Chelsea Fenton

1

Chelsea Fenton

FL 664

Powell

May 8, 2014

Case Study

Table of Contents

• Learner profile
• Student information
• Learning Styles survey
• Personality Type survey
• Observations
• Activity description and analysis
• Activity artifacts
• In class observations
• Analysis of online tests
• Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis - Hierarchy of Difficulty
• Reflection

Learner Profile

For my case study, I chose a sophomore from Spanish 102. Let’s call her Maria. Maria took Spanish 101 last semester at USM and plans to minor in the subject to accompany her major in Broadcast Journalism. Maria previous took 2 years of Spanish in high school but wanted to start over again at 101 in college. In my opinion, Maria has a proficiency level between Novice-Mid and Novice-High based on ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines.

Maria’s father has a college degree and her mother has some college credits but no degree. Both have some experience with Spanish from high school and college classes. Maria’s mom and dad have a positive attitude towards language learning especially Spanish. They have told Maria several times that Spanish will be beneficial to her in her future career. In a short interview with Maria about learning a foreign language she shared with me that she sees the potential in learning Spanish. She feels it will help her in her future career (broadcast journalism). She chose Spanish over other languages because of its abundancy and proximity in our own community. Maria enjoys learning Spanish especially the culture of different Spanish countries. She is motivated to learn because she sees the importance of speaking another language especially with a high tech and closely connected world these days

I choose Maria as my case study because I have known her since high school and she was also in the Spanish 101 class that I was the teaching assistant for last semester. I have been able to observe her for some time especially her motivation and excitement to learn. In class she is outgoing in the TL, which is a reflection of her high self-esteem. She voluntarily responds to professor’s questions without a doubt of feeling vulnerable in creating the language on her own. Her 101 professor had a more sociocultural teaching style, focusing on communication and real use of the language while the teaching style of her 102 professor this semester, its more focused on grammar structure than communication. This is another reason why I choose this student. I wanted to observe her through this change of teaching styles and help address any difficulties she might face. In class this semester, I have noticed that compared to the other students she has a better understanding of the language even as such a low level. Often times I will see her explain something to the other members of her table with they do not understand.

Learning Styles Survey

After analyzing the results and the description of each style, I was able to make some instructional changes to the way I would present the activities. Maria is a very much a visual learner. I have noticed in class that she takes very organized and detail notes. With this style, I plan to include pictures and diagrams into my lessons if possible, especially with activities that help to build vocabulary.

Personality Type Survey

I also asked Maria to take the Myers-Briggs Personality Type survey. Her results showed that she is an ESFP – Performer (Extraversion, Sensing, Feeling, Perception). The description of this types as a person who lives life to the fullest, creative, a team player, observant, practical and realistic. ESFP’s are hands-on learners and learn more by doing then by reading or studying. They tend to excel in a subject when it is of interest to them and if they relevance in the subject. Of these descriptions, I find them to match very closely the personality of Maria. These results also match the Learning Styles results also showing that she is a visual learner. It is obvious that Maria has a strong interest in Spanish – not just because she told me – but in the effort she puts into learning and the positive attitude she has towards the subject. Reflection upon the time I have spent with Maria this semester, this description of her personality type matches her very well.

Observations

My observations with Maria lasted from 30 minutes to an hour at least once a week. We met outside of class and did activities that I pre-planned before our meeting time based on my observations of her in class as well as her stated areas of need in the class. Activities were created keeping my mind the results of the Learning Style Survey and the Personality Type Survey.

Observation #1

30 minutes

Activity – Review and practice of preterit tense

In this observation, I assisted Maria in some online Wiley assignments explaining to her in more detail the past tense. I also asked her some question to practice the past tense.
¿Qué hiciste el fin de semana?

¿Qué hicieron tus padres del fin de semana?

¿Qué hicieron tus amigos el fin de semana?

Maria attempted to create language on her own and expand sentences by adding more details. At one point she struggled to express an idea because what she wanted to say needed the use of the imperfect, a tense that has not yet been learned. I briefly explained it to her.

“Fui al cine porque eh qui eh I wanted to see Divergence.”

