Reliving My Mexican Days
I’ve Been Busy. As you can tell from my lack of posting.
This evening I ran across the video I took at the dia de independencia celebration here in Austin.
Decided to attend on a whim after putting together a post for work, reliving my experience of celebrating the Mexican independence day IN MEXICO while there on my study abroad. Such an amazing, out-of-this world experience.
The celebration in Austin was good…I kinda just sat back, observed and took it all in. Watch the following video I took and check out the post I put together recapping my time celebrating down in Mexico :
[Vimeo http://vimeo.com/15019046]
actually learning in school
In school, I’ve always been in classes with 30+ students…in college many of my classes had 300+ kids. The classes I took for the Spanish major were a little better at having smaller class sizes…until they turned many of our upper-division Spanish classes into lecture courses, aka turning our previous 30 student class into a 90 person class…virtually eliminating the conversational portion and replacing this with a lecture from the professor. (and how does this help us learn Spanish…?)
At this point, I became really good at memorizing answers for the multiple choice tests given to these massive language classes…but I’m pretty sure memorizing answers with completely unrelated mnemonic devices isn’t the proper path to language acquisition.
Oh, and at this point too, I’m pretty sure the native speakers were loving the Spanish major because they have been practicing speaking / hearing Spanish at home since day 1, so…for example…the “listening” portion of tests…well, this was a piece of cake for them because they’ve grown up hearing and speaking Spanish so it’s like second nature. However, for those of us who did not grow up with the language…well, let’s just say, by having such huge class sizes and not having the opportunity to converse and practice speaking…well, let’s just say, it was a challenge.
Oh, and let me also say…I hands down learned 100% more Spanish in the semester I spent studying abroad in Mexico, than in the 8 years of Spanish I took in high school and college. Perhaps this is because I had about an average of 5 students in all of my upper-division courses in Mexico and the structure of the program was very much an experiential one. Instead of being talked at, we conversed and did many hands on projects, took field trips, etc. I’ll also note that I earned 2x as many upper division credits during the time I was gone than I would have earned taking classes at UO (I earned ~28 credits abroad and 12 credits is considered a full-time student at UO). I feel safe to say that if I spent 1 year, maybe 2 in that type of environment, I would have Spanish down, backward and forward. But no, I spent 1 semester learning the way kids should be taught, and the other 7 1/2 years…well…still trying to figure out what I got from that.
Anyway, I am digressing…and quickly…the education system is something I could certainly go off on…so yes, let’s end it there for now.
The point I’m trying to make is this. I’ve been taking a Greek class since September. There are four students in my class. I have learned more Greek in the 4 1/2 months (no class in Dec!) than Spanish I learned in the first four years in high school. Perhaps rather than cramming 3 classes into one (like my Spanish classes), we could take one class, divide it by 3, and have kids go to school for 1/2 the time, but actually learn and benefit from the smaller class sizes.
Anyway, this is what we did last class. It’s probably all Greek to you (ha ha ha I’m so funny) BUT, the stuff in this picture is a little story about a classroom and a teacher. And the teacher is learning all the kids names. And one kid forgot his pencil and the teacher became angry with him. And the kid said: well, it’s not like I forgot EVERYTHING, just a pencil!
One Of Life’s Lessons – You Can’t Take It With You.
I saw this a few years back, but thank you Zappos for tweeting this link – comes at a good time for me…and many of my peers, as we are right in the eye of deciding which of life’s paths to explore:
And yes, I agree, life is very much like a piece of music. The beginning and end are certainly important and telling points of the whole but the truth is, it’s the various components within (both a song and life) that are frequently overlooked, but quite often carry the most significance.
This past week at API we had our 2010 peer mentors in our Austin office from across the country for training. During the last part of the training, each peer mentor stood up and talked a bit about his/her experience abroad. Talk about inspiring.
A theme I quickly picked out from all the stories (and that brought back sentiments from living in Mexico) was learning the value of taking time to enjoy life and appreciate relationships, and that filling life with work and school is not how it necessarily should or needs to be.
Our peer mentor from Florence I think perhaps summarized it best -> There is always going to be more work or more school, but at some point, I learned there is more to life than work and school. When all is said and done, you can’t take it with you and it’s the relationships and experiences you that are going to be the most meaningful and memorable.
Orgullo Mexicano
He disfrutando tenieno un partner en crime para explorar una ciudad nueva.
Cuando estabamos regresando anoche, encontremos un resaurante mexicano entonces claro que detenernos y comimos la comida rica! Me encanta la cultura Mexicana y es tan maravillosa para tener la oportunidad a conocerla y las personas que tengan tan muchano… pues, estan sagrando el orgulloso de su heritage, cultura y socidad:
¡Viva!
So, as I have spent the past week interning at a study abroad company, I’ve been nostalgically reliving my freaking awesome study abroad experience in Queretaro…already 2 years ago in a month of so. Crazy.
I pulled out the 56 videos I took during my study abroad and watched a handful – this is one of my favorites – this is video of the famous Mexican Grito on el dia de independencia, right in the center of Queretaro. I love the spirit and Mexican pride coming from the Queretanos. Love it love it love it.