So, it's been almost two weeks and I guess I can safely say that we are in a routine now. Classes are a lot of work. We have a 9-11am Spanish grammar class, a 11-1pm Spanish culture and history class, another 2-4pm Spanish grammar class, and a 5-7pm Sociology/Psychology of Bilingualism class (in English, thank god!). We are definitely working hard for these nine credits, that's for sure!
The grammar classes are interesting because I am as fascinated in learning how she teaches as well as what she teaches. The way she addresses all four language modalities (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) and separates the work she gives by our levels of proficiency inspire me to do the same in my classes (I especially liked the listening exercise she did where we had to fill in the words to the song we were listening to). I feel for Prof. Perez though because it is a LOT of work to prepare three different levels of classwork/tests/homework assignments etc.
The culture class...has the potential to be great, but is sometimes more frustrating than great. The professor loves the subject of DR's history and it shows in his body language but because most of us struggle to understand all of the content in Spanish, it is lost. (Again, the connection of how our students feel in the classroom when trying to learn about the American Revolution when they don't understand English...not easy.) I find myself wanting to know more and ask more questions because I want learn more but miss/don't understand much of what he says that I find that I 'tune out' after a while. It really is a shame, I am learning lots of general stuff about the problems between Haiti and the DR, about a dictator named Trujillo and his reign over DR, and even about the current president of DR who wants to make this place a "little Nueva York" supposedly, but I know that I haven't understood everything he is sharing with us.
Dr. Nero's class is going great, mainly because I think many of us are happy to have a time where we can express ourselves in English for a change! We seem to run out of time often but only because we get caught up discussing the readings and comparing our experiences to the theory. We've also been sharing our journals in class and it has been interesting to hear how people have been feeling/what they've been thinking during our time down here.
Well, that's about it regarding classes for now...can't believe we're almost half way done!
Chetal
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1 comment:
That's a ton of work! Keep it up, though! You guys are almost in the homw stretch!
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