I noticed that she has trouble with use of prepositions por y para (although this topic has not been covered at her current level of study. ¨Estudiépor mi clase de historia¨

Observation #2

45 minutes

Activity– Song: Querido Tommy

Listening comprehension; Ability to isolate words in speech stream (p 196)

In this activity, I played this song for Maria and asked her to write down any words that she hears and knows (or think she knows the meaning of). Her list included several verbs, adjectives, and nouns that have been used frequently in class or are cognates. Next, I gave her the lyrics to the song and played it again. She said she was able to recognize more words with the lyrics in front of her – a likely case, as it’s easier to isolate speech with the help of lyrics or subtitles as a visual aid.Gass explains that, “the lexicon is the driving force in speech production” (p. 195) as well as in comprehension, written or oral. Lexical knowledge helps to isolate words during speech production, which without, an utterance would be incomprehensible due to lack of lexicon. This activity definitely provided a Zone of Proximal Development in that the lyrics of the song included words and verb tense no yet studied. Maria needed my help to decipher the meaning amongst words unknown. But by analyzing words and providing examples within other contexts, she was able to comprehend the meaning. I asked her what she thought the song was about. She was able to identify the main idea of the song and the three people spoken about in the song – Tommy, Paco, and a girl Paco likes.

One thing that caused a problem with her was the combination of the words ‘pocomás’

She was not able to understand the meaning because she saw this words as with two contradicting meanings “poco” –small and “más” – larger, greater. She was unable to put the idea together of it meaning “a little more”. I contribute this to the lack of knowledgeof the meanings of these words especially in use with each other. Chapter 8 of Gass talks about the lexicon and what it means to know a word. At a low level of learning as 102, the students do not know the multiple meanings and uses of words in Spanish. Even though this isn’t the perfect example, it does show a lack of receptive knowledge of these words especially in use with each other.

Observation #3

45 minutes

Activity – Direct and Indirect Objects

Syntax and Acquisition of Placement

The activity consisted of direct explicit instruction of the difference of DO and IO in Spanish through the use of a PPT along with examples of each. Maria told me that she enjoys English grammar and so this type of grammar rules came easy to her. To practice the use we completed an online activity on Wiley that only asked for the use of IO. Maria did well at attempting this first activity. (This material has not been cover in class as of this point because the assignments on Wiley are ahead of schedule compared with classroom instruction).

For more practice, I showed several video clips of someone doing something to/for another person or groups of students. The task was to say a sentence about what happens (using the present tense) in the clip. I first asked for only the use of IO and then after replacing the DO word with a pronoun. This task provided more of a challenge to use both pronouns of DO and IO. After completing this activity in the present tense, we repeated it in the preterit – this added no difficulty for her. The struggle I notice with Maria was the order and placement of the pronouns. This is understandable because in English both of our DO and IO pronouns come after the verb in that order whereas in Spanish they come before the verb in a IO, DO order. After some practice she began to understand better the use of these pronouns and their placements.

Observation #4

Activity of prepositions of placement

Clarification questions

This activity involved me describing the location of things in a city using prepositions of placement – next to, in front of, behind, to the left of, etc. and Maria drew a picture of the city as I describe it. These prepositions were learned several weeks ago but this activity served as a review and recall of previously learned information. Language is continuous and builds upon previous information – this continual practice is something that lacks in the classroom and I wanted to provide this opportunity to Maria in our session.

In this activity, I was listening for questions of clarification from her. Clarification requests are defined by Gassas “A device used in conversation to ask for more information when something has not been understood” (p. 521). I have noticed Maria asking clarification requests during our session especially with unknown words. She will ask in the TL what them mean. As the material being covered at this time involves the city, location of places, and giving directions, these topics of conversation are great opportunities for clarification requests.

This activity was adapted from the Time to do… in Gass on page 351. I introduced the activity by practicing questions about location of places on campus or in the city for her to recall the use of the verb estar along with the prepositions of placement. I then began describing the city and asked her to draw it on a piece of paper. I told her she could ask questions to clarify what I say but only in Spanish and that I would not translate the meaning of anything. A transcription of the activity is below (Maria’s responses are in bold) as well as the map and her drawing of the description:

Esta ciudad está en la costa y hay una playa. En el centro de la ciudad hay una plaza. Enfrente de la plaza al norte hay un cine.
¿Al norte?

Si, al norte, enfrente de la plaza. A la derecha de la plaza hay un café.

¿A la derecha? I dontremember, mmm a la derecha. Ok, I think I remember.

Alado del café hay una biblioteca y detrás de la biblioteca y el café hay un supermercado.

¿detrás?

Si, detrás.

Mm, ok.

