad, but they're not sure exactly how to go about it. There are many paths, of course, and several of the "Student Spotlight" entries on this blog highlight former students who are now living abroad or incorporating Spanish into their lives in the United States.

The Peace Corps, of course, is a well-known way to live and work abroad for a few years. That is the path that James Peters has chosen.

James was in my course on social entrepreneurship last year. James really stood out to me because he was full of ideas, willing to participate and because of his dedication to the Boy Scout troop he worked with in the community. So I was delighted to receive an e-mail from him recently recounting his adventures in Luque, Paraguay. I loved the insights into the local language and indigenous culture. I asked James if I could share his information with others on my blog, and this was his reply:

Hola! Yes I would love to stay connected with you and any class you have. If you have any students interested in working abroad/Peace Corps/ Teaching English in South America- please do not hesitate to give them my email.

Hasta Luego from Paraguay!!!!

James Peters

Peace Corps Volunteer Paraguay 2011

University of Illinois UIUC 2011

Eagle Scout 2007

President and Founder of Pi Lambda Omicron

Below is James' first e-mail describing his adjustments and assignment. I hope that it will inspire someone to take the step of contacting James or even to join the Peace Corps. What an adventure! I cannot wait to see how James' experiences and perspectives evolve over his two years in Paraguay.

Finally traveled into an internet cafe about 15km from my community. I hope everything is well at home in america. The past few weeks have been quite hectic and actually a bit intense. I guess I´ll start with before Thanksgiving because it was pretty memorable and a good place to begin my thought process. 4 dyas before turkey day, I went on what is called my site visit. I got a taste of where I would live and what I will be doing.

I travleled alone to a town called Luque by bus. From there I met my contact, which I will work with for the next 2 years. His name is Blas and he has a larger than life personality (also a huge guy). He met me in Luque as well as my host father who traveled from the barrio to downtown Luque to see that I got there safe and show me around. First, Luque is a tale of 2 distinct cities. Luque itself has around 30k population and is spilt into 2 very different parts. Downtown Luque reminds me of an old rundown industrial center from somewhere that looks geographically like Arizona. Luque´s epicenter (i think thats the translation) is a big park that street vendors and people hang out and sell stuff. It is pretty intense city because of the hyper population, which is concentrated in the downtown district (1km by 1km). That half of city is very gritty and commercial with tons of pollution and trash. On other side, there is a massive church, the municipality, and the soccer stadium (the team of Luqueno plays there). This half of the city is very nice, even from american standards. Large apartment complexes line the streets along with green vines and treetop canopies. This area has gym´s, fast food restaurants, and party centers (will explain later). I received a quick tour of Luque from my host dad and Blas then headed toward our barrio (neighborhood, sorry its difficult to explain things sometimes in English).

My new barrio is called Yká´a Caranday (pronounced, oookaaauuuaaa Karanduuah). The barrio is also a tale of two distinctly different sectors of the population. My street is paved (slate rocks) and has rows of upper class houses (satellites, cars, garages, very chuchi (spanish for yupi). My house is definitely very nice and is going to be very easy transition- living with the host family. Off of my main road in the barrio, there is a small unpaved path that leads (about .5km) to government housing projects (3rd world ghettos). This area is truly eye opening- even if I tried to describe it now, it would difficult to tell you all how these people live. Needless to say I was humbled and decided I would try to assist that community in what little ways I could (note this is a different area, that I am technically not allowed to help with because it is not my official assignment). Either way, my new host family was great- made sure I was comfortable and well fed (I will live with a man (50ish, and 2 women who are sisters- 60s) . My host dad is hilarious and very handy around the house and he was quick to show me how to do things like install a ceeling fan and fix the pipes in the bathroom. Its tough to describe my role in the community but as I see it now, it will involve a few things- Teaching environmental conservation (recycling, trash management), English, and Geography in Escuela Basica 446 Sañ Jose (middle school). The school is about 1km walk from my house, so it is very close and right inbetween the nice areas in the barrio and the gritty trash ridden parts. i will also run a youth group called Verde Corazon (green heart) that focuses on trash managemnent in the dirtier parts.

Basically I did a few things to get myself in the door of the community and demonstrate how I can help. I went to the school and introduced myself to the director (principal) as well as met some of the kids who were trying to figure out how to work some old computers that were given to the school by the government (another story for another day). Afterwards, I returned to my house and build a 2 tablon (bed) garden growing simple veggies with a compost pit. Now, as many of you know, I am no expert in gardens or compost pits, but it is important for my credibility to show people how easy it is to grow and maintain ´self sustainable practices´ like gardens. So I grow veggies and throw all of my trash (yes that includes toilet paper because you cant flush tp here) in the compost pit. Trash is the #1 problem in my new hood and I have to first show them how I can manage it myself. So moving on, my visit was fun and very informative. I also have the option to go to a city called Aregua to work with ecotourism department with my contact Blas whenever I want (Aregua is a beautiful city tucked in the mountains, very green and has a lake and a beach to swim in). Aregua is about 15minutes away by bus. I am very excited to work in Aregua and with the people there because they are really hard working and its straight up gorgeous.

So I left my site on Thanksgiving and went to the Ambassador´s house. The american ambassador is a nice, well spoken man, who lives in an enormous compound with tennis courts, pools, and 50 maids. It was awesome to step back onto ´´Merican soil and enjoy some lavish living. I watched a little of the football game, which was refreshing to see and ate a ton of food. I also swam in the pool and tried to play tennis. It was a great evening with very influential people and most importantly, mericans. haha. That night was great, but life was about to get pretty weird after that.

I woke up the next day and went to class as usual in Guambare. In the middle of a lecture explaining the differences between personakuerañdive and personakuerañdi (with peoples and for peoples, weird translation), one of my friends Vanessa (girl i traveled with a lot to go visit volunteers) stood up and said simply- ´¨Im done, I cant do this anymore.¨ And she left. She was was back in San Francisco the next day. Its really weird to think about it because of how easy it is to actually leave and return home, yet how powerful it affected the entire group. In 1 week we all leave and go to our sites and that was kinda weighing over all of our heads....when Monday rolled around.

I woke up Monday morning, rolled out of bed and was enjoying my mate (hot green tea that usually burns the living hell out of my lips). My host mom rolls in the room and says casually, ¨Vos companero se murio¨... That translates very cleanly to..... your friend died. I spilled the mate on my pants, which scortched an area I care not to describe, and sputterd ¨Que?¨ (what?). She replied that a volunteer in Paraguay had died. I quickly walked to Mason´s house (friend in Peace >Corps that lives nextdoor) and it was on TV- a girl who lived in the Caazapa (central paraguay) died in a car accident. It made the front page of the Paraguayan news papers that day from Asuncion to Encarnacion. It was such a big deal I think because of Peace Corps presence in paraguay, which has been here since 1967. So i didnt know her and she was in a different sector (economic development), but it hits home when 1 of 200 volunteers dies, which is also extremely rare occurence in the Peace corps.

So stuff was pretty hectic down here, and it is also interesting because I am sure none of you all heard about a death in Peace Corps because of how obscure that is. I have definitely done some self reflecting and decided that I am truly happy here, and I want to live in Paraguay for 2 years. It has been a tough training, but I am ready to begin helping out in any way I can.

Friday I move to Luque and get to party in Asuncion for the weekend so I plan on finding a tennis court and a beer that is darker than Brahma light (less than 1$ for 40oz, you do the math, but absolute garbage tasting). I hope everyone had a great thankgiving, I will also have internet and a phone come next friday. More info to come- Sorry again for the spelling errors but I cannot help it on this computer.

Hasta Luego, Jajotopaata (see ya lata in Guarani)

Jimmy

Creating Infrastructures for Latino Mental Health: Spanish Community Service Learning's Role

2011-12-14T13:47:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

I just received my copy of Creating Infrastructures for Latino Mental Health (Springer), edited by Lydia Buki and Lissette Piedra. I'm very proud to have a chapter in this book that not only defines the problems surrounding Latinos' access to mental health services but also makes concrete policy and organizational recommendations to address the need. (My chapter describes why and how human service agencies can contact their nearest college Spanish program to begin a mutually beneficial community service learning partnership.)

Our university's Inside Illinois also profiled the editors--two professors on our campus--and the impetus behind the book. Congratulations to Lissette and Lydia for putting forth a guidebook that outlines the issues and possible solutions!

Student Spotlight: Laura Woodward

2011-12-10T15:59:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

It is always such a pleasure for me to hear from former students. I especially like hearing about their professional aspirations and growth--whether they include Spanish or not.

Laura Woodward's message (below) should be of interest to current Spanish students for at least two reasons:

1. She has identified an educational program (Masters in International Disaster Psychology at the University of Denver) and career path that is unusual but that could actually fit many of my students interests, experiences and goals.

2. Her message models many good things about how to contact a former professor and ask for a letter of recommendation. First, her "luck" in finding work in a restaurant immediately reminded me of her sense of humor. (Each student has a unique personality, and believe it or not, we almost always notice that.) She reminded me specifically of the course, the semester and the community work that she did in my class. I need those reminders! Finally, the attached photograph clinched everything. I have had many students named Laura, but I immediately remembered many details about this Laura when I saw her face again. And what a great picture! It probably is taken from the travels she mentions.

Read Laura's message below. Have you identified a graduate program that could work for you? Do you need a letter of recommendation? Do you need to remind your professor about the work you did for them?

"Hola Ann!

"Soy Laura, fui tu estudiante hace un ano. My Spanish is a bit rusty. Luckily, with a Psych Degree, I got the pleasure of working in a restaurant upon graduation, and the kitchen staff was great about letting me practice with them. In fact, I was their "gringa preferida."

"I took your Community Service Learning class in the Spring of 2010. I have always valued volunteerism and I wanted to continue improving my Spanish after my semester in Costa Rica. I volunteered as a tutor at Booker T. Washington and worked with the graduate students in the Social Work Department finding participants for their group therapy and watching the children during the therapy sessions.

"After taking a year off and doing some traveling, I have found what I think to be the ideal Master's Program for me. It integrates my Bachelors in Psychology and love of experiencing new cultures and people. I am applying for a Masters in International Disaster Psychology at the University of Denver. It actually demands that I travel! I am hoping that you would be willing to write me a letter of recommendation based on your experience with me as a volunteer in the Spanish speaking community of Urbana-Champaign.

"I am a visual person, so I attached a picture of myself to help you better remember. I hope you feel you have an adequate memory and impression of me to write me this letter, but I certainly understand if you do not. That was part of the risk I took in taking a year off before grad school, but I am so glad I did because I feel like this program is perfect for me. Please let me know if you are willing to write this letter and I will respond with more information."

Student Reflection

2011-12-08T14:04:00.000-06:00

by Jacqui Kukulski

“Mira directo.”

“¿Está tomando algún medicina?”

“¿Está casada?”

I’ve been working at Frances Nelson Health Center for roughly three months at 7.5 hours a week. When I first started I was only on the phones, and occasionally translating at the front desk. They had me shadow the translators in the room so I could learn how to translate for the doctors and learn the medical terminology in Spanish. When November came, I was still following the translators around, like a lost puppy. I only had the freedom to go to the front desk and translate there or answer the phones without them having to be near me. If I was ever in a room I certainly wanted them there. I didn’t have the confidence in my Spanish or my medical terms and if I was ever translating for a patient I was glad that there was another translator there to help out when the patient or doctor said something that I understood but couldn’t translate effectively (or didn’t understand in the case of the patient).

All of that changed on Friday, my last day there for the semester. There were two Spanish speaking patients. One for the normal doctor and one for the eye doctor. They were both going to be seen at the exact same time, and both of them needed a translator. I was going to follow the other translator into the exam room with her as I have for the past three months. The CNA looked at the other translator, hurt that she wasn’t going to have someone help her with the Spanish. Seeing this and knowing that it was only an eye exam, something that I have been to several times and knew the general procedures, I offered her my help. After all it was only an eye exam; there shouldn’t be anything crazy going on that I wouldn’t be able to translate.

I followed her into the exam room and the patient was very nice. He understood that I wasn’t fluent in Spanish. Both the CNA and the patient were patient with me as I translated various directions. After a while we switched to the eye doctor’s exam room and I continued to translate there. The eye doctor was calm and patient as well. As I explained to the patient about eye drops that would dilate his pupils, something crazy happened. Because this information was so familiar to me, I simply just understood what it was that I had to tell him. There was no need for me to think hard about translating a word I had heard only once or never before (in that case you translate in a roundabout fashion, you explain what the word means without using the actual word.).

When I explained it to the patient, I was in the zone. I was thinking in Spanish. I was speaking in Spanish. But, more importantly, the patient understood me. Afterwards, the doctor asked me where I learned my Spanish. Everybody is always surprised when I tell them that I learned my Spanish in school. I then go on to explain that I studied in Spain for a few weeks and that seems to make more sense to them.

The patient had to wait for 15 minutes for the eye drops to work, so I went back to the phones and talked with the other translator. After a while, I came back and started talking to the patient. He asked if I was married and we discussed the problems in Mexico. We went back into the exam room and finished the exam and I walked him back to the front desk. The whole time I was in the zone though. I got very confident after translating for this patient. He was really nice and helped me feel at ease.

I’ve talked with the other volunteer at the clinic who looks more of a Mediterranean descent than I do and he often gets people assuming he knows more Spanish than he does. I look more of a northern European descent so I always surprise people when I start speaking Spanish. I feel that this helps me out when I’m translating because the patients are no longer expecting me to know every single word in Spanish and have a little more patience with me than they would otherwise. I have also found that translating for men is easier. Which seems odd. They always seem more willing to help me and have more patience than the women. I often start translating for a woman but then they’ll look to the other translator the second I start having a bit of trouble.

With my new-found confidence, we had another situation arise in the clinic on Friday. The translator and the other volunteer were going to a room and I was sitting by the phones. We got a page for another translator to a room and I showed up. I was expecting another translator to come and hoping one would come, but of the three translators that worked there, one was home sick and the other was off for the day. So when the doctor was ready to go into the room, it was just me by myself. I thought of telling the doctor that I was going to try my hardest but I might have to go get another translator at some point, but the opportunity never really arose to tell her. So I jumped in.

It was crazy. The second I translated something the doctor said, the woman started ranting about something in Spanish. Luckily her son was there with her and would help me understand what his mother was saying when she started ranting. I found that the most difficult part of this was knowing the right words to say in English. Translating what the doctor was saying was pretty simple. I knew most of the words and those I wasn’t completely sure of I was able to explain in a roundabout fashion. When the patient explained her symptoms I understood in Spanish what she was trying to say, maybe it was because she was using motions as well. Although I understood what was being said in Spanish, I understood it in my head in Spanish and not in English. But I worked through it and at the end of the exam I felt confident that everybody understood what was going on.

At one point during the exam everybody was talking at once. The doctor was talking in English to me. The patient and her son were trying to explain something to me in Spanish. I don’t know if they realized that I was trying to help them understand one another, but having all of them talk to me at once was not helpful. Even if they were all speaking the same language I wouldn’t have known what they all were saying. At one point I thought I heard the doctor say we needed another translator. I would have gladly gotten the other translator, but then they all stopped talking and I figured out what they had been saying.

At the end of the day, I was excited that I had finally translated on my own, but it was nerve racking. The eye patient was calmer and I had more time to think. The regular patient was not nearly as calm. Most patients for regular exams tend to be less calm. Maybe it’s because the doctors all feel rushed to get through their patients or maybe it’s because their problems are more life threatening or important in their eyes. Either way, next time (I’m returning next semester) I’ll do my best to remain calmer and think clearer.

Student Reflection

2011-12-06T09:36:00.000-06:00

by Jacqui Kukulski

-Quiero una cita.

-¿Para qué?

This is part of the conversation that I often have with patients over the phone. We get many calls everyday all for the same complaint: “I want an appointment” (which really isn’t a complaint or symptom of anything). On our outgoing message we have the usual request for information: name, birthday, phone number and the reason for the call. I guess you could say that we’re getting all of those, but the reason isn’t always specific. This then starts a phone call game of tag between the translators and the patient trying to get all the pertinent information as well as the reason why they’re calling, ie their symptoms. It gets even more interesting when you can’t even make out the word for their symptom.

I once had a woman explain her symptoms to me, but she kept talking. I tried my hardest to understand everything she said. I continually asked questions to make sure that I understood what she was telling me. I didn’t understand her completely. After a while she asked if there was another translator who she could speak to. I said sure. She hung up on me. There wasn’t really another available translator for her to talk to, but I found her an appointment anyways for the symptoms that I did understand. I didn’t want to call her back because she had just yelled at me. I called her back anyways, the second I said that I had an appointment for her, her attitude changed. She was no longer a complaining woman upset that she didn’t have an appointment, but she was so grateful and nice. She thanked me profusely and we went on our merry ways.

This has happened often in answering phones. They don’t always get mad and yell at me, but there are times when things get difficult and I don’t have another translator there to back me up. But it’s actually better this way, because without the crutch of the actual translator, I’m forced to work through my Spanish and find out a way to communicate with the patients in a way that we both understand.

What’s more, is that simply finding someone an appointment can make their day. The way that woman’s attitude change can attest for that. After she hung up on me and I was talking with a nurse to get her an appointment, I mentioned it to them, because after all, I was a bit upset by it. I had been trying to understand her and she simply got upset. But the nurse and several CNAs who overheard all agree: at least I was trying to understand what she was saying. At least I didn’t just guess and make things up.

This comes back to one of my earlier posts, where you just have to take things with a grain of salt and become a stronger person. If I had let that woman truly get to me, I could have given up and stopped trying to help translate. But instead you have to see beyond the interaction and understand that that woman was probably trying to get an appointment for weeks, was probably in a lot of pain and is probably under a lot of stress from her job, family or something else. It’s not always easy to see through to this point, but when you do, the compassion comes back and a sharp word no longer has the sting that it did before.

Student Reflection

2011-11-29T14:09:00.001-06:00

by Jacqui Kukulski

That wasn’t the earth opening up and swallowing me up was it? I certainly hope not, but sometimes it looks like that happens to some people. I was helping translate for a man the other day and he was supposed to have a follow up appointment a long time ago, but he understood that he would get a letter in the mail telling him when his next appointment was. He had many problems and there was a bit of confusion but what was the saddest part was there wouldn’t have been any confusion if he hadn’t been forgotten. I haven’t been at Frances Nelson long enough to witness a lot of this, but the feeling I get is that this is all too common.

Patients don’t always get appointments. The schedule fills up faster than the patients can get an appointment. Patients miss appointments or never make a follow up. It was suggested to this man that he needs to take responsibility for himself, and make sure he gets the appointments he needs. But what about his side of it? He doesn’t speak English. He probably hasn’t grown up with an American’s mentality of going to the doctor. We explain so often that you need to see an eye doctor and a dentist too, but as I was growing up, we always went. We never missed a year. It’s hard for me to understand why you wouldn’t go to a dentist, but that’s because I grew up knowing that you go to the dentist at least once a year. This patient probably immigrated here and we should be happy that he got himself to a doctor in the first place.

