Argelia García Saldivar is in her first year of teaching at Goshen College after obtaining her PhD at Purdue University.
Big doses of communicative and interpersonal skills are required in each new profession, besides to a good academic formation, to be successful in our changing and diverse work environment. The mission of recruitment companies, such as CareerBuilder.com is to develop soft skills in candidates to make them more competitive. This company identifies six essential qualities as part of the soft skills: communication, teamwork, flexibility, positivity, time management, and confidence (See: Johnson, Holly. “6 soft skills every professional needs” at CareerBuilder.com). For that reason, the new educative models are focusing in the incorporation of collaborative and interdisciplinary practices in the curriculum to prepare better all students. And here at Goshen College, those skills are part of our core values, as a Christ-centered community, we prepare young leaders integrating the “Christian values with educational, social and professional life.”
We respond to the multicultural and changing work environment innovating our different programs. Foreign Languages is an important academic area that prepares students to interact with different cultural environments, even though many individuals consider the acquisition of a new language a superfluous commodity. Nowadays, institutions of higher education prefer to enhance the Soft-Skills through the collaborative and interdisciplinary methodologies used by Foreign Languages departments. Language classrooms promote all areas of communication developing activities that require the connection of different academic subjects and the development of interpersonal abilities. In my opinion, to perfect the soft-skills corresponds to a life style, rather than a momentary training, because a positive attitude cannot be easily improvised. And it is so important to help students to develop the soft-skills in academic and social environments.
Following this initiative, I am incorporating the Project-Based Learning Methodology into our Spanish program. This methodology assigns collaborative tasks to small group of students allowing them to solve problems, develop new models, or evaluate information. The designed activities for language classes respond to different purposes. While beginners’ levels work in small groups to recall information, describe objects, represent characters, reconstruct scenarios of the stories, intermediate and advanced levels can formulate questions, compare models, evaluate information and suggest new interpretations. When students develop the ability to work with others, they become more flexible and confident.
Applying this methodology often requires changing learning habits in radical ways. For example, my generation was oriented to the individualism and the academic formation required one area of expertise, also we were trained to follow specific instructions, and our learning strategies were oriented to focus on key concepts usually marked on specific pages of our textbooks, and our assessments rested on standardized tests. Now the things are different, my students have more opportunities to do their own research, to incorporate documentaries, images, music, and text as part of the sources of information. In addition to this, they can use language apps and online translators to study vocabulary, they have access to online tutorials, videos, and practice to memorize grammar at home. For that reason, the collaborative projects became unique opportunities to improve our Spanish program.
But it is not an easy task to communicate intellectual curiosity and direct students to do research to develop projects following Project-Based Learning methodologies. As a Spanish professor, I am responsible for the general planning of each project, but I need honest feedback of all students to know what activities are helpful and enjoyable, what difficulties they face working in teams, what materials used in other classes could enrich our Spanish class, and strategic time management is also required to complete the tasks.
Sometimes students are afraid to make mistakes, other times students do not like to move out of the comfort zone, or the easy activities that provide the textbook. Unfortunately, those protections destroy the creativity and innovation. Project-Based Learning not only attempts to wake-up intrinsic motivation in each student, helping them to discover their passions and connect learning to a personal interest, but also it enhances higher order thinking. This methodology direct students to reflection through research questions, self-assessment, and decision making.
Another difficulty that I have encountered in the application of this methodology is to move students from the interpretative stages to the analytical stages. Many times students need to deal with new vocabulary, verb tenses and grammatical structure and they do not pay attention to the questions, other times they expect to find direct answer from the text. Consequently, constant training in this methodology is necessary to design good projects.
One modification that I introduced in advanced Spanish classes this semester to incorporate this methodology was the substitution of text books for the digital open content. This strategy has been more successful in the Cultural courses than in Literature. In the SPAN305 class (Culture of the Hispanic World), the web was an essential tool that helped students to access visual, oral and print materials, allowing them interpret different ways in which the humanity produce culture. But it was more difficult for the class of SPAN300 (Literature of the Spanish World) not because students were less interested in the exploration of new topics, but because the selection of the readings and videos. The readings and videos were so dense, and we did not have enough time to respond questions or reinterpret the traditional vision of the Hispanic World.
I cannot be discouraged for the problems emerged during the implementation of this methodology, this is a real-life situation that obligates me and my class to be creative and collaborate to redesign the class. After all, this purpose of collaborative and inter-disciplinary experiences that enhance the soft skills, to expose individuals to challenging situations that help them to be part of the solutions. But I am not alone in this project, I have the support of Goshen College colleagues and external Learning Communities.
Here at Goshen College, I am participating in a Learning Community that meets regularly to evaluate teaching strategies and to promote teaching best practices, I had the opportunity to present a Grant Project as a sample of my teaching activity. My learning community evaluate the clarity of the objectives and provided me valuable feedback. This encouraged me to look more challenging activities that promote higher order thinking. Outside GC, I consult virtual communities, academic research and external trainers that help me to re-design my courses. During the summer, I expect to attend to an important seminar that will help me to and to incorporate more measurable instruments in the projects. I am proud that Spanish program is also responding to educational needs of the 21st Century, and very soon will be ready to offer new solutions to the changing need of our students and in the work environment.
- Argelia García Saldívar
Assistant Professor of Spanish at Goshen College
References
Johnson, Holly. “6 soft skills every professional needs” at CareerBuilder.com, 2014, http://www.careerbuilder.com/advice/6-soft-skills-every-professional-needs. Accessed 15 Mar. 2017.
Petrosino, Anthony. Project-based learning Space at Houghton Mifflin’s, 1998, http://college.cengage.com/education/pbl/index.html. Accessed 15 Mar. 2017.