A la izquierda de la plaza hay una iglesia. Y detrás de la iglesia hay un museo

¿La iglesia está eh um a la derecho de el plaza?
No, está a la izquierda.

Oh, ok.

En playa hay un parque. Cerca del parque hay un hotel.

¿La hotel está en el parque?

El hotel está cerca del parque. Alado del hotel hay un discoteca.

¿The discoteca está a derecha o izquierda de parque?

Tambien, en la playa hay un restaurante y un casino.

¿Está cerca el parque?

No están un poco lejos pero no mucho.

Analyzing the conversation, she made good use of clarification requests in the TL to better understand the information being said. A few times her clarification requests led to more confusion but over all they assisted her in completing the task correctly. I noticed the lack of agreement of gender and the lack of agreement between subject and verb. She also omitted the conjunction of de + el =del on several occasions. The city she drew was very similar to the original picture except for that she placed the hotel in the park instead of next to it. Which is interesting because she even clarified the location of it. At the beginning she was confused between the derecha and izquierda. She used a technique I taught the class when I introduced these words by making a ¨d¨ with the right hand to help remember that right isderecha.

Observation #5

1 hour

Activity – Corazon en la maleta (Artifact #1)

Vocabulary and word formation associations

This activity focused around a Spanish song by Luis Fonsi called Corazon en la maleta. Before beginning we looked at the title of the song and brainstormed a possible meaning or amain idea of the song using the following phrases: creoqueand me pareceque. She associated the title of the song with things to do with love and traveling. After listening to the chorus of the song and completing Parte A she was able to tell me that the song is about a boy and his girlfriend and understand the metaphor of the song title ¨my heart in the suitcase¨.

In Parte B, Maria was able to correct comprehend the verses of the songs to fill in the blanks with the preterit tense verbs. We analyzed the verses of the song and focused on unknown words that share the same root of words already known.Gass explains lexicon knowledge also includes knowing how words are formed by adding other elements to give new meaning (p.203). In Spanish word formation is quite simple. All verbs in the infinitive end in –ar, -er, or –ir and adjectives end in –o or –a depending on the noun. The root of the word is most of the time the same, given learners the advantage of recognizing words they many not know the meaning of. Even though Maria had never seen any of these words before she was able to guess about the meaning based on association or appearance. A list of words we discussed and she was able to recognize the associationis below:

Limpio/a – limpiar cambia –cambiar sucio/a – suciar corta–cortar

Locura – loco/a Recuerdos - recordar

This activity included a vocabulary matching part that asked the student to match 2 phrases with the same meaning. I thought this activity was very useful even as a low level for her to realize different ways of saying the same thing. This helps to build vocabulary especially in the case of not knowing a word, being able to use circumlocution to express an idea. For example using decir adios instead of the verb despedirse.

Observation #6

1 hour

Activity – completion of song activity from previous session (Artifact #1)

Agreement of gender and number; Writing sample; Oral production of past tense

We continued this activity a week after completely the above parts. Maria was able to recall the metaphor of the song and the vocabulary that was introduced through the song.

In continuation with the idea of traveling, we reviewed articles of clothing that are being learned in the classroom right now in Chapter 8. This part of the activity was contextualized using the vocabulary of clothing, weather, and travel. The directions asked to tell what you would wear based on the weather predictions. We did this part orally and she was able to correctly express verbally what she would wear using the phrase porsiacaso (in case) with the simple future tense. By teaching her how to use phrase likeporsiacaso andme parece/creoque relates to the idea of teaching in chunks as a lower level. This allows students to be able to completely express an idea without knowing the exact grammatical detail of each part of the sentence. They are only responsible for make sure that the grammar structure they know are correct.

The last part of this activity asked for a written answer to the following question:
Escribeunparrafosobre un viaje en que lo fuiste. ¿Adóndefuiste? ¿Con quién? ¿Porcuántasdías? ¿Quéhiciste? ¿Cuálropallevastecontigo? All of these questions require the student to recall verb forms and vocabulary that has already been studied or is in the current chapter.

Analyzing the writing simple of my case study. She has a good understand of the structure of the language. Her interlanguage greatly reflects the structure of Spanish with a few mixes of English structure placement on occasion. The few mistakes she had were simple disagreements of gender and number with nouns and adjectives. On one occasion the subject and verb were in disagreement.

I asked the question that was just answered to the student to have her answer me orally, telling me what she wrote down. The transcription is below (Maria’s responses are in bold):