The saddest story I’ve heard is about a woman who was having a bad reaction to a medication, and no one caught that it was from the medication for over two years. No one, save a very compassionate translator. Without this translator, this woman wouldn’t have gotten an appointment, and no one would have been alerted to the fact that the reaction could be from some medication.

I only deal with the Spanish speaking patients, so I don’t know if these instances occur with the English speaking patients. Also, I can only assume that this is the same that happens at every clinic. There must people who simply fall through the cracks, I hope it’s not true. But now, this raises another question: why are they falling through the cracks? Is it because they don’t have insurance? Is it because they speak Spanish? Is it because the doctors aren’t taking the time to listen to their patients?

I don’t have the answers to these questions, but I also don’t think there’s a simple answer. There never seems to be a simple answer to something so complicated. When I first started working at Frances Nelson, I saw doctors as someone who was nice, helped people and prescribed medicine. Now, having seen the system from another side, the non-patient side, I realize that healthcare needs to be so much more than that. It needs to take care of the whole person and it needs to be the one person or group of people that still watch out for you.

Advice from Former Spanish CSL Student: Internships and Volunteering in Latin America

2011-11-14T11:12:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

I just heard from one of my former students, Sarah Moauro, who has built a wonderful international life for herself in Latin America. I know that so many of my current students would love to do exactly what Sarah is doing, and she actually has some really good, specific advice. If you want to contact Sarah, just let me know (arabbott@illinois.edu)!

Here's Sarah's message:

Hi Ann,

I hope you're doing well and that it's not too cold yet in Illinois! I was just thinking that if you have any students coming to/studying in Buenos Aires or Latin America in general this year, here are a couple of ideas you could let them know about.

Over the last couple of months, I have been volunteering at an NGO called Fundacion Pro Vivienda Social. They do microfinance programs to help communities improve their housing and neighborhoods by developing infrastructure. They're almost always looking for more interns, helping with research or with communications, so it is something that could be useful for a lot of backgrounds (economics, political science, business, marketing are the most common). They usually ask interns to commit to 3 months.

If you have students coming to Buenos Aires that are interested in journalism (as well as marketing/event planning at times), I have friends that work for a English-speaking newspaper down here called The Argentina Independent. They always have a set of interns and the paper gets involved in some pretty interesting things (as well as have a fun community).

Also, for anyone coming to Latin America to study or volunteer, I have a friend who works for a scholarship fund that gives out two scholarships of $500 every month. It's called LIVfund and is pretty new - it's something that I think would interest people that take your courses.

Anyways, I just wanted to say hello and share these with you - from personal experiences, I know that finding good places to volunteer and intern without paying to do it isn't as easy as it should be.

There are more things you can do around here that involve basic volunteering (teaching English in a poorer neighborhood a couple hours a week, weekend activities for groups like Un Techo para mi Pais that is similar to Habitat for Humanity), but I wanted to send you things that were more internship/work experience related. Feel free to put people in touch with me if anyone is interested in any of them.

All the best,

Sarah

Champaign-Urbana: Volunteer Opportunity on Saturday

2011-11-10T11:14:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Please consider volunteering and using your Spanish at this event:

This Saturday, November 12 from 10:00AM till 2:00PM there is a community fair at Lincoln Square in Urbana. Volunteers are needed. The name of the event is called "A community fair to connect working families with local services in East-Central Illinois," and participants will share information on where to obtain free medicare, dental services, access to healthy food, and so on.

WHEN: November 12, 10:00AM - 2:00PM

WHERE: Lincoln Square, 201 Lincoln Square, Urbana

Please contact Guadalupe at:

Email: Guadamaria1@gmail.com

Phone: 217-344-8455

"You Have the Right to Remain Silent": Spanish Community Service Learning and Our Legal Rights

2011-11-07T10:28:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

What would you do if the police knocked on your door?

My first instinct would be to open it.

But I would fight that instinct. I would ask them through the closed door what they wanted. Until I figured out the situation, I would give no information beyond my name.

If the conversation continued, I would ask them if they had a warrant. If they said no, I would stop communicating. If they said yes, I would ask them to slip it under the door for me to verify. Those are my rights.

I am a US citizen. White. I live in a very good neighborhood. I was raised to see the police as my ally. Truly, I don't think I have any reason to fear them. I want to be a good citizen, and I want to help the police create a safe community for all of us.

But it is our right to remain silent--and not just after they have arrested you, despite all the chatty people you see on Law & Order.

I teach this in my "Spanish in the Community" course. It's in Lección 14 ("¿Qué se debe hacer durante una redada?"), and students tell me that they had no idea what their rights were. Most also think it's something they don't have to worry about. They've probably never found themselves on the wrong side of the law and cannot imagine ever finding themselves in that situation. Ever.

Of course it can happen to anyone. But the larger lesson for my students is that the community members we serve need to know this information--citizens, legal residents, documented immigrants and undocumented immigrants. These rights are for all of us.

And this morning, I read a case from the community that illustrates exactly why I teach this information to my students"

"Esta manana oficiales de immigracion entraron a uno de los barrios donde viven muchos Latinos en Champaign y detuvieron a una persona que estaba saliendo de su casa. Le preguntaron su nombre y pidieron ID. Cuando el hombre entro a su casa por su ID ellos fueron tras el, le hicieron mas preguntas y al final lo arrestaron. POR FAVOR cuando alguien asi se acerque no tienen obligacion de responder a mas preguntas. Solo deben dar su nombre. Si los oficiales no tienen una orden de arresto con su nombre, firmada por un juez y con su direccion no tienen derecho de entrar a su casa pero si ustedes les dejan la puerta abierta ellos entran. No les abran la puerta. Estos oficiales aparentemente estaban buscando a alguien mas pero se llevaron arrestada a esta persona. Cuidense."

Comunidades also has an activity that asks students to explore and question our concept of "success" (pp. 94-95). One item involves community-police relations: "Un grupo de padres que colabora con la policía local con la intención de disminuir la criminalidad en su vecindario." Students almost always say that, yes, that is an example of successful people. I then point out that although the intention may be noble, in some communities collaborating with the police may be seen as a betrayal. We need to understand that our lived reality with the police--which informs our perspective on them--may not be the same as everyone else's. Some immigrants may bring with them the notion that police are corrupt and not to be trusted. (Well, some people in the US might feel the same way, in fact.) Some people may not be able to distinguish the difference between the police and ICE officials. "Secure Communities" has created much mistrust between immigrant communities and local police.

I am certainly not against the police and their role in public safety. However, I do want my students to ask themselves and others if a man leaving his home, as in the example above, has anything to do with public safety. What crime was he committing? Why was it necessary to arrest him? Was that a good use of police time and effort? Did that make our community safer in any way? I also want students to understand more about ICE, Secure Communities and other policies that determine police relations with our local communities.

This may be a controversial post. Do you have an opinion to share? Do you know what your rights are? How much do you know about ICE, Secure Communities and crime rates among immigrants? What are the facts versus the media hype? Please leave a comment if you have a perspective to share!

Languages for Specific Purposes: One Look at the Role of Community Service Learning in LSP

2011-11-01T10:49:00.001-06:00

by Ann Abbott

I was very happy to receive my copy of Specialised Languages in the Global Village: A Multi-Perspective Approach (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011) in the mail today. The book focuses on languages for specific purposes (LSP) and was edited by Carmen Pérez-Llantada and Maida Watson.

My contribution was Chapter Two "Social Entrepreneurship and Community Service Learning: Building Sustainable Non-profits and Language Programs" (p. 27-45).

You can see in the table of contents that the chapters cover a wide range of issues. I would especially recommend the chapter by Stefanie Stadler for anyone who is working on intercultural competence (and aren't we all). There are also very insightful pieces by several of my CIBER colleagues who have become my friends: Christine Uber Grosse, Maida Watson and Mary Risner.

The book is described in this way: "The status of LSP (Languages for Specialised Purposes) in the contemporary socio-cultural context is an ongoing central issue of scholarly debate. Specialised languages in the global village examines the impact of globalisation on intercultural communication within specialised communities of practice. The contributions of the volume provide linguistically and pedagogically-informed discussion on modes of communication practice in professional and institutional domains, frames of social action and the construction of professional identities. The contributors also address issues of languages and social entrepreneurship, and the acquisition and development of linguistic/cultural competence in foreign languages for specialised purposes. The edition is a valuable reading for researchers in LSP, specialists in the fields of discourse analysis, sociolinguistics and scholars in the area of rhetoric and composition. It is also of interest for professional translators, language editors and language advisors in the fields of specialised academic/professional communication. LSP instructors and foreign language teachers will also find informed guidelines and useful pedagogical proposals for classroom implementation."

I first met Maida (Florida International University) when I went on the study trip she leads in Spain for instructors of business Spanish. Soon after that professional development trip, Maida and I co-authored an article about experiential learning and professional development programs: “A Business Language Faculty Development Program with Experiential Learning,” in Global Business Languages 11 (2006): 3-21. Since then we continue to meet at each year's CIBER Business Languages Conference (this year it will be at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill), and I went to Miami last winter to speak at the conference they organize for K-12 teachers of business languages.

In short, languages for specific purposes is an up and coming field within linguistics and has a place, I would argue, in cultural studies. The Modern Language Journal will soon come out with a special LSP issue. (My colleague, Darcy Lear, will have an article in it about the intersections between LSP and CSL.) It is the subject of many conference presentations, not just at CIBER's business languages conference. And the field is perhaps most developed already in Europe. I am happy, then, to have a chapter in this book that gathers many helpful studies and provides solid bibliographies for further research.

Spanish Lesson Plan with News Items

2011-10-27T11:52:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

It's the time of the semester when we all need to interject a little variety in our classes to keep students alert and engaged.

Today I'll be doing parts of Lección 15 ¨¿Son noticias para nosotros?¨ from Comunidades. I gathered a few articles from today's La Raza (a Spanish-language newspaper based in Chicago). I copied them, divided them in half and printed them out. In class, I'll mix them out and hand each student a piece of paper. Students will read their half of the news item and then search among their classmates to find the person who has the other half. They'll sit down together to fill in the complete picture. You can print out the articles I chose and do this activity with your students, too. (I have enough for 14 students. If you have more, just choose a few more articles or pair students up.)

Afterwards, I'll have students do the following:

Circulate among their classmates again, telling about their article and asking if the other students already knew about this news item or not. (Conclusion: usually the "Latino news" are completely unknown to most students.)
Ask them to identify why they think these particular news items are pertinent to their work in the community or connected to information we have studied in class.
Get out their smart phones or laptops and browse La Raza for a few minutes. Then go to La Opinion (a Los Angeles based Spanish-language newspaper) to compare the two perspectives.
To conclude, I will ask students to answer our lesson's initial question: ¿Son noticias para nosotros?

I hope that you can use these articles with your students. If you do, let me know how it goes. I find that it is both a fun and informative lesson.

Student Reflection

2011-10-27T11:31:00.001-05:00

by Jacqui Kukulski

Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego? Well, Carmen Sandiego contracted Chagas disease in her exploits over in Central Americas, lost her health benefits and her amazing salary so she’s at Frances Nelson Health Center. That’s quite unfortunate for Carmen Sandiego.

Luckily, that’s not the case for the people who get treated at Frances Nelson. I haven’t heard of a single case of Chagas disease. There’s honestly nothing amusing about working at Frances Nelson, but to work there you need to be lighthearted but with eons of compassion.

Frances Nelson Health Center is a governmentally subsidized clinic that provides healthcare for the uninsured (or self-pay) and for the bad insured (their insurance doesn’t help out much). Every patient this clinic sees is on a pay scale based on their monthly salary and how many dependents are in the household. Through this center patients are able to get appointments at Carle Hospital for specific procedures that the clinic can’t handle itself, and their pay scale stays. I don’t know how you may pay your medical bills, but if you have ever seen a bill without any insurance, you’ll understand that this pay scale is the reason these people are able to get healthcare.

The pay scale certainly helps the patients out, but there would be no clinic if there was no one willing work there. Every single employee there is a hero. They may not be wearing camouflage and fighting to preserve our freedom. They may not be secretly wearing spandex under their street clothes. In fact their wearing scrubs, t-shirts, jeans, dress pants, and dress shirts. From the girls at reception to the doctors to the triage lady to the people I don’t even know who work there, they’re all heroes. These women who work here (there are about 4 men who work there), are some of the most amazing people I've met. They are the embodiment of this clinic. Recently the clinic has taken too many patients on and is no longer accepting new patients, but when a little girl with many medical problems coupled with Down syndrome showed up at the clinic, she became a patient. This is only one example of their extreme compassion. But there are also times when we have to turn patients away because they showed up too late for their appointment.

Working at Frances Nelson is rewarding yet difficult. It’s difficult because you find out about everything that is wrong with the health care system and how people are being forgotten. I have learned that people come from drastically different backgrounds and only want one thing: to see a doctor. And, that is where it becomes rewarding. For the Spanish speaking patients, I am one of four people who make up the keystone. With out us translating, it would be weeks if not months before a Spanish speaking patient was seen, not to mention the doctors would have trouble figuring out what was wrong with them. I may only answer phones at the moment and translate at the front desk, but at the end of the day, I know that without me, that patient might not have been seen.

While working at Francis Nelson, I have met and talked to people with drastically different backgrounds. Of the Spanish speaking community, whom I work with most, there are immigrants, mothers fleeing their husbands, children who try to translate for their parents, teenagers who want to help out with the family and are giving up a college education and fathers who accompany their wife and children to their appointments. Seeing all of these people has opened my eyes. I have always read or heard about people like them. I learned about them in my Spanish classes in high school, in history classes, on the news, but never have I actually experienced (knowingly) someone from a drastically different background than my own.

There is a student in my Spanish class this semester who is very knowledgeable about immigration laws and has a very strong opinion about them. It wasn’t until a week ago I learned that his family is full of immigrants and have probably had to face similar hardships like the ones the patients are facing at the clinic. After learning this, everything became real. I could hear the emotion in his voice when he was talking about his family history. It wasn’t just another story for the news; it was his life, just like it is the life of these patients.

After working in Frances Nelson for a few weeks and listening to this student I have learned to open my eyes to the world as it is. My veil of ignorance is gone and that decrepit looking house down the street isn’t abandoned, that mother debating $1.09 for food isn’t just a penny pincher, that father sitting in the clinic with his kids isn’t just a father. Everything is more. That house is a home. That debate for food is a debate between feeding her children and paying a water bill. That father isn’t just a father, but a protector and the anchor that family needs to stay sane.

Student Spotlight: Carolyn (Carolina) Kloecker

2011-10-19T11:29:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Carolina Kloecker is passionate about Spanish and service. She is a self-starter who came to my office just to introduce herself long before she actually took a class with me. And that "jump-in-there" attitude of hers (which many students can develop more in themselves) has taken her far.

As a UIUC student, Carolina studied abroad in Ecuador, did a Spanish & Illinois Summer Internship with ACCION Chicago, took "Spanish in the Community" and "Spanish & Entrepreneurship," worked in the Study Abroad Office and amped up their social media presence, and in general simply took advantage of many, many opportunities on campus to develop her language, leadership and service skills.

She was an ideal student. But she graduated in May 2011 and had to find her way in a tough job market. I think her current job and activities will be of interest to all Spanish students but especially those interested in teaching. You can visit her classroom blog, and you can read below to see how Carolina continues to use her passion for languages and cultures in her teaching.

"Hi there!

"I have been so very busy as a 1st Grade Dual Language (Bilingual) teacher here in Austin! I actually teach at Gattis Elementary in Round Rock, Texas, which is a suburb just north of Austin. After getting in to Texas Teaching Fellows in March, I moved down in June to start my summer institute and student teaching. I worked with a Pre-K class (also dual language) and absolutely loved it.

"I am having a blast, and I am especially excited about the expansion of the Dual Language model throughout bilingual education. My classroom is actually "Two-Way" Dual Language, meaning that I have both Spanish-speaking and English-speaking students in my class, and the English-speakers are learning Spanish while the Spanish-Speakers learn English, so both languages are equally valued. We alternate Spanish days and English days, but Language Arts is always in the child's native language (so I have to teach at least 2 separate lessons each day), Math is always in English, and Science and Social Studies are always in Spanish. My class is about 2/3 English speakers and 1/3 Spanish, so I have noticed that I have to use lots of goofy gestures and visuals especially when we are doing Science and Social Studies. In the morning on a Spanish day the English speakers walk in and say "awww man! It's a Spanish day." but then when we get to a read aloud or an activity in Spanish, they get so excited when they actually figure out what I'm saying. I have some wonderful students that are very attentive and they are really picking up a lot of vocabulary and understanding very quickly.

"Spanish in the Community and Spanish in Entrepreneurship obviously prepared me incredibly for the role of being a bilingual educator. I was taught to value Spanish, and I saw the reality in Illinois schools (much like in my hometown) where Spanish-speakers are separated and can occasionally be "pushed" to learn English (early-exit) without ever really learning "academic" Spanish. I hope that the dual language model will start to spread even further. It is already in several large districts in Texas and Washington state, as well as other places around the country. More about Dual Language is on the Gomez & Gomez (guys who came up with it) website: http://dlti.us/ In their model, students will continue through dual language at least through 5th grade (there is no "exiting"), if not entirely through middle and high school. They are creating true bilingual citizens, because students will learn subjects in both languages rather than just doing things at school in English and at home in Spanish.

"I am so happy at my school, and I was so lucky to be able to get a job. I really think that I have a job because I speak Spanish, and because of my motivation to learn. That is what I try to tell my students and the parents of my students, that bilingualism (or multilingualism!) can be a huge asset and is one of the most rewarding things you can do with your life."

Carolina, you are a shining star and an example that all of our Spanish students can follow. Good luck!

Student Reflection: Jacqui Kukulski

2011-10-18T12:13:00.000-05:00

by Jacqui Kukulski

Well, hello there. It’s a bit into the first semester and I’ve been to my community partner several times. I recently spent the summer in Spain working on my Spanish and all things Europe related. A regular Spanish class for my Spanish (second) major didn’t fit into my schedule and I didn’t want to take a semester off of Spanish so I thought this class would work nicely. And I’m ecstatic with my decision. I’ve been learning Spanish since I was 13 years old and up until last June my Spanish was only mediocre. I was terrified to speak, zoned out whenever someone talked to me for more than 30 seconds in Spanish and fell asleep reading it. But I could write. Boy, could I write. But, that’s probably because I was able to look up all the words I couldn’t think of off the top of my head. When I got back from Spain, I was pretty confident with my Spanish skills and took on quite an undertaking. I started talking with Frances Nelson Health Center about volunteering with them this semester for my community partner. In their blurb, it says only work here if your Spanish is very strong. Maybe Spain boosted my confidence, maybe my Spanish really is pretty strong, but I got my work there.

