Yo hablo, je parle, io parlo
Today I got my first Spanish comment on this blog. Pedro, my new friend from Spain, and I have been emailing each other and trying to set up a global exchange of email between his English learners and my Spanish learners. We have typed each other in both languages. I always type in Spanish when connecting with native speakers-it is a courtesy, as well as a good practice for me to maintain my adult Spanish literacy abilities.
Pedro has taken to typing me in English-probably for very similar reasons. He has visited my classroom web-page. I have seen pics of his school and students(they look like mine in size, attitude and composure). His students can view my class montages from onetruemedia.com on my page. Recently on twitter, the question was posed by Clarence Fisher(AKA glassbeed) do you let your students use translator programs to learn languages? Only Susan Roustan (byndpdcstng) and I responded. Both of us stated that computers have not yet mastered the nuances of languages. There is subtlety to knowing the right expression and how it is used by the people within their culture.
Tonight I watched this google video by Luis von Ahn, Ph.D, Asst Professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Melllon University. He talks about Human Computation. There are still many things we can do better than computers. If you have not tried his game esp-it is addicting! He was recently on PBS Wired Science. He is from Guatemala and I love his ability to explain how his culture helped him think ‘outside the box’.
If you watch the video- you will know why I feel secure in my job as a Foreign Language teacher at this point!
