Workshop

 UNIVERSIDAD PEDAGOGICA Y TECNOLOGICA DE COLOMBIA

Master Programme in Language Teaching

Seminar on Linguistics

 

 

 

Be ready to expand on the following issues:

 

1. A book/article you have read recently.

 Recently I have read “Famous tales and stories for performance” by paulino Garcia and Miguel Arcangel Garcia. It is a complete and useful guide to use drama as a tool for education, in its different ways as they are roleplaying, pantomime, sketches, and others. It has  a variety of funny and entertaining stories to work during your class with the children while improving their speaking and listening skills 

2. A study on Language/Linguistics/ either you have done previously or wish to explore in the near future.

During the last semester of my college I had to carry out a short term project called enhancing oral production through total physical response and implementation of short nursery rhymes in Institucion tecnico comercial de Jenesano. It was developed with my partners: Alexandra Moreno, Feiber Letrado y Daniel Alvarez,  in four different venues of this public school: 20 de Julio, Baganique Bajo, Baganique Medio, Rodríguez, Piranguata, Dulceyes y Paeces Bajos

3. A lecture/conference you have attended and that impressed you.

About conferences, one of the most interesting ones I remember is “learning a second language develop your mother tongue?”. I found it looking for an interesting authentic material to work with my students during a speaking class.  the different languages we learnt don't exist in isolated parts of the brain, not a single component of the language in the brain at all. if we learn a concept in one language we don’t have to relearn it in the other language we just need to learn the language bribe it, as english teachers we just have to display the concepts in  your mother tongue just to connect the dots 

 

4. A Subject/Seminar/Module that called your attention in the study of language.

 At the beginning of my college we had our first contact with linguistics  through a subject called general Linguistics. It was taught by professor Mauricio Uricochea. Thanks to this seminar we start thinking in a reflective way about  language, its components, Its changes, and how it works in society. Also it helped me to have a more critical thinking about what I was learning at that time and my own learning process to then have a better understanding on how to teach languages.

5. A field/area of study/research you have been or might be interested in.

As I have had a child I am getting curious about the language learning process and specifically  how to start this language learning with my baby. Maybe, I would like to research about early language stimulation in two or more languages. what kind of strategies there are already, how they work, and how to apply them with my baby. Language learning is a unique process, totally different for each person and I would like to help my child the most that I can as a language teacher to make it easier for him while teaching him all that I already know.

 

6. Are you a teacher, a Linguist, or both?

All along college, I have studied the basics of linguistics but also the basics of pedagogy. And through my career I have been applying both of them in my practice as a language teacher, no matter the context or population I was working with I had to always combine them to improve as a professional. So, I would consider myself both a teacher and linguist, because it is almost impossible to separate them in a daily practice of reflection and critical thinking, the teaching-learning process that you as a teacher and your student are having at every single session. 

7. How do you approach/conceive the study of Language? 

In the beginning, I would think about language since the conception of a formal system and probably that will take me to think about grammar, vocabulary acquisition, standard pronunciation of words, and others. but soon I would realize that it is not enough at studying language and I will have to look at the language in use and how it is concerned with every aspect of daily life and interaction that we are having as human beings even with ourselves.