This first post was suggested to me to be about my experiences with Spanish and I feel that my decision to double major in Spanish is a story required of that suggestion. When I was a junior in high school I had completed all four levels of Spanish that I needed to not only graduate high school, but also college (at least here at UIUC). I had an open space in my schedule and I could fill it with a study hall, two photo classes, or Spanish AP. To this day, I still can’t put my finger on what drove me to take Spanish AP. I had cursed it all through high school, dreading the exam that I didn’t prepare for, not putting nearly as much importance on that class as I had my sciences or math. In my senior year I applied for the Spanish language scholarship, the one requirement I didn’t like: I had to take at least one semester of Spanish in college. I was not going to continue with it. Registration came and went for U of I and I registered for Span 204, or Spanish grammar. First semester came and went and I received an A in the class. Second semester came and Spanish didn’t fit into my schedule. I got sad. I missed it. How was that possible? How could I miss a subject that I had loathed in high school? I decided to minor in it and took two Spanish classes the next semester.

At this point I had discovered my love for Spanish. My life would not be complete without it. It had to stay in my life. A minor would not be sufficient. I worked through my schedule and discovered I could double major in it. I came in with enough AP credits. And then, I applied to study in Spain. That was the key to making this work. And then I went to Spain.

I like to compare learning Spanish to running a marathon. I’ve never run a marathon so the comparison might be off, but they always say that when running in a marathon you hit a wall and you have to work past that wall in order to finish the race. In terms of Spanish, that wall is the first “ah ha” moment when things start to click: the point when you stop translating in your head and you start thinking in Spanish. My wall was when I took Spanish AP. We practiced for the exam by writing 200 words in 10 minutes. At first it was difficult, but by the end of the year, it was like breathing.

I was helping a friend yesterday with his Spanish homework, and someone else asked if I was fluent, because according to her, I sounded fluent. I said no. My friend with the Spanish homework asked me: Have you ever been to Spain? Yes. How long were you there? Six weeks. Did you speak Spanish the entire time? Yes. My friend smiled at me. That was sufficient enough to tell me that I am in fact fluent. I still disagree; there are many words, phrases and idioms that I do not know. But I know enough Spanish to order in a restaurant.

What is "Real" Community Service Learning Work?

2011-10-18T10:51:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

I think that the following e-mail thread will be of interest to students, instructors and community partners. It illustrates how we may have unaligned expectations about what constitutes "real" Spanish community service learning (CSL) work.

Human services workers know that paperwork and basic office tasks are routine but necessary parts of the job. Students, however, may not know or value that work. What do they expect to do in a human services office? What do they want to do? What does learning "look like" to them? These are all important yet difficult questions for CSL instructors who must design mutually beneficial partnerships.

E-mail exchange #1: Student to TA

[TA],

He visto tus comentarios sobre [community partner] y mi frustracion sobre no mucho trabajo y que estoy haciendo tarea muchas veces. Estoy de acuerdo que no es el punto de la clase, y quiero hablar contigo sobre otras opciones de hacer trabajo, quizas con ESL o algo similar. No se que exactamente hay que hacer. Y para responder sobre sus comentarios de quizas estoy detras en mis horas, voy a hacer las horas en los fines de semanas que vienen en un programa que [community partner] ofrece para los ninos. Gracias

[Student]

E-mail exchange #2: TA to Student with cc to Course Supervisor (me)

Hola [Student]:

Gracias por escribirme sobre tu community parnter. También le mando a la Profesora Abbott este mensaje.

Me parece bien que vayas los sábados para hacer las horas. Sin embargo, como tu dices, tal vez no termines todas las horas porque durante la semana no hay mucho trabajo que hacer en [community partner].

Creo que podrías ver otras oportunidades en el blog y también podrías ver si puedes hacer terminar las horas adicionales con otro community partner.

Vamos a ver que sugiere la Profesora Abbott.

Gracias por avisarnos.

[TA]

E-mail exchange #3: Course Supervisor (me) to Student with cc to TA

Student,

I just want to make sure what "no much trabajo" means. Some students do not value answering the phone and greeting clients as work, and it is. Just want to check that first.

In addition to [TA's] suggestions, please make sure that you have talked with [community partner employees] about what you can do at [community partner] when there are slow times. I for one would love it if you could come up with information to post on their Facebook page. (If you can't post directly, send items to me.) See if you can come up with a short video for their website. Be creative!

Ann

E-mail exchange #4: Student to Course Supervisor (me)

Professor Abbott,

The more I think about it I guess I really do quite a bit of work. I am constantly answering phones and the door, which I realize alleviates a lot of the work from the other workers when they are with clients. I also do interact with a lot of the clients and do translations and such. Tomorrow when I go in I will talk with [community partner employee] about the facebook page and see what I can do. As I told [TA], I also plan on helping out more with their Saturday kids program which I imagine will be much more interactive. Thanks for getting back with me.

[Student]

E-mail exchange #5: Course Supervisor (me) to Student

[Student],

I can't tell you how happy I am to read your message. Not only does your work alleviate the other workers, it is very important to the clients themselves to see a friendly face and be able to speak in Spanish to the person who responds to the door and telephone. Thank you for your work at [community partner]!

[Community partner employee] probably won't have much ideas about Facebook, but you and I can talk about that if shedoesn't have other projects for you.

May I post your messages on my blog? I would delete your name and [community partner's] name as well, of course. I just think it would be helpful for my readers to see what students think. I hope so, but if you say no, that's fine, too!

Ann

E-mail exchange #6: Student to Me

By all means, you are welcome to.

Spanish Community Service Learning and the Job Hunt

2011-10-17T12:51:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

I received an e-mail this morning from LinkedIn with links to two articles about career success that are, in my mind, indirectly linked to what we do with our students in Spanish community service learning (CSL).

1. "The Must-Have Leadership Skill" talks about the importance of emotional intelligence. I really feel like the the experience of doing community service learning plus creating activities that explicitly address seeing things from other people's perspectives contributes to students' emotional intelligence. In an interview and in job search materials, being able to demonstrate with examples that you were able to work successfully in a multilingual and multicultural environment and understand multiple perspectives should be positive indicators of future success. While students may examine multiple perspectives in other courses, our CSL courses ask them to put that into action.

2. "The Ten Worst Mistakes of First-Time Job Hunters" focuses on things that recent college graduates wish they would have done while in school. Learn Spanish should be top on the list! But CSL is an overlooked opportunity in the following items:

"I would have taken on a job or an internship in addition to my courseload." CSL work is a job! Our students have to work a minimum of 28 hours per semester, so it is an important part-time job for them. However, it's necessary that they think of it and treat it as such if they want to truly take advantage of its career-preparation opportunities
"I would have gotten more involved in career-relevant extracurricular activities." Again, CSL does this for them. Being involved in our community partners' day-to-day work and special events are career-relevant. Students can help community partners with event planning, internal and external communications, grant writing, building a social media presence and many other relevant career tasks.
"I would have kept better track of my achievements." Our students' reflective essays and exams are really a catalog of their achievements that they can later mine for relevant examples.
"I would have focused more on developing relevant skills." All our students work on customer service. And think of students who work with a particular student in an after school tutoring program: their "project" is to improve the student's academic achievement. With some smart "project management" thinking they can build a variety of tools to achieve and measure success as well as make recommendations for changes that can be implemented by next semester's tutor.

Darcy Lear and I co-wrote an article about how Business Spanish CSL students can be encouraged to "package" their Spanish CSL work in job search materials: "Marketing Business Languages: Teaching Students to Value and Promote Their Coursework." The article refers to several activities in Comunidades: Más allá del aula that explicitly walk students through the steps of transforming their academic CSL experiences into professional assets.

In short, academic CSL is much more than just job training. But it gives students a unique opportunity to prepare themselves for the competitive job market.

Champaign-Urbana: Volunteers and Donations Needed for Mexican Mobile Consulate Visit

2011-10-16T10:55:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Please contact Jill Capes (jillcapes@gmail.com) if you can help. This is a very important event for our community. SPAN 232 & 228F students can use these hours if you think you will fall short of 28.

Volunteers Needed

The Mexican Consulate will visit Champaign-Urbana on November 4 -6 to process passports and consular identification cards. Spanish-speaking volunteers are needed to help individuals fill out forms. Other volunteers (Spanish not required) are needed to play with children while their parents complete the paperwork and ID process. Volunteer shifts are listed below.

Friday, November 4

1:45 – 5:00 pm

5:00 – 8:15 pm

Saturday, November 5

8:45 am – 12:00 pm

12:00 – 3:15 pm

Sunday, November 6

7:45 – 11:00 am

11:00 am – 1:15 pm

Location: Centro Romero at St. Mary’s Church (link to map)

612 E Park Street

Champaign, IL 61820

Near the 6 Orange and 7 Grey buslines.

If you or your group is interested in volunteering or you have questions, please contact Jill Capes at jillcapes@gmail.com with your name(s), availability, preferred role (helping with forms or children), and phone number(s).

We are also looking for breakfast contributions for Saturday or Sunday. This includes breakfast foods and drinks such as soda and coffee. Please contact Jill at jillcapes@gmail.com or 217 778 4202 if you or your group is willing to contribute.

Articles of Interest in Hispania 94.3 September 2011

2011-10-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

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.

Community Service Learning and Spanish Composition

2011-10-12T14:42:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

This semester I am teaching a special honors section of Spanish composition that involves community service learning. Students have the same CSL requirements as students in "Spanish in the Community" and "Spanish & Entrepreneurship," but during class and for homework they have the same requirements as all the other Spanish composition students. The students are wonderful, and I read their writing with interest and delight.

Honestly though, it has been a real challenge to integrate the two components: Spanish composition and CSL.

Of course, written reflections are the obvious points of contact between the two. But what should they write about? How can the actual content of Spanish composition link to CSL?

I know there are many very good answers, and I'm sure that my readers can share their wonderful ideas. However, this is another case, it seems when we foreign language teachers face a lack of teaching materials.

Just the other day I received a sample copy of Developing Writing Skills in Spanish by Javier Muñoz-Basols, Yolanda Pérez Sinusía and Marianne David (Routledge). I was very happy to see that the content of the book went beyond the typical genres: description, narration, argumentation and exposition. Instead, they also dedicate chapters to advertising, legal & business documents and technical writing. I was also very happy to see an activity-approach to every chapter. Students actually have to do task-based activities in order to learn about each genre and analyze them. That was such a relief from the typical "read this and discuss this" approach. Furthermore, it's not a grammar book disguised as a writing book, as so many are. Yet out of a 37-page chapter, four sentences are dedicated to students' actual writing. At the very end of the chapter, of course.

That is why I use Modelos. It really focuses on the process of writing. Students don't get to the end of the chapter and read: Now write an essay about this. They're given strategies, tactics and tools to use throughout the writing process--from generating ideas to finally editing their language. Unfortunately, its approach has no connection to CSL or the role of writing in the "real world" of Latino immigrants and those who work with them.

The closest we have (that I am aware of) to a book that integrates a process approach and real-world Spanish is Kim Potowski's Conversaciones escritas: Lectura y redaccion en contexto. First of all, the chapters are thematically-organized, not just genre-organized. (Why do textbooks with chapter titles like "La descripción" and "El ensayo argumentativo" teach students what makes a good title?) That's what writing is about! We write about things. Sure, genre is important--and Conversaciones escritas covers them--, but when we decide to actually write about something it is because we have something to say about something. Furthermore, the chapter topics are pertinent to a Spanish CSL course. In fact, the very first chapter is "La inmigración." Because the book emphasizes US Latino experiences and perspectives, Spanish CSL students will come away better informed about many aspects of the community members' lives. Finally, students do activities, analysis AND writing throughout each chapter. That sends a clear message that writing is a process--and that it is part of thinking, doing and analyzing, not something that happens once you have done all of that preliminary work. There's so much more to say about Kim's wonderful book, but suffice it to say that I will use it the next time I teach my special section of Spanish composition with CSL.

However, I think we can identify gaps that still exist. Any book about writing and Spanish CSL would have to also include the following:

Translation. Some brief but explicit instruction on translation. After all, our students must constantly do that in the community even though they have no formal training it.
Letter writing conventions. Students do write a letter in the very first chapter of Conversaciones escritas, but from my experience teaching Business Spanish, they need a lot of guidance about the formalities of letter writing--from what greetings are appropriate to how to close. (I have read "Sinceramente" many, many times!) Our students who work in schools often need to write letters to the parents. Our students who work in offices could help write letters and e-mails (a constant part of work life for all of us) if our community partners new the students were well trained in matters of form and formality.
Pamphlets and fliers. Our community partners struggle to keep up-dated brochures about their organization and timely fliers about the events that are constantly occurring in the community. The writing needs to be visually appealing, easy to read with graphic elements that enhance the message and in a simplified language that even people with lower levels of literacy can comprehend.
On-line content. I haven't seen any composition book tackle this. Writing for the web is very different than writing an academic article with dense paragraphs that fill 15 pages. Students need to know what keeps someone reading on the web--short paragraphs, snappy anecdotes, multiple examples and all the multi-media content that can be embedded. Which is one reason why script-writing or story-boarding for videos should also be part of a CSL composition course.

These are my thoughts based on many years of working with community partners, students and non-profits in general. Ideally, a Spanish composition CSL course would have content that informs students about the communities within which they are working and would introduce writing genres that our community partners use and need.

Immigration: An Example of Interdisciplinarity as Best Approach to Complex Topics

2011-10-12T13:00:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Sometimes when I am teaching my "Spanish in the Community" course, I feel the weight of the entire Spanish curriculum--even the whole university curriculum--on my shoulders!

How can students be successful Spanish CSL students if it is the first time that they are not using "classroom Spanish"?
What (erroneous) assumptions do students make about the bilingual classes where many of them serve when they don't have a background in the theory of bilingual education?
Do students really understand why people leave their home countries if they don't know about pertinent US foreign policy, world events and history?
Might students view community members' interactions with the law as isolated events without realizing how ICE and Secure Communities have created a constant "ghost presence" in immigrants' lives?
Just how developed are students' critical thinking skills and media literacy? They need those to disentangle themselves from the barrage of negative messages about immigration that we all receive daily.

Thankfully, our students take many courses while in college, and some of them help them fill in the gaps. Just the other day, one of my students made very articulate connections between NAFTA, losses in specific Mexican job sectors and immigration. I think this came in part from a political science course he had taken. In the past, students with an education background have been able to inform all of us in the classroom about education policies that affect Latinos. Those are shining moments when the students do the interdisciplinary work for you.

It's also heartening to know that we have many colleagues across campus who are researching and publishing on many facets of immigration. Picking up the latest issue of Inside Illinois, I was excited to read about two such projects.

1. This work by Joseph P. Robinson in the College of Education can help students better understand the challenges facing the ESL and bilingual education students--and teachers--with whom they work.

2. I enjoyed the first sentence--"It's not one border, one time, that makes an immigrant, says Dorothee Schneider"--of the article that featured her new book, Crossing Borders: Migration and Citizenship in the Twentieth-Century United States.

For our students' sake, immigration and immigrants should be topics that show up repeatedly across disciplines and throughout the curriculum within each discipline--especially in Spanish courses.

Community Service Learning at ACTFL 2011

2011-10-12T10:30:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

In just about one month I'll be flying to Denver for the ACTFL 2011 Convention. It's exciting for me because I get to see old friends from grad school, friends who were once TAs that I supervised and friends from publishing, especially the Pearson/Prentice Hall world languages team.

If you will be at ACTFL, let me know! I'd love to meet up.

I will be giving a session titled "How to Prepare Service-Learning Lesson Plans: Synthesizing Best Practices" on Friday, November 18 from 3:45 to 4:45 in Room 304 of the Colorado Convention Center. Here is some more information:

Description

In service learning (SL), students work in the community; but what happens in class? This session presents a lesson-planning model that weaves SL pedagogy into the same task-based, communicative activities foreign language instructors already use. Examples include adding SL activities to standing lesson plans as well as building new plans.

Content

Instructors may feel that service learning (SL) requires them to totally transform what and how they teach. On the contrary, once the SL work has been added to a course design, successful lesson plans incorporate the same, familiar elements they already use: vocabulary building, grammar instruction, the 5 C’s, the four skills, communicative and task-based activities, etc. The trick is to adapt the content of those activities to reflect students’ experiences in the community.

We illustrate the lesson-planning model with a sample lesson plan designed for the intermediate level and based on a common foreign language SL scenario: students working as ESL tutors. Activities include listening, speaking, reading and writing. The vocabulary relates to basic tutoring activities; grammar instruction focuses on formal commands; students read about ESL pedagogy; finally, students prepare a poster with good tutoring “commands” to be displayed in the tutoring space.

By doing a search of the program, I came up with these other results for service learning:

1. Sessions about service learning.

2. Individual presentations about service learning.

However, I know that this is just a partial list because my own title didn't show up in the search! I will search out more sessions and report on them from the conference.

Here are some more sessions that I interest me.

1. Holly Nibert will talk about her work with international TAs in her language program coordination and TA Training: "Promoting the Intercultural Competence of International TAs in the Classroom."

2. Bill VanPatten's talks are always informative, and he has two this year.

3. For Portuguese, Fernanda Fereira will talk about "Improving Speaking and Writing Practice in Spanish and Portuguese."

4. Audrey Heining-Boynton is a wonderful speaker and will be involved in several sessions, including one about communities.

5. My colleauge from German who always does wonderful things, Cori Crane, will speak on "

Teaching Emotional and Evaluative Language in the German Classroom"

Once I have the printed program in my hands, I will search for more CSL presentations. If you're giving a presentation, please leave a comment so that we can all know!

Help at Central High School's Parent-Teacher Conferences

2011-10-07T15:08:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Helping Spanish-speaking parents communicate with their children's English-speaking teachers during parent-teacher conferences is both important and rewarding. My students always learn a lot, gain confidence and understand better the challenges that both students and parents face within the educational system.

Again this semester, Central needs our student volunteers. Use this opportunity to ensure that you get 28 hours of work this semester. Students from past semesters are welcome as well, and no one needs a criminal background check to do this work.

Be sure to read about the vocabulary used during parent-teacher conferences and about one student's experience.

Here is the note from Central High School's Ms. High:

"My name is Janet High. I am now scheduling parent teacher conferences for Central High School. We were hoping to again get your assistance with translators. Our conferences are scheduled for Thursday the 27th of October from 5pm through 8pm and Friday the 28th of October from 8am through noon. If you know of anyone that might be interested, could you please have them email me at highja@champaignschools.org. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Hope you are having a great day!"

Blogging about Spanish Community Service Learning, Social Entrepreneurship and Business Spanish

2011-10-06T11:29:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Somehow I took a longer vacation from blogging than I intended. I missed blogging!

We're already at the mid-point of the Fall 2011 semester, and I will begin my blogging routine again. As usual, I will cover the following topics. But if there is anything you would like to see me cover that is not listed, please let me know! Furthermore, if you or your students would like to be guest contributors to this blog, I would be delighted to highlight your experiences and perspectives. But here is what you can expect from me:

Highlights from conferences I attend.
Reviews about articles and books that focus on Spanish or foreign language community service learning (CSL).
Reflective posts from my honors students who are doing CSL.
Lesson plans and classroom activities that I use with my own students. (Many are tied to Comunidades: Más allá del aula.)
Profiles of former students who are doing interesting things in their professional lives and with languages and cultures.
Updates to the running Spanish CSL bibliography. (Please add to the list if I have missed something!)
Local (Champaign-Urbana) opportunities for students and others to use their Spanish to help in the community.
Information about events that highlight issues of concern to local Latinos and Spanish-speaking immigrants everywhere.

