Spanish @ MSMC

Free Screening of the The Longoria Affair… Sept. 13th.

Víctor Azuaje — Sun, 04 Sep 2011 17:53:11 +0000

The MSMC Department of Hispanic Studies will present a FREE screening of The Longoria Affair (El caso Longoria) in Aquinas Hall, room 163, next Tuesday, September 13^th, at 7p.m. The screening will be followed by a Q&A session with director and producer John Valadez. This is an activity open to the public.

The Longoria Affair has been nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Historical Program. (Winners will be announced and the Awards will be presented on Monday evening September 26^th in New York City.)

The film is the story of the events and controversy around Felix Longoria’s wake. Longoria was a decorated Mexican American soldier killed in battle during World War II. According to his family, a funeral home in Three Rivers, Texas, refused to hold funeral services because “The whites wouldn’t like it.” Senator Lyndon B. Johnson supported the efforts of Dr. Hector Garcia, the founder of the American G. I. Forum, to find a burial place for Longoria and offered to arrange the ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery. The Three Rivers town is still bitterly divided over the controversy.

The PBS site points out that
..newly elected Senator Lyndon Johnson and activist Dr. Hector Garcia… formed an alliance over the incident. Over the next 15 years, their complex, sometimes contentious relationship would help Latinos become a national force for the first time in American history, carry John F. Kennedy to the White House, and ultimately lead to Johnson’s signature on the most important civil rights legislation of the 20th century. (PBS About the Film)

Write, director, and producer John Valadez has been a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellow twice, a Rockefeller Fellow, and served on the Artists Advisory Board of the New York Foundation for the Arts. He is also a founding member of the New York Chapter of the National Association of Latino Independent Producers(NALIP). He attended the film program at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.

Maestro Soler performed at MSMC Whittaker Hall

Víctor Azuaje — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 02:26:39 +0000

The acclaimed guitarist Maestro Soler performed at MSMC Whittaker Hall. He played pieces of Villa-Lobos, Barrios “Mangoré”, Tarrega and others. It was a great night for guitar music lovers!

Are you going to take the NY Spanish CST?

Víctor Azuaje — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 03:29:29 +0000

MSMC Hispanic Studies Majors:

If you are planning to take the New York State Spanish Content Specialty Test (Spanish CST) send me an email. We will set an appointment to review content —six (6) subareas—, check resources, and practice additional strategies that can help you to take the test.

Creativity runs in Hispanic Studies!

Víctor Azuaje — Mon, 10 May 2010 03:22:58 +0000

Be creative in learning Spanish!

Students of the Spanish for Teachers course practiced this important principle while teaching at Bishop Dunn Memorial School. They wrote bilingual stories for children and created wonderful books to read with them.

You can appreciate the craft of one of the groups by clicking here to download a PDF file. The story is titled Pedro Searches for a Birthday Gift / Pedro busca un regalo de cumpleaños.

Other titles in the collection are:

A writer is born!

Students of the Latin American Short Stories course also came up with new creative ways to learn Spanish. Each week, they commented on short stories from Latin American authors in the Facebook group page.

However, talking about what others did was not enough. To test their story writing skills, the students rewrote a short story that was discussed in class into a short story for children.

At that point, they wanted to do more (!?). They wrote their own short stories and went through the exciting experience of reading them in public. A captive public, we may add, but one that enjoyed interesting stories.

§§§

The other side of the story… or what they really thought about such a writing intensive course.

mis lágrimas = my tears
¡Qué lástima! = what a pity!

Dr. McCarthy at Downing Park

Víctor Azuaje — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 18:07:20 +0000

This past Saturday, MSMC students planted 10 trees in Downing Park Saturday to commemorate the college’s 50th anniversary. Dr. Karen Eberle-McCarthy, professor of Spanish and president of the Downing Park Planning Committee, introduced Mayor Nick Valentine, Father Kevin E. Mackin, President of the College,as well as Student Government Association VP Dorothea Van Valkenburgh.

Social Services for Latinos

Víctor Azuaje — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 10:38:42 +0000

Click to view slideshow.

Tibaire Araujo, B.A, M.A., conducted an awareness session about social services for the Latino community. Some of the issues Mrs. Araujo talked about were:

Mental Health Services
Domestic Violence
Foster Care
Preventive Services
Child Welfare
Parenting Service
Why do agencies want to serve the Latino community?

Health Care for Latinos / The Talk

Víctor Azuaje — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 02:17:42 +0000

Mr. Hector Cotto talked to the “Spanish for Health Care Prof / Social Services” class about the legalities of interpreting and translating documents in the Health Care setting – Cultural Differences- Language Barriers Mr. Cotto is a NYS Certified Court Interpreter.

Spanish for Teachers SP’10

Víctor Azuaje — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 18:53:40 +0000

The Spanish for Teachers class had a wonderful semester teaching Spanish to the students of Bishop Dunn Memorial School.

La clase de Español para Maestros tuvo un magnífico semestre enseñando español a los estudiantes de Bishop Dunn Memorial School.

Strategies for success in Spanish (II): Flashcards (from Benjamin Rifkin)

Víctor Azuaje — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 23:27:10 +0000

Flashcards

Make and use flashcards – not just words, but words in context and with grammatical endings
English on one side only.
Write out words with grammatical variations (verbal conjugation, articles, nouns)
Write out words with syntactical context (fuller phrase)
Write out example sentences that are meaningful to you (reflect your life, interests, humor)
Write out example sentences taken from the textbook

Working with Flashcards: Shuffle the flashcards to defeat the “order effect”!

Write out flashcards for all the words (or some percentage of the words based on the number of words)
Review from Spanish to English until you can correctly identify the English translation of each Spanish word or phrase.
Review those words from the unit before that were hard for you. Review all the words from the previous two units.
Work English to Spanish, review every word or some percentage of the words from English to Spanish until you can get it right.
Use flashcards while walking, while sitting, with or without musical accompaniment. Sing and dance your vocabulary, too!

Strategies for success in Spanish. (Adapted from Benjamin Rifkin, Professor of Russian)

Víctor Azuaje — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 14:00:26 +0000

Strategies

Set goals
Evaluate and monitor, reflect on the success of your study strategies and use strategies that are working for you. (Stop using strategies that are NOT working for you!)
Ask others about their strategies and try new strategies suggested by your friends.
Regular schedule: Monitor sleep, exercise, eating, drinking (and time when you do those things).

Resources

Flashcards
Review old words
Repeat in writing and speech

Vocabulary

Review old words – in speech and writing.
Make sentences that are meaningful to you.
Mnemonics – rhyme, alliteration, rhythm, music, etc.
Associations by image, function, opposite, classes of words, related words.
Associate with context, guess by context.
Little notebook for questions, vocabulary that you can carry with you.