Presentation at NEMLA

Developing Intercultural Pragmatic Competence in Elementary-level Spanish learners.

Lecturers Adriana Merino and Andie Faber recently presented their work at the 50th NorthEast Modern Language Association Convention in Washington, D.C. Their talk, “Developing Intercultural Pragmatic Competence in Elementary L2 Students through NNS Interactions” was included as part of a panel titled “A classroom with a worldview: Teaching and learning intercultural sensitiveness”. In this presentation, they discussed the curriculum they implement in their Spanish 102 and Spanish 103 courses at Princeton that focuses on developing pragmatic abilities through recorded conversations. As part of each assignment, students learn about a specific aspect of spoken Spanish, they see examples and practice its use before engaging in spontaneous conversation with a partner, in which they work to incorporate the knowledge and expressions they have just learned. Once students finish their conversations, they listen to the recording and reflect upon their strengths and weaknesses in the conversation. An analysis of these recordings indicates that students build on their skills throughout the semester, incorporating pragmatic aspects they have learned in previous assignments in each new recording.