I hope to hear from you in the comments, in person, on Facebook or Twitter (though I must confess that I'm as behind on tweeting as I am on blogging).

Champaign-Urbana: Conexión. Ven y conéctate.

2011-09-06T11:35:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Aside from our valued community-partnerships, one-time or short-term opportunities to serve in the community often come up during the semester. Students are encouraged to take advantage of this opportunities for two reasons:

To expand their experiences in the community and with different community partners.
To ensure that they get 28 hours of community service in by the last day of classes.

Alejandra Coronel just wrote to me about one of these opportunities. I hope that our "Spanish in the Community" students can attend and help.

We would like to invite you to participate in CONEXIÓN, an upcoming outreach event. This is a free event in Champaign-Urbana to connect Latinos with you, area businesses and service providers. CONEXION is sponsored by Windsor Road Christian Church, Busey Bank, and Coronel Bilingual Consultant.

Don’t miss the opportunity to promote your product, and services while connecting with our Latino community. Join other area businesses and service providers including: Children/Parenting services, Career/Vocation, Financial/Banking, Legal, Mental Health, Community Center, Food, Medical, Dental, Recreation, Transportation, Automotive, Churches, Housing, Insurance, Law Enforcement, etc.

When: Saturday, September 24, 1-4 p.m.

Where: Judah Christian School Gym
908 N. Prospect Avenue, Champaign

Why: To make resources known to the Latino community.

We would like to have service providers and area businesses staff a table at the event to talk directly to Latinos about the services/products they have available. We also suggest having materials available to distribute for participants to take home with them. If you would like to have your material translated to Spanish, feel free to contact Coronel Bilingual Services at (217) 390-9560, ac@coronelbilingualservices.com for document translation services at a discounted rate for event participants.

If you have further questions, please feel free to contact Christine Decker at fourdeck@gmail.com or by phone at (217) 355-8763. We look forward to partnering with you to serve our Latino community at this event.

Spanish Community Service Learning and Law School

2011-08-08T11:15:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

I recently received a message from a former student of mine who was accepted to the University of Chicago law school. What an accomplishment! I am happy for her, and I was happy to read how she connected her own success with Spanish community service learning (CSL):

"I also wanted to let you know how much I appreciated your course and the Spanish & Illinois program. Not only was it something that I was able to speak about during interviews, but it also sparked my interest in immigration law and working with the Latino community. University of Chicago has a really interesting Immigrant Child Advocacy Project, and I hope to work there during my time at school."

Many students who never take a CSL course are also successful, of course. Still, I was happy to see that CSL can give students a leg up in interviews. There are so many things that they can reference in their interviews: using their Spanish with native speakers, working in a professional context, succeeding in a multicultural work environment, tackling challenging situations, overcoming personal doubts, doing research about immigration policies and connecting them to individual's situations, etc.

I'm also very happy that one more professional will soon enter the workforce who can speak Spanish and is sensitive to the issues (and the facts, not the hype!) about immigrants' lives.

Recruiting Teachers and Principals for Survey

2011-07-25T15:23:00.000-05:00

I am passing along this call for a friend of mine:

CALL FOR TEACHERS (CALL FOR PRINCIPALS BELOW)

Current and former teachers,

The United States Department of Education is looking for current and former K-12 classroom teachers from across the country to participate in telephone interviews. The goal of these interviews is to test new items for a national survey that is administered to educators. Participants will be asked to answer selected items from the survey and provide feedback.

Teachers at public and private schools may be eligible to participate. You may be eligible if you are a:

- Current teacher who has had a break in service in the past five years

- Current teacher who has changed schools in the past five years

- Former teacher who left teaching in the past five years

If you participate in the research study, you will receive $50 in appreciation for completing the interview. The telephone interview will take approximately 30 minutes to complete, and can be done from any phone, at home or at work.

If you know anyone else who may be interested in participating in this study, please let them know about this opportunity. You may be eligible for an additional $10 payment for each qualified person that you refer that is interviewed. The person you refer must mention your name in order for you to receive the additional payment.

If you are interested in participating in this study, please respond to this email or call 1-800-287-1581.

On behalf of the Department of Education, we thank you for your help!

Joyce Clingan

Recruiting Coordinator

ICF Macro

11785 Beltsville Drive, Suite 300

Calverton, MD 20705

*********************************************

CALL FOR PRINCIPALS

Current school principals,

The United States Department of Education is looking for current K-12 school principals from across the country to participate in telephone interviews. The goal of these interviews is to test new items for a national survey that is administered to principals. Participants will be asked to answer items from the survey and provide feedback.

If you participate in the research study, you will receive $50 in appreciation for completing the interview. The telephone interview will take approximately 20 minutes, and can be done from any phone, at home or at work.

If you are interested in participating in this study, please respond to this email or call 1-800-287-1581 <tel:1-800-287-1581> .

On behalf of the Department of Education, we thank you for your help!

Joyce Clingan

Recruiting Coordinator

ICF Macro

11785 Beltsville Drive, Suite 300

Calverton, MD 20705

Impact of Spanish Community Service Learning

2011-05-10T09:05:00.001-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Do you have to hand in an end-of-the-year activities report? Do you hate doing it? Does it feel like bean counting?

I know the feeling. But looking at the numbers can actually be helpful. Your community partners have to do this kind of reporting all the time when they apply for and report back on grants and within their internal and external communications.

There are many ways to measure activity, importance and impact. Numbers do not tell the whole story. But they are one piece of the puzzle. And here are my numbers regarding teaching and program coordination for academic year 2010-11. (OJO: the numbers represent available spaces in the courses I teach/coordinate; I did not count actual enrollments in each and every section. Hence the phrase, "up to.")

5 courses taught/coordinated

SPAN 202 Business Spanish
SPAN 208 Oral Spanish
SPAN 228 Spanish Composition
SPAN 232 Spanish in the Community
SPAN 332 Spanish & Entrepreneurship

725 (up to) students in all five courses
13 TAs (up to) per semester teaching these courses
12 community partners
165 (up to) students in a CSL course

4,620 (up to) student volunteer hours in the community
$98,683.20 (up to) dollar value of student volunteers

37 honors projects (language-learning social networking sites and student reflection blog posts here)

What are your numbers for this year? What other "data" do you think tells the story your course or program's impact? How do you measure quality versus quantity? Leave a comment to let us know!

Student Reflection

2011-05-09T09:46:00.000-05:00

by Hanna Perhai

Hello, once again! Now, unfortunately, for the last time.

The semester has flown by, especially my time in Spanish in the Community. I'd just like to close the semester with some highlights from my experience with S.O.A.R.

My favorite thing, by far, has been getting to know my student. Over the months, I've learned how he learns best, where his strengths lie, and what he likes to do. I know that mental math is not his strong suit, but he almost always gets the right answer if he just writes out the problem. He reads very well in both Spanish and English, but he understands the story better if he reads it in Spanish.

We got the chance to read through a substantially long book in Spanish about Bambi. This was one of the best parts of my time with my student. We switched reading every page so that he would get practice reading a difficult book, and then I got practice reading out loud in Spanish. I honestly think that if a person were to listen to us both reading aloud, they would think we were at the same reading level! But it was excellent practice for us both, and we were able to bond over a common love for Disney.

So, there have been really rewarding experiences for which I'm truly grateful, but that's not to say it's all been fun and easy. I know I've outlined some challenges in previous posts, but this week, during my last day volunteering, I probably faced my biggest one.

I feel like everyone that is volunteering for other organizations, like the Refugee Center, has more difficult situations to deal with. All I have to do is talk to kids who don't care if I make mistakes or don't know all the words. Yesterday, however, I was doing some extra hours and helping some of the S.O.A.R. kids, including my student, take a survey for Abriendo Caminos. I stayed until all of the students were picked up after school except for mine, whose family wasn't showing up. So I was left with my student and the non-Spanish-speaking director of the program.

Long story short, I was expected to call my student's parent and make sure she was going to be able to pick him up. I understood very little of what she was saying, but I did my best to relay the message. I honestly do not feel like I did a good job at all. However, it's a learning experience, and it was definitely good practice, so I don't regret having the opportunity to make a fool of myself on the phone. :)

Along with these challenges, I've seen the need in the community for good education and interaction with these kids, and it's become a cause very special to me. Next semester, I'll be studying abroad in Spain, but I plan to continue to volunteer with S.O.A.R. upon my return in the spring. Now, if you remember, I had three goals I wanted to complete this semester, which I wrote about in my very first post:

Become more comfortable with Spanish. Well, I still have a long way to go, but I definitely feel that I've made lots of improvements with my speaking skills. I'm now more willing to talk in Spanish in public, when before, even that was a feat.
Make a difference. So, I know that I can't change someone's life drastically through two hours a week, but I know that my being there every week to work with my student had an impact. I might not see it explicitly, but I still feel like I've done something for the community.
Have fun! I definitely did this. :) Sometimes it was stressful, but overall, working with S.O.A.R. was a blast.

Okay, so this was a lot longer of a post than I was planning on writing. But it's the last one, so I figure that's fine. I'm so grateful for the experience to use my Spanish in the community, and I hope to keep using it for years to come!

Videos for Comunidades: Más allá del aula (3)

2011-05-08T08:00:00.001-05:00

[Note from Ann Abbott: As an extra project, one of the "Spanish in the Community" students watched the videos that accompany Comunidades: Más allá del aula and has blogged about several topics that emerged for her. You can see the videos yourself:

click on this link for Comunidades: Más allá del aula
By "Welcome," choose "Unidad 1" from the dropdown menu
Hit the "Go" button
Click on "Videos" in the left navigation column]

by Haley Dwyer

Topics

Although the accents were the most challenging part of watching these videos, the range of topics was the most interesting for me. The vast majority of the topics that were discussed during the videos were both informational and pertinent to the information that I have learned throughout the semester. Because many of the topics that were discussed are not things that I normally talk about, in English or in Spanish, my knowledge of the Spanish language was truly tested.

The main thing that I noticed while I was watching the videos was that I had more difficulty understanding topics that were not interesting or completely new to me. For example, Ruth Montenegro’s, who is from Guatemala, video about business was incredibly difficult for me to understand. In fact, I had to watch all of her videos multiple times to simply get the point of them. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand the words, because she did not use complex or technical vocabulary. Instead I was simply not able to connect the words into sentences that made logical sense. It was almost as if she was speaking in strands of completely unrelated words. After reading the summary that is associated with each video and watching the videos multiple times, I did eventually grasp what Ruth was trying to say to the viewers. This phenomenon has never happened to me before and I was shocked when it did. The only reason that I can guess why this happened was because she was using words in a context that I was completely unfamiliar with.

Along with the difficulties that I encountered with Ruth Montenegro, I also encountered difficulties of a different kind while watching the videos of Luz Río, from Colombia. Because she was talking about bilingual education, a topic that I had no prior experience with, I found that I needed to look up many words so that I could grasp what she was saying. I think that because she is a well-educated woman who was talking about a specific topic that I am not familiar with, the vocabulary that she used was simply outside of what I have learned. Although it was difficult to watch this set of videos, I found the challenge interesting and rewarding when I could finally understand what she was saying.

Personally, my favorite part of these videos was when the speakers spoke about their home culture. I loved hearing about things that I had never really thought of before, like the fact that each Mexican state has its own unique culture and identity. My favorite person to listen to was probably Leticia Fonseca. Although she was challenging at first, her stories were personal and interesting to listen to. Her antidotes about her trials with the bank were both funny and thought provoking. I never thought of the fact that some countries didn’t use the banking system because it has always been a part of my life. Its little things like this that make a huge impact on the life of an immigrant and yet virtually no impact on the life of an American citizen.

One topic that I was disappointed that was not covered more was the differences between the speaker’s native culture and the American culture. Personally, I think that this would be extremely interesting and I would love to learn more about it. Along with the question of cultural differences, I would have liked to learn more about the differences in the education system. Only one of the speakers, Yolopatti Hernández, talked about the differences that she has seen. I was most curious about whether or not there is bilingual education throughout other Spanish-speaking countries or if it is only widely used in the United States. Besides these two things, I found the videos informative and I wish that they could have been better incorporated into the Spanish in the community syllabus.

Videos for Comunidades: Más allá del aula (2)

2011-05-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

click on this link for Comunidades: Más allá del aula
By "Welcome," choose "Unidad 1" from the dropdown menu
Hit the "Go" button
Click on "Videos" in the left navigation column]

by Haley Dwyer

Accents

Throughout watching these videos, the one thing that I believe challenged my Spanish the most is the varying accents that I heard. Because most of my Spanish language learning has been spent in a classroom and not traveling the world, I have only been exposed to a few different accents. Listening to the different accents was both frustrating and enjoyable. Not only did the accents make what the speakers were saying easier or difficult to understand but I also noticed that the way in which they spoke made a huge difference in my comprehension levels. Whether they used their voice to emphasize certain words, where they put the stress, and even whether or not they used hand gestures played a very large part in my comprehension level.

After watching the videos, I realized that I really hadn’t heard a large variety of Spanish accents and it left me wanting to learn more. I was the most comfortable with the different Mexican accents, which is probably because I have had the most experience with them. There were a few accents that I heard that I actually had a hard time understanding, which I was surprised about. Watching these videos, made me realize the extreme difference in Spanish and Argentinean accents. Although I have had a TA from both of these countries, watching these videos made me realize that they really do change their accent in class so that we can understand them better. I was honestly shocked when I heard the Argentinean accent because it was so different to what I was used, to the point where I almost could not understand what was being said.

Although some of the accents left me stumped, I found hand gestures and vocal inflections very helpful. I learned that hand gestures are not common in all Spanish speakers, which I found strange. Instead, I now think of them as almost cultural. In the past, every Spanish speaker that I have met likes to use their hands to talk; in fact they are almost vital to any conversation. After watching these videos, I noticed a stark difference in whether or not hand gestures were used. In fact, I noticed that the use of hand gestures actually helped with my comprehension levels. For example, I had the hardest time understanding Leticia Fonseca, who is from Honduras, at first. The first time that Leticia appeared on film, I had to watch the video a couple of times to fully understand what she was talking about. Luckily Leticia liked to use hand gestures and a lot of vocal inflection when she was telling a story. This helped to fill in the large gap that sometimes appeared because of her accent or my lack of vocabulary. After watching Leticia multiple times, I actually grew accustomed to her and by the end I could understand exactly what she was saying without relying on her hand gestures.

Hearing and seeing these native speakers speak made me want to go and explore the world even more than I already do. It showed me that I am not aware in the variance in language that can occur from one country to the next. The stark contrast that I saw in some of the accents taught me really how to listen to a native Spanish speaker in an attempt to fully understand what they are saying. I think that the videos helped me to look practice looking past accents that I am unfamiliar with and instead focus on the content that the speaker is attempting to get across. Ultimately, I was not only challenged by the accents but also the range of topics that were discussed, which I will talk about in my next posting.

Videos for Comunidades: Más allá del aula (1)

2011-05-06T08:00:00.002-05:00

click on this link for Comunidades: Más allá del aula
By "Welcome," choose "Unidad 1" from the dropdown menu
Hit the "Go" button
Click on "Videos" in the left navigation column]

by Haley Dwyer

Language Learning

Along with our Spanish in the Community textbook comes a supplemental website that is full of interesting resources that I was unaware of. For example, there are about thirteen different sets of videos from native Spanish speakers. These videos cover every topic imaginable with speakers from different parts of the Spanish-speaking world. Watching all of these videos taught me many different things. Because I have not been exposed to that many different types of speakers, it was interesting to test my knowledge of the Spanish language. Ultimately, I think that they did aid in my overall learning of the Spanish language in many different ways.

I feel that watching these series of videos first and foremost expanded my vocabulary. Because these videos talked about many different topics, I was able to put words into contexts that I had never before been able to do. For example, Sebastían Burset, who is from Argentina, used the word lindo multiple times. While I was watching this video, I was extremely confused as to what this word meant. Ultimately, I decided to stop the video and attempt to figure it out. After trying multiple different spellings on a few translation sites, I learned that lindo was an adjective that meant pretty or lovely. Immediately, everything that Sebastían was saying about Argentina made sense. It was amazing to me that one simple word could make the difference in my entire comprehension of his conversation. Because of the importance that a few words can make in comprehension, I am glad at this ability to expand my vocabulary a little further.

Along with learning new words, the videos also helped me to review words that I had once learned. Since the topics of the videos varied, I also had to use vocabulary that I had not used in a very long time. This helped me to practice my recall of the Spanish language. For example, in one of her talks Leticia Fonseca talked about the types of food that people eat here. I had not learned the names of foods since high school Spanish classes and I was shocked to learn that I still remembered many of the foods. I believe that a lot Spanish recall comes from immersion. I think that immersing yourself in a language is the quickest and most efficient way to learn it and these videos help with that. In fact, the thing that I found most interesting while I was watching these videos was how I took my notes. Throughout all thirteen video sets, I took notes in both Spanish and English. I found it very odd that in one shorthanded sentence, I automatically switched back and forth between Spanish and English. I hope that this is an indication that I am becoming comfortable with my Spanish abilities and not that my brain is cracking from the stress of finals.

Although I greatly enjoyed watching these videos, there were a few things that I felt could be improved to greater help me with my language learning skills. I would have liked to see a video of two native Spanish speakers interact. When you have a conversation with another person, it is more difficult for an outsider to follow, because you tend to talk faster and with more slang words or phrases. I think this would really test my Spanish abilities and therefore be a great addition to the videos. I would also be curious to know if these speakers are speaking at a normal pace, because I was honestly surprised that I didn’t have to rewatch that many of them. Besides this, I felt that the videos were a great addition to my Spanish language learning because the topics and accents were varied and unique.

Student Reflection

2011-05-05T08:00:00.000-05:00

by Kendra Dickinson

Hello all,

As some of you may know, I have been working in the Extension Office of Hispanic Outreach as part of my Capstone Project for my minor in the Environmental Fellows Project. Over the semester I devoted myself to projects such as a Water Quality Survey given to Spanish-speakers, a Latin American Literature Reading Group, researching world environmental, health and hunger problems, translating and editing materials in English and Spanish, and a project called Scientific Animations Without Borders, working on scripts for videos in English and Spanish. Looking back on the semester, I remember when I first approached my minor advisor, looking for a project. He suggested that I find a project to fulfill my minor’s Capstone Project that combined my major, Spanish, and my minor, Environmental Studies, in order to do a multidisciplinary project that used my strengths and put to use my studies here at the university.

Overall, I could not be more happy that I did that, and that I worked in the Extension Office. I have been challenged, confused, stressed, but overall I have been exceptionally fulfilled in knowing that my work and dedication mattered and have made a difference. I have learned about the limitations that language and literacy barriers place on community involvement in creating solutions to environmental issues, and the importance of environmental education that takes into account language, literacy and cultural values. As I prepare to graduate, I know that the skills and knowledge that I have gained as a part of this experience will be invaluable to my future projects. I know that in the future I will continue this kind of work. To anyone that might be reading this, I challenge you to combine your interests and knowledge in the same way that I did to create projects that are specific, innovative and overall effective. Good luck to all of you in your endeavors!

Student Reflection

2011-05-04T08:00:00.001-05:00

by April Nwatah

Hey readers!

Can you believe that this semester is coming to an end?! Spring semester always seems to fly faster than fall, and every semester that brings me closer to graduation (Spring 2012) seems to fly faster than any other. It was a surprise to look at my calendar the other day and realize that my last day of volunteering was upon me. Today was my last day volunteering with Salt and Light Ministries and I’m generally not too good with endings. It makes me sad to think that I may never see certain people again. I’ve gotten used to seeing the same kids and families every Monday. It still hasn’t really sunk in that I’m finished…

I guess it’s a good thing that I have plans to keep working in the community! (=

As a student living on campus, it’s generally pretty easy to get caught up in what I like to call “the campus bubble.” In previous semesters at the university I found myself not leaving campus for months at a time. During such periods, I would tend to get quite antsy and bored with my surroundings. On the other hand, the semesters that I’ve spent volunteering have brought me a lot of joy. Every time I can step off campus and interact with others I feel refreshed afterwards. Last school year I volunteered at the Refugee Center every Saturday mornings helping kids with their homework and taking them on local field trips. A lot of my experiences in the community have overlapped as I’ve run in to some of the same people at the Refugee Center, at Salt and Light, and all over the Champaign-Urbana community! Some of my most memorable experiences this semester have been running into people from the community at the supermarket, at the mall, etc. With the relationships that I’ve built in the community, it makes me feel like I’m more than just a student in this town.

As for the future, I am spending the summer in Honduras volunteering with an HIV/AIDS facility. I look forward to using the various skills (Spanish skills, interpersonal skills, etc) that I’ve sharpened in this class while I’m in Honduras. As for next fall, I haven’t quite decided where I’ll volunteer next. But with this class and the connections that I’ve made, I’m excited about all of my possibilities!

Until next time!!

Student Reflection

2011-05-03T08:00:00.001-05:00

by Haley Dwyer

Well, my time at the Refugee Center has finally come to a close and I’m sad to say that unfortunately I have had to call it quits earlier than I thought. Over the past three weeks, I have been getting sicker and sicker. Recently, I found out that not only did I get lucky enough to get mono in the last month of the semester but also I now have a sinus infection along with the mono. Being sick is not fun. When you are sick, going to class, talking to friends, walking up the stairs, and even eating lunch is painful. Add in speaking a foreign language with a native Spanish speaker and it can get overwhelming very quickly. I have learned a lot from being sick and working at the Center over the past couple of weeks.

I learned that it is important to take things slow. When you are sick, there is a large part of your brain that is devoted to simply attempting to deal with being sick, so mistakes are made easier. Although making a mistake is not the end of the world, it can be the straw that breaks the camel’s back when you are sick. Because of the added stress that your body is under with the sickness, your stress hormones are pumping extra hard and that little tiny mistake can ruin a perfectly good day. After getting frustrated with myself, I realized that I was worrying over nothing. Quickly, I learned that moving forward was the best thing to do in the circumstance. You can’t control your immune system so it is best to learn to work with it instead of against it.

Along with taking things slowly, I learned that sometimes it’s important to ask for a break. Personally, I am the type of person who is really good at pretending they are not sick when they are actually dying on the inside. I simply go about my daily life and pretend that my body is not crying out in pain with everything I do. After dealing with mono, I have learned that sometimes it is best to ask for help. You are not perfect, and everyone gets sick so sometimes calling in a sick day is not the end of the world. That is what I have had to do with my last three weeks at the Center. After being yelled at by both my parents and the doctor, I asked for help and called in a couple sick days. I learned that people are accepting of things that you can’t control and that asking for help is always best. Ultimately, you need to take care of yourself and people generally understand this.

Most importantly, I learned that I can actually speak Spanish when I am not in the “mood”. I know that may sound strange or obvious to some but in the past I have always avoided using Spanish when I’m not up to it or just not feeling my best. Speaking a different language takes a lot of concentration and when I am sick, it is extra effort that I was not willing to give. Now I know that if I just take it slowly and ask for help when I need it, I can speak in Spanish.

Originally when I signed up for this course, I was excited that I had to complete 28 hours in the community. Although it is a large time commitment, I believe that it is one that is achievable for students who are truly looking to improve their Spanish. It is understandable that a professor would get frustrated with students who simply do not hold to this commitment and instead make excuses in an attempt to maintain a decent grade. Along with impacting the professor who coordinates the programs, I think it is important too for the student to realize that their organization is counting on them to volunteer each week. When a student simply stops showing up to volunteer, it can pose a major issue for the organization that they are working with. This is especially true when a sickness arises. Not only will the professor have the added strain of working with the student to complete their hours but the organization is also left without a volunteer. Because I stopped volunteering at such an early point, not only did I put strain on my academic grade but the Center also has to function without the help that I promised. This aspect of getting sick is the most difficult for me.

Although I am sad that my time at the Center has finished, I am glad that I learned how to handle being sick and speaking Spanish before I go to Spain next semester. I am also extremely grateful for the time that I spent in the Center. I can easily say that I learned more about myself, Spanish, and different cultures in the one semester that I spent at the Center than the three other semesters that I have spent taking Spanish courses at the University.

Student Reflection

2011-04-28T09:12:00.001-05:00

by Haley Dwyer

Hi all! I’m back and it’s sad to say but my time at the Refugee Center is coming to a close. I have done a lot at the Center over this semester and learned a lot from my experiences. One of the skills that I will take out of this experience is the ability to translate documents. At the Center, they translate all sorts of documents in every language. Over the semester, I have translated everything from birth certificates to divorce certificates to diplomas. Through these experiences I have learned a lot about the art of translation.

When translating federal documents to English I have learned the importance of word choice. Different types of documents use different types of words so it is extremely important that as a translator, you realize what type of document you are translating. Because federal documents use specific words that I am not always familiar with, I use wordreference.com often to attempt to choose the perfect word. On wordreference.com there is a discussion space in which people can ask questions and most times the word that I am looking for is in there. This site alone has come in handy during my time at the Center.

Along with picking the most appropriate word, I have learned that formatting the document is also very important. When U.S. customs officers or other officials look at the translation, they want it to look as similar to the actual document as possible. This includes translating the stamps, signatures, and seals that are associated with official documents. I have learned that translating these special things is probably the hardest part of translating a document. The words are not always spelled right and sometimes they are abbreviated or smudged so it is important to spend the time to attempt to fully understand them.

Although translating is time consuming and sometimes monotonous, I have taken joy from doing it at the Center. For me, it is a way for me to get to know and to help someone without actually meeting them. It feels as though they have allowed me to get a closer look at their life and for this I feel blessed. It has also been extremely fascinating to notice the differences in the format and wording of official documents from different countries. This is just one of the many tasks that has made my time at the Center fly by over the semester.

Student Reflection

2011-04-26T08:00:00.005-05:00

by Hanna Perhai

Hello, yet again!

As the semester is quickly coming to a close, I only have two posts left to reflect on my experience. In the past, I've talked about my goals for this semester, the organization that I'm working with, and some of the challenges that I've faced so far.

Before my final, closing post (which will come sometime next week), I'd like to focus on not only my experience in the community, but how it has worked in conjunction with my time in the classroom. To be honest, I never was very excited to have a classroom portion of this course. I only really wanted to work in the community and get a chance to improve my Spanish. However, I now realize that having a classroom portion has been extremely beneficial in getting the most out of my experience in the community. For example, before my first real day of tutoring in Spanish, we learned different math vocabulary like addition and fractions. Little did I know, I would use those very words the next day when I worked on math homework with my student. In fact, he was studying fractions at the time. When just one day before, I didn't even know how to say "one-third," I was talking about all kinds of fractions and helping my student learn. Similarly, our practice on commands was quite helpful. Knowing how to effectively keep the kids on task without having to think too much about how to say things is invaluable.

Still, when we got away from our unit of Spanish in education, I felt like my use for the classroom would soon be over. While the subject matter didn't necessarily apply specifically to my situation, it still wasn't entirely irrelevant. Learning about the difficulties that undocumented immigrants face really opened my eyes to what the lives of some of my students' families could be like. I realized how ignorant I had been before.

I'm in this class--and ultimately this major-- because I want to help people with it. And it shouldn't matter what a person's legal, socioeconomic, or whatever else status is, I want to help.

One big epiphany I had while I have worked in the community is that I want to pursue child psychology. I love working with the kids in S.O.A.R., and I really have always loved children. So child psychology was something that was always there, but I never really considered it. Now I'm very interested to look more into it so I can help children, especially those whose primary language is Spanish. :)

So I leave you with these thoughts. This week we got good-bye cards from our students because the year is almost over. It was really heartwarming, and so I posted the front of my card here for you to see. That's all!

Student Reflection

2011-04-25T20:41:00.000-05:00

by Kendra Dickinson

Hello Everyone!

I have been doing so much during the past few weeks that it is difficult to even know where to begin. As the school year comes to a close, I am beginning to wrap up the projects that I have been working on. Most importantly, there is still much left to be done for the Water Quality Survey that I have been working on, so I am trying to get as much accomplished as I can before I graduate. Right now, we still need about 100 more people to fill out the survey, so I have been working hard to make that happen. As I described in my previous post, it was very labor intensive to go out onto the street and talk with each person completing the survey individually. While this method is ideal in the sense that it creates a person-to-person connection and fosters a better understanding between the researchers and the people completing the survey, unfortunately it is not the most efficient way to carry out the Water Quality Survey. Francisco and I talked this over, and did a lot of brainstorming to attempt to come up with the best way to distribute the survey, reaching the most people, as well as a diverse group of people, in the most efficient manner. We ultimately decided that they best way to do this would be to contact organizations in the Midwest that serve Latino and Spanish-speaking communities, and to ask them to hand out the surveys in the communities that they serve.

So, for the past few weeks I have been working diligently in contacting organizations across the Midwest, from Minnesota to Indiana to Michigan, trying to find groups that are willing and able to distribute the survey in their communities. In addition, in order to minimize the amount of work that these organizations have to do, we will provide them with individual envelopes that each contain a copy of the survey, and are complete with stamps and address labels so that all they have to do is distribute those envelopes in the community, and the people filling out the survey simply fill it out, seal the envelope, and drop it in the mail. Out of the over 50 organizations that I contacted, I only received two responses. One group, unfortunately, was not able to help. However, the other response that I got was from a woman that works at multiple organizations that serve Latino and Spanish-speaking communities in Madison, Wisconsin, and she agreed to pass out copies of the survey. I put together a packet with instructions, as well as 30 envelopes with stamps and surveys and sent them off to her last week. Now I just have to wait!

In addition, I also went to Lunch at La Casa last week in order to present the Water Survey to students there, to see if they were able/willing to fill out the survey, or if they were able to bring the survey to their Spanish-speaking family members. This was moderately successful, because not all of the students visiting La Casa are in fact of Latino heritage, and of those that are, not all of them speak Spanish. Still, it was a great experience to get to hear a very interesting talking about perceptions of beauty of Mexican women in post-WWII Chicago, and to interact with the students that were in fact interested in the survey. Also, if any of you readers think that you might know of an organization that serves a Spanish-speaking community that would be interested in getting involved with this project, please let me know by commenting on this post!

Finally, I have just started working on yet another project, which is called Scientific Animations Without Borders. Two of the people that I work with Extension, Julia Bello Bravo and Francisco Seufferheld, are part of this project, which creates 2-minute scientific videos, usually related to agricultural, environmental or community health topics. These videos are produced in many different languages, and can be downloaded through computers or cellphones almost anywhere in the world. Click here to read more about these 2-minute scientific animations.

While the videos are being produced in many languages, there are many videos in Spanish relating to themes such as cholera prevention, how to make natural insecticides, as well as how to store cowpeas. I have been working on this project by helping to create the scripts for upcoming videos, as well as contacting NGOs in order to distribute the videos. If you are interested in seeing one of the videos, you can watch one in Spanish about making a natural insecticide by clicking here.

Overall, the common theme of these projects is the distribution of information to populations that could benefit tremendously from the knowledge and information. While working on these projects I have begun to learn about the many barriers to distributing information in way that is understandable and accessible to the target group. With the Water Quality Survey I have learned the importance of surmounting language barriers. With the Scientific Animations Without Borders Project, I am seeing how literacy can also be a huge limiting factor in the dissemination of information about environmental and community health related issues. Therefore, I am really happy to be able to be a part of these projects, not just because of what I am learning through my work on them, but also because of the potential that they have to help people both in our local communities and all over the world gain increased access to information about the environment that relates to their lives.

Student Reflection

2011-04-25T08:00:00.001-05:00

by Marlee Stein

As the semester is coming to an end, I definitely feel as if it was a wonderful and rewarding experience. Although my placements started out a bit rocky, I learned a lot because I was able to work with a number of different students.

The last 5 weeks or so I worked consistently tutoring with one girl, and really created a bond. She was a very intelligent girl and helped me learn a lot of Spanish, despite her knowing very little English.

I got to work in classrooms for both 3^rd, and 4^th grade students, but didn’t use very much Spanish. Nonetheless I gained insight into how best to help the students with homework and learning English.

By subbing at SOAR I worked with girls of all ages and of all abilities. I even had to teach a girl who knew absolutely no English how to add fractions. It really forced me to use everything I knew in the Spanish language to explain the difficult concept clearly and properly.

This past Thursday I was subbing for some tutors that went home for the holiday and the girl I regularly tutor on Tuesday ran up to me and gave me a hug and begged that I get to work with her that day. I was shocked at the impact I had made on her. It was the first time I realized the opportunities that Spanish could provide.

I have always known I wanted to study Spanish, but until now never really knew what could be done with it other than use it to travel. Working at SOAR and Booker T. Washington not only told me an option I had but allowed me to experience it to see if that was possibly the career path I was interested in.

Up until now I felt like my Spanish classes had fallen into a lull in which it was only repetition of grammar rules learned in high school. In this class I learned more than I did in any of my other classes. Also I was finally able to apply the grammar rules that I learned in previous classes. I hope to continue and volunteer with SOAR next year, since it will be great preparation for going abroad and I think it is a wonderful program.

Student Reflection

2011-04-24T08:00:00.001-05:00

by Hannah Perhai

Hannah here, once again! I'm back to blog about my work in S.O.A.R. this semester.

So, in my last post, I promised to discuss the difficulties that I have encountered while volunteering as a tutor for a Spanish-speaking second grader. These challenges come in two categories: language-related and behavior-related.

I'll discuss behavior-related problems first. As with any young child, you're going to have some difficulties here and there keeping your kid in line, especially in an after-school program when the kids are exhausted or hyper after a full day of school. Luckily, my student behaves fairly well. While most of the boys in our class act out (and the girls behave like little angels), my student mostly spaces out. I consider myself lucky in that respect because I don't have to yell at him to stop breaking rules all the time, but when it comes to getting homework and reading done, his lack of attention can be challenging.

I've found that in this situation, I need to remind him constantly of what we will be doing once we finish the task at hand.

Some weeks, I am paired with an extra student because his or her tutor was not able to volunteer that day. These situations are the most trying in getting the kids to behave since they now have a partner in crime. I must assert my authority and threaten consequences if the children do not follow through with my requests. Still, even with these difficult situations, everything has turned out well.

The next set of problems I encountered while tutoring at S.O.A.R. is language-related. First and foremost, I took this class to practice my Spanish. While I am expected to do a lot more while in the community, I always try to get a good amount of Spanish-speaking in every week. This means I help my student with his math homework and I discuss our readings in Spanish with him. The problem is that sometimes I am not sure of how to say something, and my student is having trouble understanding the concept anyway. Many times while explaining a math problem, I have felt that my lack of Spanish skills was hindering his ability to learn. Knowing this is the hardest thing about tutoring, and so I find it necessary to use the right balance of Spanish and English to make sure we both understand what is going on.

One of the best moments in my volunteering so far happened last week. I was given an extra student to work with for the day, so I was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Both boys started to work on their math homework, and my new student finished very quickly. Immediately, he wanted to go to the library to read, but I could not let him go unsupervised, and I needed to help my other student finish his homework.

Well, the first child sat down and worked through the problems with my student, explaining each step of the problem without giving away the answers. It truly was inspirational to see one student teaching the other, and it helped me learn how to better work with my own student to see how he explained everything.

So, even though I've had some problems in my volunteer experience so far, I've learned a lot. I hope to continue learning and facing obstacles as the semester comes closer to an end!

Student Reflection

2011-04-23T12:50:00.000-05:00

by April Nwatah

Hello Friends!

So from what I’ve been told, this is the first semester that Spanish 232 has worked with Salt and Light. In a sense, me and my two other class mates that volunteer at Salt and Light are pioneers in this project! However, being a pioneer isn’t always simple. When we first started working there, there wasn’t very much for us to do. On Mondays (the day that I volunteer) they give away clothes. The way it’s set up, its kind of like a thrift store – except everything is free. With the large amounts of people that come in to receive clothes, the area gets quite messy. Therefore, for our first couple weeks we simply organized the racks of clothing. When clothes would fall off of the hangers (percha in Spanish, as I’ve learned through my time there) we would put them back on. There weren’t too many opportunities to speak Spanish and it was getting kind of frustrating.

While at Salt and Light, we noticed that a lot of kids would come in with their parents and have nothing to do. My classmates and I decided that we should do something with these kids. We then talked to some of the people who worked at Salt and Light about coordinating a coloring table for the kids. Apparently, they used to do that but didn’t have the volunteers to run it so they stopped. This was great news for us! Because they used to have a coloring table they still had all of the supplies, so we didn’t have to go get any of our own. Also, it was finally something that we could do to be useful to the community AND practice Spanish.

The coloring table has been a great idea. Often times, the same kids come back so I’ve gotten to be friends with a few of them. Because many of them speak Spanish, I’ve been able to practice my Spanish so much more than I was able to do before we started the coloring table! Overall, it has been a great experience working with the kids.

Lesson Plan about Messy Problems in Community Service Learning

2011-04-19T16:59:00.001-05:00

by Ann Abbott

In their seminal book, Where´s the Learning in Service-Learning, Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles, Jr. identify the learning outcomes of service learning. Eyler and Giles explain that well-designed service learning forces students to confront "ill-structured problems," which they define as "complex and open ended; their solution creates new conditions and new problems. Such problems require, first and foremost, the ability to recognize that the problems are complicated and are embedded in a complex social context, the ability to evaluate conflicting information and expert views, and the understanding that there is no simple or definitive solution" (16). "Traditional academic programs," they state, "however, have not resulted in moving most college students to the levels necessary to cope with complex issues and information (King and Kitchener, 1994)" (17). On the other hand, their research on service learning indicates that, "The quality of service-learning, including application, opportunities for structured reflection, and diversity and community voice, was a predictor of reports of critical thinking, ability to see consequences of actions, issue identification, and opennes to new ideas" (127).

Today, we tackled messy problems in my classes. Students confront them every day in their CSL work. For example, a CSL student who tutor an ESL student might suggest that they stay for extra help after school, but if the student doesn't take the bus, he/she has no way to get home. Or he/she has to work after school to contribute to the family income. These are just a few of the many examples my students see every day in the various places where they work. But I wanted to bring that into the classroom today. So this is what we did.

1. Social Security Numbers. I said mine out loud. I asked students to raise their hand if they had theirs memorized. (Everyone raised their hand.) So we did a "fuga" (like "Row, Row, Row Your Boat") in which one person starts saying theirs, the next person starts, the next person starts, etc. Students had fun with that and recognized that they have memorized their Social Security numbers because they use it so often.

Video. We watched this video about drivers licences and undocumented immigrants. After the video I divided students into small groups, gave each group a large ficha and asked them to draw a large circle on the ficha. They then had to represent the issues presented in the video in the form of a cycle, or vicious circle. (They did a great job.) We then commented on a quote from the video, "Dios no hizo fronteras."

2. Poverty simulation. Then students opened up their laptops and smart phones, and they went through an on-line poverty simulation (unfortunately it is in English; if anyone knows of one in Spanish, please let me know). Some worked individually, but others made decisions together in small groups. They were very engaged in the activity, perhaps the most engaged I have seen them all semester. We then discussed the hidden "costs" (ethical, medical, social, etc.) in the decisions they had made in order to save money. We also talked about the importance of relationships, because asking for help (and not paying certain bills) was really the only way that they could make it through the month.

3. Connections and conclusions. We ended the class with this question: What is the connection between the video we watched at the beginning of the class and the simulation they did at the end of the class. There were many very good answers from the students, but I was happy to see that one conclusion they reached was that life is a series of "ill-structured problems" (even though they didn't use those words), not only, but especially when you have few resources.

4. Follow-up. In Thursday's class, students will use the structural model from the poverty simulation and create their own "problems and solutions" that undocumented immigrants face. I'll let you know how it goes!

Links to Spanish-Learning Sites

2011-04-11T09:27:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Although this isn't a "how to learn Spanish" blog per se, using Google Analytics, I can see that many people come to the blog looking for specific information about learning Spanish.

So, I was recently contacted by a blogger who asked that I mention a post on her site. I'm happy to do so:

One Word at a Time: Top 15 Spanish Blogs

Bibliography on Transcultural and Intercultural Competence for Spanish CSL Research and Practice

2011-04-10T11:28:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

This blog's running bibliography on Spanish community service learning (CSL) is one of its most-accessed posts. I'm happy that people find it a useful resource.

Now, I'd like to do the same for a bibliography on transcultural and intercultural competence. Although cultural competence and intercultural competence are terms that have long been used, researched and theorized, the MLA's 2007 special report on "Foreign Language and Higher Education: New Structures for a Changed World" has prompted a new wave of work on the topic. I am particularly interested in how Spanish CSL does/does not influence students' developing transcultural competence.

This bibliography may be a bit messy at first. There are many publications, and I may find that I need to organize them in different categories than what I can envision right now. Plus, I'm going to just jump and start adding sources to the bibliography, but I may later remove them if I find that they do not seem related in some way to Spanish CSL. Please write a comment with your suggestions for both the organization of the bibliography as well as individual items within it.

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Levine, Glenn S. and Alison Phipps, Eds. Critical and Intercultural Theory and Language Pedagogy. AAUSC Issues in Language Program Direction. Boston: Heinle, Cengage Learning, 2012.

Phipps, Alison & Glenn S. Levine. "What is Language Pedagogy For?" 1-14.

Kramsch, Claire. "Theorizing Translingual/Transcultural Competence." 15-31.

van Lier, Leo. "Classrooms and 'Real' Worlds: Boundaries, Roadblocks, and Connections." 32-42.

Urlaub, Per. "Understanding Comprehension: Hermeneutics, Literature, and Culture in Collegiate Foreign Language Education." 43-56.

Gramling, David & Chantelle Warner. "Toward a Contact Pragmatics of Literature: Habitus, Text, and the Advanced Second-Language Classroom." 57-75.

Lu, Peigh-ying & John Corbett. "The Health Care Professional as Intercultural Speaker." 76-94.

Dasli, Maria. "Theorizations of Intercultural Communication." 95-111.

Parker, Jan. "Framing Ideas from Classical Language Teaching, Past and Future." 112-124.

Brenner, David. "From Core Curricula to Core Identities: On Critical Pedagogy and Foreign Language/Culture Education." 125-140.

Train, Rober W. "Postcolonial Complexities in Foreign Language Education and the Humanities." 141-160.

Coleman, James A., et. al. "Collaboration and Interaction: The Keys to Distance and Computer-Supported Language Learning." 161-180.

Elola, Idoia & Ana Oskoz. "A Social Constructivist Approach to Foreign Language Writing in Online Environments." 181-197.

Arnett, Carlee & Harriett Jernigan. "Cognitive Grammar and Its Applicability in the Foreign Language Classroom." 198-215.

Arens, Katherine. "After the MLA Report: Rethinking the Links Between Literature and Literacy, Research, and Teaching in Foreign Language Departments." 216-228.

Phipps, Alison & Glenn S. Levine. "Epilogue. Paradigms in Transition." 229-233.

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Lo Bianco, Joseph, Anthony J. Liddicoat & Chantal Crozet, Eds. Striving for Third Place: Intercultural competence through language education. Melbourne: Language Australia, 1999.

Crozet, Chantal, Anthony J. Liddicoat & Joseph Lo Bianco. "Intercultural competence: From language policy to language education." 11-30.

Crozet, Chantal &Anthony J. Liddicoat. "The challenge of intercultural language teaching: Engaging with culture in the classroom." 119-129.

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Stadler, Stefanie. "Intercultural competence and its complementary role in language education." Specialised Languages in the Global Village: A Multi-Perspective Approach. In press.

Hispania, March 2011

2011-04-09T08:26:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

What a pleasant surprise to receive the latest issue of Hispania and find so much good information on foreign language community service learning (CSL).

Zapata, Gabriela. "The Effects of Community Service Learning Projects on L2 Learners' Cultural Understanding." Zapata's article provides something that we need in the Spanish CSL literature: a study based on an applied linguist's expertise. When Darcy Lear and I began publishing on CSL, most of the literature we found was descriptive. The majority of our published pieces of been based on qualitative studies. Qualitative research, while widely accepted in many fields, is not widely used in foreign language research, in which quantitative research dominates linguistics research and humanistic research is used for the predominate force in language studies: literary analysis. Zapata's "small-scale study [that] investigates the effects of... [CSL] projects or a cultural presentation on the development of the cultural understanding of low- and high-intermediate L2 students" (86) is a welcome addition to the growing body of work on foreign language CSL. Furthermore, people often question whether CSL can be done in introductory language courses. Zapata's study shows that it can indeed be problematic at that level ("low-intermediate CSL students[']...CSL experience may have been inhibited by their L2 proficiency and problems in the delineation of their CSL duties" 86). However, more clearly delineating low-intermediate students' CSL duties is possible, and I firmly believe (but need to research) that even Spanish 101 students can do CSL work that fits their language proficiency level and meets community-identified needs.

Barreneche, Gabriel Ignacio. "Language Learners as Teachers: Integrating Service-learning and the Advanced Language Course." Barreneche's work is based on a partnership he developed with Junior Achievement. I encourage you to read the entire article, but I would like to highlight just two things. First of all, I think one of this article's strengths is its literature review. Barreneche does such a good job of situating Spanish CSL within many strands of higher education practice and policy debate today: civic engagement education, the role of foreign language education in the evolving face of liberal arts education and then, more specifically, CSL's role in students' language acquisition and motivation. The entire "1. Review of the Literature" section should be required reading for all of us involved in foreign language CSL. Secondly, I'd like to highlight that partnering with Junior Achievement means that there is much more of interest that Barreneche (and others) can explore about content learning in CSL. Junior Achievement has very interesting programming to teach and support youth regarding finances, entrepreneurship and overall professional skills. (On Twitter, I follow @JA_USA and @JABrasil. My Twitter name is @AnnAbbott.) For example, I teach social entrepreneurship as well as Business Spanish, and a partnership with Junior Achievement in those courses could add to the course's "triple bottom line": language, culture and business knowledge. In other words, there is much work to be done on CSL's impact on students' content learning in content-based CSL courses. Matching the nature of students' CSL work to the content being taught in the course can be challenging, but the Junior Achievement partnership described in this article has sparked ideas for me.

Book review: Learning the Language of Global Citizenship: Service Learning in Applied Linguistics. Wurr, Adrian J. and Josef Hellebrandt, eds. Reviewed by Anne Reynolds-Case. This review succinctly summarizes each chapter and the book's overall focus. Josef Hellebrandt is one of the earliest figures in the practice and publishing on Spanish CSL, so it is nice to see more of his work in promoting and disseminating CSL. The reviewer concludes by noting that the pieces in the volume do not provide "tangible results afforded by the means of language proficiency tests or similar testing instruments" (224). While it is true that that kind of study and its results would be a welcome addition to the expanding literature on foreign-language CSL and many people have noted its absence, we should be careful not to privilege that kind of study as the only one that can give us "real," "hard" data on CSL's efficacy. Research methods within foreign language departments may be an unacknowledged part of the very difficult debates going on in many Spanish departments nowadays about what we do, what we value and what we reward.

Our Student Blogger Receives Fullbright

2011-04-07T15:27:00.002-05:00

by Ann Abbott

Congratulations to one of our bloggers from this semester, Kendra Dickinson (B.A. Environmental Studies and Spanish, May 2011). Kendra has been offered a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship Grant to Argentina.

Student Reflection

2011-04-07T08:00:00.002-05:00

by Haley Dwyer

Hola a Todos! As my time has been progressing at the Refugee Center, I have had many challenges that I have had to overcome but the greatest one is easily talking on the phone to native Spanish speakers. Talking on the phone in English is hard enough for me but talking on the phone in a foreign language has taken some getting used to. For me, a lot of ability to understand and communicate efficiently in Spanish has to do with body language. When words fail me, I can always rely on the fact that I can point to things and use gestures or facial expressions to get my point across but on the phone this is not possible.

As time has progressed, I have gotten better at talking on the phone in Spanish because I have learned how to communicate better without body language. I have learned that when in doubt it is always best to rephrase what the speaker said in simpler terms so that I know that I fully understand what they are saying. This has taken some practice but I can now successfully say that I can ensure that I understand the speaker completely without sounding like I just started learning Spanish yesterday. Along with this, I have learned that the conversation goes a lot smoother if instead of asking someone to repeat something you simply state that you can’t hear them properly. This way, the speaker does not get frustrated that you cannot understand and instead they simply repeat what they were saying, only slower and louder.

Although these tricks have helped me to master the phone, I still have a difficult time with names. I don’t think that people in general realize how fast they are stating their name so a lot of instances at the Center I have not been able to understand what the client’s name is. Shortly after my first encounter with the phone, I learned how to ask someone to spell their name. This has helped me greatly but people still spell their names incredibly fast so I still have difficulty with this often. I hope to get better at this as time progresses and as I become more familiar with typical Spanish names.

Overall, although using the phone is frustrating, I am glad that I am learning some of these tricks and techniques for talking on the phone now and not when I am in Spain next year. This is one aspect of life in Spain that I did not think of and so this learning experience will come in handy next year when I have to talk on the phone everyday in Spanish.

Student Reflection

2011-04-06T08:57:00.000-05:00

by Val Kaskovich

April already? Can't believe my semester at S.O.A.R is coming to a close, not to mention my college career. As I inch closer to donning my cap and gown, I am growing sentimental about all the great times and wonderful learning experiences I have had as an undergraduate at the University of Illinois. That being said, I am so glad to have participated in the S.O.A.R. program during my time here. Although S.O.A.R. is currently fulfilling my volunteer requirement for the Spanish in the Community coursework, it is actually my fifth semester with the program. I have had the privilege of seeing some students blossom from tiny, curious kindergarteners into responsible and intelligent older students.

I am proud to have lent my service to the community these past few years. What I have found, though, is that S.O.A.R. has been mutually beneficial. The most obvious perk of the program for me (and one of my main reasons for participating in the first place) is the opportunity to practice my Spanish with native speakers. I truly feel that through tutoring, my fluency and understanding of the language have increased significantly. These kids are the perfect conversation partners -- chatty, knowledgeable, and not afraid to correct me if I make an error!

Besides language skills, S.O.A.R. has really given me the chance to develop my leadership skills and become a role model. With practice, enthusiasm, and a lot of patience, I learned now to make a first-grader respect me and still think I'm the coolest thing since sliced bread. Tutoring at BTW has heped me relate to people who come from completely different backgrounds and lifestyles. I am more aware of happenings in my community thanks to S.O.A.R. The "bubble" of campus life no longer holds me captive, and I have a greater interest in what is happening beyond the quad, beyond the state, and beyond the US. I am grateful for this experience, especially knowing that I will use all of these skills in my work next year teaching English in Galicia, Spain. What I have gained from my service in the community is truly immeasurable. I feel prepared and confident for whatever next year has in store for me, and I hope that other students take advantage of the chance to make a difference and develop personally by becoming a tutor with S.O.A.R. Hasta luego, Illinois!

Activity Using Census Data in Spanish Community Service Learning Course

2011-04-05T17:30:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

We're at the point in the semester now where we have already covered the specifics of what students need in their CSL work in schools or human services so we are now turning our attention to broader, contextual issues. In other words, how do their experiences in the community relate to larger socio-cultural and policy issues?

Today's lesson was on housing. I began the class by writing three big words on the board: casa, hogar, vivienda. In pairs, students had to differentiate between those words. Not surprisingly, vivienda gave students the most problems.

We followed Lección 17 in Comunidades. First, students analyze their own experiences looking for housing in Champaign-Urbana--their priorities and the problems they faced. Then they compare their own experiences to those of a recent Spanish-speaking immigrant who is looking for work and a place to live. Even though it's hard to put yourself in someone else's shoes, they did a great job recognizing all the barriers to getting housing that some immigrants might face.

Finally, I put students into five groups, and each group was given census data about five Illinois counties: Cook, DuPage, Champaign, Clay (the county I am from) and Pope. They analyzed the data, and then one person from the group had to stand up with the information in their hand. They then lined up from greatest (on the left) to smallest (on the right) for the following information: population, % of Latinos, median family income, percentage of residents living below the poverty line (picture) and average home value.

What did students learn? I think it surprised them to see the difference between rural and urban poverty, for example. They also saw that in the rural counties, household income was much lower, but the price of homes was not much higher than their incomes. On the other hand, in Cook and DuPage Counties, the average price of a home was much more than double the annual household income. It also gave a picture of northern, central and southern counties in this very large state of ours. Most importantly, however, the census data and their comparisons shed real light on the issue of affordable housing in our communities.

How to Prepare Service-Learning Lesson Plans: Synthesizing Best Practices

2011-04-05T06:18:00.000-05:00

by Ann Abbott

The ACTFL 2011 Annual Convention will take place November 18-20, 2011 in Denver, Colorado, and I received the message yesterday that my session proposal was accepted. I hope to see many of my friends and colleagues there.

My session will focus on lesson planning in foreign language community service learning (CSL). At first I thought that I would present my data about how CSL students choose their community partners. Or maybe some preliminary research findings and interpretations about students' higher-level critical thinking skills in reflective essays. But then I remembered what happened at the 2010 ACTFL in Boston...

I was part of a well-attended plenary session on "The Lost 'C': The Communities Goal Area." Each person in the plenary session had an individual follow-up session, and for each session attendance dropped. By the time my individual session on "The Communities-Classroom Cycle: Smoothing Service Learning's Transitions" came around, I had great people in the room with me, but only about 20. Thomas Sauer came in for his session afterward and told me, "Everyone went to the lesson-planning session."

So if lesson planning is what interests people, that is what I will speak about this year. I do think that that solid lesson plans are very, very important. Whenever I have my classes well planned-out (which is not 100% of the time, I must confess), there is a well-defined outcome I want to achieve by the end of the class period, and I plan my activities "backward" so that students have the language, cultural knowledge and content knowledge they need to achieve the outcome. So I do think it's important, and I don't think it's easy to achieve. So below is the information that I submitted to ACTFL. I hope to see you there.

Title

How to Prepare Service-Learning Lesson Plans: Synthesizing Best Practices

Description

Content

Methods

The session will begin with a brief interview activity related to the very first time the participants taught a class. Because students feel the same way when they first do service learning (SL), we will transition into a short introduction on why lesson planning and classroom support is so vital for foreign language SL students. Participants will then receive two handouts: 1) a SL lesson planning template that uses a backward design and a checklist of foreign language and service learning best practices, and 2) a sample lesson plan that uses that template. We will analyze the sample lesson plan as well as do some of the activities themselves. Finally, we will show examples of how existing lesson plans within popular intermediate-level textbooks can be tweaked to incorporate SL content and reflection. The last 15 minutes will be reserved for audience questions and discussions.

Outcomes

Following the session, participants will be able to 1) implement the sample service learning (SL) lesson plan with their own students, 2) create novel SL lesson plans following the template and 3) tweak textbook lessons to incorporate service learning content and guided reflection activities.

Student Reflection

2011-04-04T16:48:00.000-05:00

by Kendra Dickinson

Hello Everyone!

I hope that you all enjoyed your Spring Breaks, whether you were on the beach relaxing or building houses with Alternative Spring Break. I myself had a very unique Spring Break this year, as I spent many hours working on the Water Survey that I have been talking about a lot in my posts. Just in case you are not familiar with it, the survey, written in Spanish and administered only to native Spanish speakers, aims at gaining more information about: (i) The perceived and actual household water quality of Spanish-speakers in the Midwest, (ii) The access of the Spanish-speaking communities of the Midwest to information about water quality, (iii) The main sources of water of members of the Spanish-speaking communities of the Midwest, (iv) Preoccupation of Spanish-speaking communities in the Midwest with water contaminants.

Throughout the semester I have worked on various facets of the survey including writing and editing questions, compiling and analyzing data, and distributing the survey by mail. However, during Spring Break I went out onto the streets to actual interview people face to face for the survey. Before doing this, I sat down with Francisco, one of the outreach coordinators that I work with, and discussed some of the possible obstacles and challenges of stopping people on the street to give them a survey. We discussed the idea that people might not trust a random person on the street, or might not have time to stop to talk to you. While I had thought about the numerous challenges that I might face, it was in fact far more difficult than I ever would have expected.

I went out one morning to walk around my own neighborhood in Chicago, Albany Park. The neighborhood is relatively diverse, but there is a large Mexican population in the area. First, I just walked around the neighborhood to survey the scene and to assess my options. I ultimately decided to stand outside of Harvest Time Grocery store, a local food store where many Spanish speakers shop. I asked people if they were interested in completing the survey as they went in and out, but most people were not interested and were clearly busy and had time constraints. I did talked to a few people there, but after that I decided to walk around the neighborhood and look for other locations. As I walked I came upon a Laundromat, and went inside. There I was able to interview a number of people, as they were simply sitting and waiting for their clothes to dry. Many of the people that I talked to even seemed interested in the goal of the survey. After that it started to rain, so I was forced to return home. I went out the next day to the local school to try and talk to some of the Spanish-speaking parents as they waited for their children, but just as I got there it started to rain! Finally the next day I was able to walk around the neighborhood some more and visit other Laundromats, and was ultimately fairly successful in interviewing people for the survey.

Doing this also got me thinking about communication and limits to accessing information. Last semester I took AGCM 430, Communication in Environmental/Social Movements, taught by Professor Ann Reisner. Part of the course focused on limitations to participation in environmental and social movements. One of the types of limitations is called a biographical limitation. This means that a person, because of the role that they play in society, is not able to participate in environmental/social movements or to access information that would aid them in their lives. Examples of these types of limitations include, for example, having dependents that rely on you for care so you cannot attend community meetings, or working constantly so that you do not have time to be involved in social movements. I encountered some of this while I was on the streets giving the survey. Many people were perfectly nice to me, but were not able to stop and talk to me because they were working, or going to pick their kids up, or had some other responsibility that conflicted with their ability to talk to me.

While I did feel that time-constraints did limit the number of people that I was able to talk with, I still felt very successful, as this survey overcomes another type of biographical limitation that is a language barrier. Many immigrants in the United States may not have access to information that they need about their water quality because they cannot read the information in English, or are not able to participate in surveys like our Water Survey because they do not speak English. Therefore, this survey surmounts one of the biographical limitations of the involvement of the Spanish-speaking community in environmental and community health related issues.

I learned a lot of this experience. I never would have expected the hours that it can take to administer a simple survey to a few people. However, doing this made me value even more every single survey that we have been able to get completed and made me realize the dedication that it takes to do research in the field. I am now even more motivated to continue working on this survey because I realize that every single person that participated took time out of their busy schedules to aid in the gathering of information about the water quality of Spanish-speakers in the Midwest, which will hopefully aid in eliminating the language based and biographical limitations that prevent Spanish-speaking immigrants from accessing information and participating in the resolution of environmental and community health/social issues.

Student Reflection

2011-04-01T08:42:00.000-06:00

by Marlee Stein

I went to my usual placement again this past Tuesday. After a relaxing spring break at home, where I did not use any Spanish, it was a little challenging to get into the swing of things again. I now am consistently working with one girl, and I really enjoy it because as opposed to my classroom placement earlier in the semester, I am able to create a one-on-one bond with one student. My student had minimal homework so we were able to spend a lot of time reading. The homework she did have concentrated on using sounds such as he, hi, ho, and hu to make words. She had to fill in the blanks to complete Spanish words such as hada (fairy) and many others. She did another activity where she had to color in spaces that had the sound ce or ci in it. It was easy for her to locate the words that started with those sounds such as cero (zero) or cine (movie theater) but she couldn’t identify words such as hace quite as easily. After we finished her homework we read two books. One about Clifford the big red dog, and the other was Little Red Riding Hood. I really enjoyed reading Little Red Riding Hood in Spanish because it is one that I had read in my Spanish classes in Junior High. Sometimes students blindly read and do not really understand the plot, so what the teacher had me do was ask her to identify the protagonist and explain what they do in the story. My student seemed to understand the majority of the plot, but sometimes she would get stuck so I had to ask her questions to lead her in the right direction with out giving away the answer. I also got to learn more about her as a person. I learned about her family, and that she came here from Guatemala. Overall it was a successful week in placements!

Lesson Plan with Music Videos about Immigration

2011-03-31T08:11:00.002-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Again, I'm trying to vary the dynamic in my classroom as we head into the final weeks of the semester. So today in "Spanish in the Community" will be dedicated to music videos related to immigration--as long as enough students bring in smart phones or laptops.

Step 1. I will set up five "stations"--one for each music video. The stations will include a copy of the lyrics, except for the mix. For the mix, I will ask students to jot down lyrics that they hear.

"Clandestino" Manu Chao
"Frijolero" Molotov (OJO: some strong language)
"Mojado" Ricardo Arjona
"Venezuelan en New York" King Chango
Narco corridos mix, DJ Rojo Mix

Step 2. The students will go to one of the five stations, and fill out the following information on a note card:

Nombre de la canción y artista-grupo
Un comentario sobre la letra.
Un comentario sobre la música.
Un comentario sobre las imágenes.
Una pregunta.
Estrellas--de una a cinco.

Step 3. After viewing the video, students will partner with someone who saw a different video. They will explain the songs to each other and then compare and contrast them.

Repeat steps 2 and 3 until students have seen all videos or until time allows.

Step 4. I will write the names of the songs on the board and all students will have to come up and put a tally mark beside their favorite. We´ll see which one wins, and hopefully have time to find out why.

Update: Class #1's favorite song by far was "Mojado."
Class #2 had a more even vote: "Frijolero" (3) "Mojado" (2), "Clandestino" (2) and "Venezuelan en NY" (2).

Student Reflection

2011-03-30T13:58:00.000-06:00

by Hannah Perhai

Hello again! Hannah Perhai here with an update on my experiences in the community!

This semester, I'm volunteering for the S.O.A.R. Program at Booker T. Washington Elementary. It stands for Student Opportunities for After-School Resources, and it provides after-school tutors for the children at the school via University students. Lots of different students get involved: people looking for Education hours, Spanish students like me, and those who just love working with children and making a difference. These students travel out to the temporary location of Booker T. Washington (pictured) every Tuesday, Wednesday, and/or Thursday to work with the kids who participate in S.O.A.R.

So where does Spanish come into play? Well, Booker T. Washington is a bilingual school with many Spanish-speaking students. The earlier grades are taught in a mix of Spanish and English, so I've been paired with a Spanish-speaking second grader. He is more comfortable with Spanish, so we get to learn together as he works on his schoolwork and I practice my Spanish!

A typical day in a S.O.A.R. classroom consists of circle time, homework time, at least twenty minutes of reading, and then free time. In circle time, the whole classroom comes together to learn a quick lesson or do an activity. Right now we are learning different health tips, and last week we learned the value of stretching before exercising.

Next comes homework time. Most often, the kids have math homework to finish up. My child's homework is always written in Spanish, so this is where I get to start practicing my language skills.

Before homework and reading every day, the tutor and student are expected to set a daily goal. Usually, our goals are something like "read three books." These books can count toward the daily expectation of reading at least twenty minutes during reading time. The kids get a sticker for every day that they accomplish this goal, and at the accumulation of six, they get a prize. My student and I read books in both Spanish and English, and we talk about the story in Spanish.

Finally comes free time, when we are free to play games or play in the gym on some days. This time is always very open and free, so I get to meet the other students and join with them and their tutors for different board games or card games. Last week, I played Uno while speaking about the rules of the game and chatting in Spanish! When someone called out "Uno!" it was very appropriate. :)

So, all in all I've been enjoying my volunteering experience so far. S.O.A.R. is a great program with a heart for educating our youth. I am very happy to be working with it. There are plenty of difficulties, which I plan to discuss in my next blog post, but the rewards are far greater. Let's see what the rest of the semester has to offer!

Student Reflection

2011-03-30T13:53:00.001-06:00

by Val Kaskovich

Hello once again! This week at the S.O.A.R. tutoring program, I was presented with a rather unusual task. I had the opportunity to interact with someone I usually do not -- my student's parents. Although I have never met them nor will I likely meet them in the future, I was assigned the challenge of writing a letter to the parents of my first grade student about my experience as their child's tutor. While the task at first seemed daunting, to my surprise the letter was easy to write and actually turned out better than I expected.

As I have stated many times before, the kids at Booker T. Washington are wonderful. That being said, I believe that my student is truly exceptional. He reads and completes assignments with enthusiasm and diligence. He communicates well in both Spanish and English, and is not afraid to ask for help when he needs it. I have seen huge improvements in his math skills and reading comprehension in just a few short months. All this is extremely impressive and deserves recognition at home.

Academic achievement and progress is important to include in a letter to his parents, and I am sure they will be very proud to read about it. However I think that the most important part of my letter was what I included next -- praise for their son's attitude, character, and behavior. He is polite 100% of the time. Everyone wants to be his friend because he is kind, smart, and just downright fun. He is responsible yet accomplishes his goals with a carefree mindset and an amazing sense of humor. I am so glad that I had the opportunity to let his parents know what a great kid they are raising. Parents have so much influence over a child's personality and education, and I am happy to be able to communicate my pride in their student's success in words (and most importantly, in their native language, Spanish!). I hope they enjoy the letter and keep supporting him at home as they have been. Can't wait to finish out the school year with S.O.A.R.!

2011-03-29T14:26:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Teaching the first class after spring break can be challenging. The students are refreshed, but are starting to feel the itch to finish the semester.

In today's "Spanish in the Community" class, we did Lección 15 in Comunidades: ¿Son noticias para nosotros? The activities in the lesson analyze how informed students´ are about the news in general, the news in Spanish and the news in their local Spanish-language newspapers/radio stations/blogs/etc.

My students reported that they are not very well informed about the news in general. A few students are, but just a few. They have discovered over the course of the semester that there is a lot of information about immigration that they don't know, and they realize that being uninformed means that misinformation can take hold. Still, most say that they're just not very interested in the news.

So the next activity was both fun and informative. I printed out seven articles from today's La Raza, Chicago's Spanish-language newspaper, and cut them in half. In one class I have fourteen students, so everyone got one half of an article. They read their half. Then they had to stand up, circulate, explain their "noticia" to their classmates in order to find the person who had the other half of their article. I think they had fun and at the same time learned about the other articles.

I learned, too. Did you know that in the US, human trafficking generates more money than drug trafficking? I didn't.

Here are the articles students read:

Fascinación por el narco y su vida. Students compared this to gangster rap.
Tráfico de personas a EEUU genera $6,600 millones. We talked about border crossing and coyotes in in Lección 14 ¨¿Por que emigrar?¨ And when we talked about culture and numbers, students learned (most of them for the first time, I think) that billion in English is mil millones in Spanish. Seeing that in the headline was a good review.
Activistas declaran: Illinois no es Arizona. One of my students is from Arizona, so she has added a lot of perspective to our class discussions about national discourses on immigration. This article showed students that Illinois wants to be hospitable to all members of its communities. (Well, at least some people do.)
Ponen rostro a la inmigración. This article talked about undocumented students who are publicly declaring their status in order to effect change. Since so many of my students wrote their second reflective essay on the Dream Act, this was a good connecting article.
Superan situaciones traumaticas con terapias grupales exclusivas para hispanos. Especially for students who are working in human service agencies for their CSL work, this is a good reminder that programs that are important in all communities still need to be both linguistically and culturally appropriate.
Salvan pie a indocumentada. One of the activities in Lección 14 asks students to ennumerate the dangers of different forms of border crossing: rafts, coyotes, walking through the desert, hidden in a truck-trailer, and hopping a train. This was a good reminder that what we talk about in the book and in class is real, not just theoretical.

Do your CSL students read the news in Spanish? Are they informed enough to be able to challenge people around them who repeat the commonplaces about immigration? This was a good lesson: it got the students up and moving around, and it informed them.

Mary K. Long, Teaching Business Languages with a Humanist's Sensibility

2011-03-28T15:39:00.001-06:00

by Ann Abbott

I have always said that I am a better writer and teacher of Spanish community service learning, business Spanish and social entrepreneurship because of my background in literary analysis, not in spite of it.

My dissertation was titled, "Transitional Discourses: The Psychosomatic Fiction of Juan José Millás." In the chapter I wrote about Millás' novel, Tonto, muerto, bastardo e invisible, I included one section on "A Corporate Topography," which explored the spatial representations of power within the corporate discourse presented in the novel and in the protagonist's actual disruptions of the spatial relations at his job. In the final chapter, I analyzed Volver a casa. And in that chapter, I analyzed the "work" of literature in a section called "Metafiction and Materiality."

Then when I graduated and began teaching, I twice taught an undergraduate course called "El trabajo y los sistemas de poder" about Medieval and Early Modern Spanish texts. So looking back, I now realize that I was always interested in business studies, even when I was working within literature.

This is a very long way of introducing the work of Mary K. Long, who also has her PhD in literary studies and now works in literature, business language studies and translation studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Mary co-edited a recent book from Vanderbilt UP, Mexico Reading the United States: "The thirteen original essays in this collection explore the Mexican point of view from the 1920s to the present in order to register often unheard voices in the complex cross-border, cross-cultural reality shared by the two nations. The contributors, all of whom have personal experience with the challenges of bi-cultural and bi-national living, discuss travel writing, novels, film, essays, political cartoons, and Mexican sociocultural movements. In a time of ever-increasing migration of capital and human beings, this book turns on its head the usual perspective of U.S. economic and cultural dominance in order to deepen understanding of the bi-national relationship." In addition to the introduction, Mary wrote a chapter titled, "Writing Home: The United States through the Eyes of Traveling Mexican Artists and Writers, 1920-1940." From the title, description and Mary's chapter title, you can see that she brings to business language studies a unique ability to understand and appreciate multiple perspectives and power relations.

Mary also gave us information about two recent collections:

Consistent Incorporation of Professional Terminologies into the World's Languages: The Linguistic Engine of a Global Culture. Michel, Gueldry, editor. Edwin Mellen Press, 2010. (I was pleasantly surprised to see that the book was reviewed by Larry Scher, from the University of Illinois.) Unfortunately the link doesn't show you the table of contents (how is that possible?), but I'll share just a few chapters: "Languages, Culture, and Education for Nonproliferation Policy"; "Lost and Found in Translation: Integrating Languages into health Care for Improved Health Outcomes"; "The 'Cultural Turn' in Business and Management Discourse: Political and Ethical Considerations"; "Issues in Language Policies for the Labor Force in Developing Countries."
How Globalizing Professions Deal with National Languages: Studies in Cultural Studies and Cooperation. Michel, Gueldry, editor. Edwin Mellen Press, 2010. My friend, David J. Shook, has a chapter in the collection: "First-year Spanish Textbooks: Towards Connecting Students, Professional Goals, Language, and Culture. Mary also has a chapter: "Spanish for the Professions Degree Programs in the United States: History and Current Practice." This chapter, for me, complements Christine Uber Grosse's work, and echoes languages for specific purposes (LSP) importance, achievements and challenges. In addition to the valuable information in the chapter about LSP programs in the US, I would like to quote a few noteworthy passages from Mary's article:

"Thus Spanish for any 'professional use' is much more than a technical course an din fact requires both the critical thinking skills and cultural knowledge that are at the heart of traditional humanities education in language and literature. What has changed from the traditional approach to language and literature is not the teaching of literature, culture, critical thinking and textual analysis, but rather the sorts of texts and situations being analyzed (the categories have been expanded beyond literature); the way literature is read and increased sources of cultural information." (37)
"University of Colorado students...prepare multimedia group presentations on business aspects of the Hispanic world as well as individual presentations focusing on sustainable business practices and non-governmental agencies in specific countries.... They also write a career research paper, and in the final course for the major prepare a professional portfolio that includes translations of a variety of texts as well as summaries and analysis of articles about current business issues in the Hispanic world." (38)
Spanish for Professions degree programs have a solid, proven record of combining the many strengths of professional fields with the life values of liberal arts programs. It is expected that the field will continue to prosper." (42)
In sum, this is a chapter that I will often refer to.

Mary's work is a good example of what business language studies can look like when a scholar who is well-grounded in the theories and methodologies of her area of PhD preparation brings those same tools (and others--and in Mary's case her personal experiences from living and working both the US and Mexico) to bear on LSP.

2011 CIBER Business Languages Conference, Teaching with Technology Workshop

2011-03-28T12:51:00.002-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Orlando Kelm's workshops are legendary. I know that sounds like hyperbole, but I'm serious. And it's rightfully deserved. I'm pretty savvy about technology, yet I learned about platforms I didn't know about, and Orlando gave very creative and inspiring examples about how to use these tools in the teaching of business languages.

You can see the information from his presentation in this particular post. Be sure to view the entire blog as well to learn more. It's a wonderful example of how to effectively use a blog as your course website, how to teach business cultures, and it contains very useful links and posts.

Specifically, I learned about polleverywhere.com and posterous.com. We did some very fun activities with polleverywhere during the session. Students can text or tweet their responses as well as via the website. It was fun to see the graphs change in real time as people sent in their responses. This could be used in class to give a quiz, to solicit opinions, to probe students' background knowledge and more. You can use the free version if no more than 30 people respond to the poll, and Orlando sometimes has students create the poll themselves, not just answer ones that he has written. Orlando uses posterous.com to allow his students to upload their videos to his YouTube channel.

Two Google projects were mentioned--Google Goggles and the Google Art Project. I will have to look into them more on my own.

This is a very quick summary, in part because nothing I can write can do justice to Orlando's presentation style, his wonderful examples and the back and forth with the audience members. I encourage everyone to explores his blogs.

2011 CIBER Business Languages Conference, Day 2

2011-03-28T09:57:00.001-06:00

by Ann Abbott

At some conferences, the quality of the sessions is really hit or miss. At this year's CIBER Business Languages conference, I didn't attend one single session in which I didn't learn something or get an idea for something I can incorporate into my teaching and/or programming.

Here are the sessions I attended and just a few of the highlights.

Christine Uber Grosse. The link I provided here shows many of the articles that Chris has published, but certainly not all of them, especially not the latest. She has been and continues to be a leader in business languages, especially because of her publication record in top journals. Her morning keynote talk was titled, "The Continuing Evolution of Languages for Specific Purposes" and was based on her article that will appear in the Modern Language Journal special issue on LSP. She gave a very interesting retrospective on the field, highlighting key professors, and her article will be a qualitative study based on in-depth interviews with leaders in the field. Since her article will soon be available for all to read, I'll just give one quote that I jotted down: "The irony is that the greatest opposition to LSP comes from Modern Languages faculty." Her talk generated a terrific question and answer period. Several people gave wonderful advice for raising the field's profile. Mary Long (University of Colorado, Boulder) said we should retool the language with which we speak of business languages (e.g., express it in humanist and linguistics terms, the "languages" spoken in most language programs), stop asking for "permission" with our body language and to never be apologetic about what we do. Maida Watson said to show the deans that you are bringing in resources through grants and other sources. Chris said that we need to publish in the *best* journals. And Barbara Lafford followed up by saying we should use the same theoretical frameworks as the more established fields. There is more to say on this topic, of course, and I look forward to reading many of the articles in the upcoming MLJ special issue.
Margrit Zinggeler and Coral Lopez-Gomez. Margrit and Coral both talked about an internship program that they have established with Eastern Michigan students who work with Consulates. Coral is an Honorary Consul of Spain, and she explained the differences between career consuls and honorary consuls, as well as the duties they carry out for their citizens, the host country's citizens and the business community. She suggested contacting your nearest Consulate Corps to begin an internship program. Margrit then followed up with a presentation about the academic structure of the internship. Eastern Michigan holds an important place within LSP studies, so it was great to see the latest from there.
Juanita Villena-Alvarez. First of all, I would like to congratulate Juanita on her very prestigious award: South Carolina Governor's Professor of the Year. (Whatever you think about recent South Carolina governors, the recognition for Juanita's work is wonderful.) Secondly, I'd like to thank her for the information she shared with us about trends in the research and practice of Spanish for the healthcare professions. The main take-away for me from Juanita's talk is that we need to establish some common criteria and standards to combat the mish-mash of programs and approaches that we have now. I'd like to see a core curriculum in translingual communication strategies and transcultural competence that is applicable in any profession. To that, we can add profession-specific topics.
Mary K. Long. Mary explained the benefits of the CIBER faculty development trips abroad (FDIB) to business language faculty. Although Mary teaches Spanish, she explained how the trips to Asia and Eastern Europe have informed her thinking and teaching of Business Spanish. What impressed me most was the way that Mary showed such a macro-view of understanding the connections among business, culture, ethics, power structures and global policies. I loved the slides in which she would juxtapose a business practice with a contradictory cultural practice. Mary is a wonderful example of how faculty with strong grounding in the humanities enrich the teaching and research on business languages.
The lunchtime keynote talk was given by two representatives from the Defense Language Institute/Foreign Language Center, Presidio of Monterrey, CA. No comment.
Greg Moreland and two University of Florida students. It is always eye-opening to listen to students talk about their learning experiences in our classes and in study-abroad. I was especially struck by how different the experiences are for heritage speakers and non-heritage speakers. It would be interesting to have a panel of students who have taken a business language class abroad, studied business in the host institution or had an internship abroad.
Michael Doyle and Mary K. Long. Mike and Mary both presented on translation studies within a business language curriculum. Mike's presentation focused on the American Translators Association's certification exam and argued that when we grade our business language students' translation work, we should at least make them aware of the ATA's grading criteria so that they understand the professional practices and ethics of translation. Mike also said something that merits, I think, an entire session: "biliteracy is necessary for translating, not just being bilingual and bicultural." Both Michael and Mary have translation courses within their business language programs, so it was wonderful to get their in-depth insights. Mary's talk, "'Real World' Documents as Linguistic and Cultural Artifact in the Spanish for Business Translation Class," was especially interesting for me because of the translations students do for community entities. She trains her students not just in "how to translate," but, perhaps most importantly, because they will not come out of her course ready to be professional translators, she teaches them when to say no, that they cannot translate something. In fact, she goes so far as to teach students how to say, "I cannot translate this, but I can help you find someone who can," because after her class they also know how to identify qualified translators. Mary also provided this valuable nugget: a report on "What Business Wants: Language Needs in the 21st Century."
After a busy day, we spent the evening at a wonderful outdoor reception--although it was quite chilly--and a dinner at the Riviera Theater, a beautiful, art-deco movie theater.

What a successful conference. I'm looking forward to next year's conference at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

2011 CIBER Business Languages Conference

2011-03-24T20:46:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

I always enjoy coming to the CIBER Business Languages Conferences to see friends and pick up new ideas. This conference has been especially energizing. Being in Charleston, South Carolina is a nice break from the long Illinois winter we had this year, and having all the sessions and events in the same hotel makes for a nice, intimate atmosphere.

Here is the conference agenda, and I will highlight a few things from today's schedule.

Plenary panel on "Directions for Research on Languages for Business and the Professions." It was a good idea to start the conference with a focus on research. If we want to raise the profile of this area, we need to raise our expectations for the scholarly output, too. Mike Doyle is advocating for a change of wording and suggests that we call what we do Business Language Studies. That's important, as long as we also do the research, and he mapped that out on a slide. I think his piece in the upcoming special issues of Modern Languages Journal will explain that in more detail. Maria Antonia Cowles focused on curriculum development and called for participatory action research. Steve Sacco called for us to teach business languages, especially in the less commonly taught languages, in a more coordinated manner and less in the piece-meal fashion in which it takes place now. He had a strong conclusion linked to the very premise of CIBERs and their federal funding.
Darcy Lear. Darcy and I presented together, but on two different topics. Darcy described many aspects of the Spanish for the Professions Minor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel-Hill, and she spoke in-depth about the Spanish for Journalism course she teaches. She told how she integrates service-learning into the course (they do non-profession-specific CSL work, but their journalistic work for the class is for their community partner or describes it. In other words, they may do ESL tutoring, but they would then write a press release for the school or write an article for publication in the Spanish-language press about the students, program or school. (Thanks, Darcy, for also sharing how you use Comunidades with your students.) The audience was very interested in seeing the posters her students must prepare and the finished, published pieces that emerge from their course work.
My session. I then spoke about teaching social media marketing in my business Spanish class. At the outset, I told the audience that I wanted them to walk away with some activities in hand and with a framework for teaching the "soft skill" of transcultural competence. I think the information was well-received and that people recognize social media marketing as an important skill to teach ourselves as well to our students.
Marta Chamorro. I met Marta at ACTFL in Boston. We got together for breakfast one morning to chat because we had a lot in common, including our teaching of Business Spanish. Marta spoke about her work with the four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) in her Business Spanish course and included videos of our students' work. I think that the feature that most impressed people in the audience is that her students must read Spanish-language newspapers for ten minutes every single day of the semester (yes, on Saturdays and Sundays, too) and then spend five minutes writing up a very short summary and analysis. Those all go into the portfolio of all their work for the semester. Marta has high expectations for her students and also gives them lots of support and inspiration. Everyone was impressed by her work and her energy.
E. Teel Evans. Teel presented the work done by her students in a sixth-semester Business Spanish course (i.e., her students have already had a previous introductory Business Spanish course). She showed the extensive and intensive work that her students did to plan an international business, and the best part was seeing that one of the students built on that work and actually opened his own business: Spanish Vines.
Nancy Buchan. Our lunchtime keynote speaker talked about the research-based Communication and Social Interaction Style (CSIS) assessment. The test could be a very good teaching tool, not to reinforce stereotypes of direct/indirect cultures for example, but instead to help students examine their own cultural beliefs on several dimensions in comparison to other possible perspectives and practices. (Although I will admit that I pointed my finger at Darcy when the speaker described one "type" as someone who is direct, unafraid of confrontation, believe in schedules, adheres to deadlines and wants plenty of space during interactions. She never pointed her finger at me as any one "type;" maybe I'm more direct and confrontational than her!)
Maida Watson. I was so happy to hear Maida present on entrepreneurship in foreign languages. She, Darcy and I all received grants from the programs on our campuses that were funded by the Kauffman Foundation, and we developed entrepreneurship courses with them. I teach "Spanish & Entrepreneurship" at UIUC, Darcy Lear teaches a freshman seminar on "Spanish and Entrepreneurship" at UNC, Chapel-Hill and Maida taught a course, in English, at Florida International University about entrepreneurship in foreign languages. Maida's paper will be published in a forthcoming book on Specialized Languages in a Global World.

Tomorrow will be another good day of sessions, and on Saturday morning I will attend Orlando Kelm's workshop on technology in business language teaching.

Student Reflection

2011-03-21T20:19:00.000-06:00

by April Nwatah

This past weekend I had the opportunity to volunteer with the Guatemalan Mobile Consulate. From what I was told before I volunteered, this was the first time that they’ve come to the Champaign-Urbana area. In addition, Champaign-Urbana has a large Guatemalan population – so their services were quite needed.

While they were in town they issued passports and identification cards to the Guatemalan community. This event was held at the Wesley Foundation on Green and Goodwin. While there I mostly did child-care (coloring and playing games with the kids of the people who came).

I had an amazing time working with the kids! Initially I found it to be quite easy to communicate in Spanish. I was able to think of all of the words and phrases that I wanted to use and was able to converse quite rapidly with the people in the community. However, in many cases my Spanish was not needed and was occasionally useless. I specifically remembered talking to one young girl in Spanish when she replied (in English) “I don’t speak Spanish.” I didn’t really know what else to say until another young boy interjected and explained to me that they spoke a Guatemalan language. My years of studying Latin American EVERYTHING all came together in an instance. I remembered learning about Guatemala and how although Spanish is the official language, 40% of the population speaks one of the many indigenous languages. This fact was really important for me to realize. I usually assume that if I’m working with someone from Latin America, I can just speak Spanish with them. I usually don’t remember that there are other languages spoken in Latin America. It also made me wonder how many times I’ve spoken Spanish in the community and how many of the people have actually understood me (as they may have actually spoken another language).

This encounter has encouraged me to do more research on the indigenous populations in Latin America. I look forward to learning more about them!

Hispania, March 2010

2011-03-21T11:57:00.001-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Yes, I'm reviewing a year-old issue of Hispania. I'm sorry for the delay, especially since the Special Section on "Curricular Changes for Spanish and Portuguese in a New Era" is so pertinent and timely to the curricular innovations I would like to see happen in our Spanish program.

But first, let me mention Bill VanPatten's article, "Some Verbs Are More Perfect than Others: Why Learners Have Difficulty with ser and estar and What It Means for Instruction." I remember reading that article when the issue first arrived in my mailbox and being impressed by the elegance of BVP's writing. I think all academic writers should aspire to write so clearly and engagingly--and I say that as someone who does not do second language acquisition research! (By the way, my post on Bill VanPatten is consistently one of the ten most accessed posts on my blog.)

The special section is a collection of 15 short articles that respond to two MLA reports:

I will highlight very briefly a few of the pieces that I believe will be of interest to readers of this blog.

"Promise (Un)fulfilled: Reframing Languages for the Twenty-First Century" by Raquel Oxford inserts ACTFL's work with the "Partnership for 21st Century Skills" within the list of transformative guidelines for our profession. She asserts that, "changes for twenty-first-century skills must form part of the conversation as modifications move forward in the language curriculum." (68). I concur, and I think that CSL in on-line communities and on-line CSL work are important pathways on the mapping of 21st century skills.
"A Responsive, Integrative Spanish Curriculum at UNC Charlotte" by Michael S. Doyle details how their program offers translation studies and business content within the undergraduate, Masters and potentially the PhD programs.
"El español para fines específicos La proliferación de programas creados para satisfacer las necesidades del siglo XXI¨ by Lourdes Sánchez-López talks about the role of languages for specific purposes (LSP) in the re-envisioning of foreign language curricula. The piece offers a very useful definition of LSP that builds upon language for general purposes courses: "no lo consideramos como una entidad aparte de la enseñanza del español como lengua extranjera, sino como una integración, ampliación o prolongación" (87). Her recommendations are strong and solid, but hinge on professors being willing to prepare themselves to teach outside their comfort zone and in areas that pull them out of the academic world, something that I observed that very, very few faculty--even those within language programs that risk extinction--are willing to entertain.
"The Case for a Realistic Beginning-Level Grammar Syllabus: The Round Peg in the Round Hole" by Audrey L. Heining-Boynton argues that we need to abandon the notion that the entire gamut of grammar structures be presented in the first year of students' language studies. As you know from reading this blog, I feel that CSL reveals the gaps in students' language abilities that remain hidden in the classroom (numbers, names, commands, etc.) that should be emphasized more in the language curriculum. They can communicate fine without the pluperfect. But they cannot function in a CSL setting if they cannot give commends.
"Where's the Community" by Ethel Jorge states that "though the suggestions [of the two MLA reports] might be far-reaching for many institutions, I believe they do not go far enough for a small liberal arts college such as Pitzer College. In many ways the collaborative satement in the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages et al.'s 'Standards for Foreign Language Learning: Preparing for the 21st Century' was more visionary because of its recommendation to include student interactions with communities of native speakers in the 'integrative approach...to the major' that the MLA ad hoc committee endorses" (135). She then describes Pitzer's CSL program in compelling language that other Spanish faculty can appreciate.

I'd like to close with a quote from Ethel Jorge's piece that, for me, wraps up quite nicely the difficult nature of change within Spanish programs and the pushback we can expect when we push to enact these curricular changes that look nice on paper, but create real challenges when put into place:

"Undeniably, there are realities that make curricular changes difficult to implement. Among these is the traditional power structure in foreign language departments. ... the entrenchment of permanent faculty in traditional positions; doctoral programs that do not produce new faculty with the broad conceptual background and skills to match emerging needs; and a reward system in academia that has a traditional view of the type of work that counts for promotion and tenure. Also, in recent discussions about the future of foreign language teaching, there are members of professional associations who are thoroughly invested in literary studies. These individuals claim that the introduction of cultural area studies and languages across the curriculum threatens the integrity of the field. They are concerned that foreign language departments will lose their hard-won reputations withing academic circles based on literary studies and will be tarnished by these new intellectual trends" (137).

Our work is hard. Some people say that we want to turn our departments into "service departments." And my feeling is that the people who are the most difficult to engage in conversations about serious curriculum revisions are not even reading these seminal reports nor the Special Section of Hispania. Nor this blog.

Foreign Language Annals, Spring 2011

2011-03-20T10:35:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

Although there are no articles dealing with community service learning in the latest issue of Foreign Language Annals, three articles did strike me as important for what we do.

Carreira, Maria and Olga Kagan. "The Results of the National Heritage Language Survey: Implications for Teaching, Curriculum Design, and Professional Development." In addition to the very important facts and general profile that emerges within the article, the abstract states: "We argue that a community-based curriculum represents an effective way to harness the wealth of knowledge and experiences that [heritage language learners] bring to the classroom and to responde to their goals for their [heritage language]," 40. While a community-based curriculum could be interpreted in many different ways, community service learning (CSL) is obviously an important part of that curricular response. In the "Implications for Teaching" section, the authors make the following suggestions for administrators and instructors interested in improving heritage language programs:

"Know the community," (59). You can gather information about the community in many ways, but a good CSL program will give you deeper, richer insights into the community from community members themselves. Furthermore, your students will have that same knowledge based on their own interactions in the community and the information you provide to them in class.
"Know the learner," (60). A group of my "Spanish & Entrepreneurship" students spoke last week at the Scholarship of Engagement Seminar. Two of the students were heritage speakers and the other two weren't. Listening to the heritage speakers talk about their learning experiences with CSL was enlightening. A lot of their learning had to do with issues of identity, reclaiming their language and culture in an academic setting, and helping younger students go through the same experiences they had as kids. There is a lot of research waiting to happen on the connections between CSL and heritage learners.
"Connect the learner and the community," (60). The authors mention community-based oral history projects that are available through the NHLRC. That can also be embedded within a CSL course, and I have a lesson on oral histories in Comunidades.

Miao, Pei and Audrey L. Heining-Boynton. "Initiation/Response/Follow-Up, and Response to Intervention: Combining Two Models to Improve Teacher and Student Performance." I was mostly interested in this article because I saw Audrey's name. She is another Pearson/Prentice Hall author, so I have gotten to know her fairly well. I like her, admire her work and respect her advocacy for languages on several fronts. IRF and RTI were completely new terms to me. The authors state that, "RTI formalizes what good teachers in all subject areas have always done: to reflect and asses their practice in order to modify and improve their instructional delivery" (66). I firmly believe in the importance of reflection in our teaching, not just in students' CSL work. I reflect on my teaching through this blog, my conversations with friends/colleagues (mostly Darcy Lear) and with my students themselves.
Ben Youseef Zayzafoo, Lamia. "Teaching About Women and Islam in North Africa: Integrating Postcolonial Feminist Theory in the Classroom." I was pleasantly surprised to see an article that was not based on a quantitative or qualitative study! And I learned a lot about the content matter and related issues just by reading the article. In the abstract, the author lists many "conceptual limitations" in the teaching of Islam and North African women to undergraduate students: "inadequate knowledge of the geography and history of North Africa; the discursive dichotomy between East and West; the production of the Muslim woman as a single category; the tendency to de-historicize Islam and Eastern cultures in general into unchanging and closed systems of religious practices and beliefs; the uncritical adoption of Islamic exegesis as an explanatory prism to understand all the woes of the Islamic world; and the cultural essentialism underlying the discourse of multiculturalism in American textbooks" (181). Not only is this very important information about the teaching of Islam and North Africa, many of the issues transfer to discussions of immigration and specifically of Latino immigrants to the US.

How do Spanish Community Service Learning Students Define Success?

2011-03-20T09:02:00.000-06:00

by Ann Abbott

If you read through the "Student Reflections" on this blog, you'll find that students define a successful Spanish community service learning (CSL) experience in many ways.

They use and improve their Spanish.
They feel they "connected" somehow with a member of the local Latino community.
They feel that they were able to help someone in the community resolve a problem.
They gain new insights into immigration policies and immigrants' lived realities.
They feel that their work in the community connects to their career goals.

But this week in class, we turned the tables: I asked students what they thought success looked like in general and for immigrants in particular.

First we did the actividades concluyentes at the end of Unidad 3 in Comunidades. Then we viewed the video interviews with Ruth Montenegro, a successful businesswoman originally from El Salvador. (You can see those videos at the Comunidades Companion Website.)

Finally, we did the activity about defining success (pp. 94-95). I wrote items that invited discussion, thought and questioning. At least I thought they did. I was surprised to find that the majority of my students--who are all smart, sensitive and caring people--defined success in almost exclusively economic terms. There were a few other surprises, too.

Item #1 asks if this is "éxito" or not: "Tener una casa propia, un auto que no tenga más de cinco años y poder tomar vacaciones en la playa dos veces al año." From my observations, this item generated no discussion or questioning among the student groups. The answer was simply, "Sí." First of all, if that is the definition of success, not many people in this country will ever be successful. And if that's what people aspire to, that's why too many people are maxed out on credit with their mortgages, car payments and credit cards.
Item #3 describes, "Una madre que lleva una vida de sacrificios para que sus hijos puedan estudiar en una escuela de renombre y vestirse de moda." Although this item did generate more discussion in a few groups, it also revealed that a lot of people have very gendered notions of success. In short, most students seemed to feel that, yes, that was an example of success. That disappointed me, of course, because again, it is all about external, material, "branded" signs of success, and all on the back of the self-sacrificing mother.
Item #7 is about, "Alguien que se hace millonario, pisoteando a los demás." To begin with, most students did not know the word "pisotear," so I think the answer I expected from them probably came through in my explanation of "stepping on others." Still, some students did feel like that was success.
Item #8 portrays, "Una persona que trabaja para pasar un referéndum que beneficiaría a las escuelas, pero el referéndum no pasa." I was surprised that at least some students said that, yes, this was success because the person had worked hard.

In the future, I will develop this activity further. As it is right now, it is a very good starting point for a broader discussion about success. Where do our ideas about success come from? What are the realities versus the myths of success? What would ethical or moral success look like? Where do immigrants and their lived realities fit within our definitions of success?