1. Language course at the students' level. 4 credits. Students will take a language course for 4 weeks (weeks 2-5 of the semester), 15 hours per week, at the UBA's Centro Universitario de Idiomas (CUI: University Language Center). The courses include cultural excursions that are then linked into classroom activities (hooray for field trips!).
2. History and Society of Argentina. 4 credits. Students will take a team-taught course coordinated with TicketEdu. The professors are ones with which TicketEdu has worked successfully in the past and one is a contact through an ILC professor ( Profesora Joanna Bartow). The course's purpose is to approach the following broad questions: to what extent does Argentina's history reflect that of the rest of Latin America and how does it diverge?; what is Argentina's official history and what is its unofficial history?; who have been the main actors in these two histories?; what has been the United States' role in Argentina's geopolitics? The course will also have a component taught at the Intercultural Institute during a week in Mendoza, where the guiding questions above will relate specifically to the economy and culture of the Cuyo region (where Mendoza lies). The course will lean heavily toward history and the social sciences, but will also address the cultural areas each student is exploring in her research project.
3. Research Methodology and Project. 4 credits. The director of TicketEdu, Claudia Oxman, has experience in teaching research methodologies, particularly in the use of the interview. She will teach the methodology classes and direct the students' independent projects, to be presented at the end of the semester.
4. Writing workshop. 2 credits. This workshop supports the other courses, and particularly the research project's evolution. It combines lessons on writing with individualized work with each student (and I need lots of work).
5. Experiential Learning. 2 credits. This will be participation in a theatre workshop for one student, and in a volunteer activity for the other, based on their research and personal interests. They will prepare written reflection that integrates the experience with other coursework.
SO thats 16 credits! Excellent. Thats the same amount that we received at ICADS.
Also; I'm the student doing the theatre workshop..... I'm excited, but a little worried... I'm not sure why.
....................................
An e-mail from Claudia I received on July 13th about my host family: ( *my comments in parenthesis are NOT direct translations)
Tu casa de familia queda en el barrio de Palermo ( I was reading my Lonely Planet: Argentina... apparently this is a pretty good neighborhood), a muy pocas cuadras del Jardín Botánico y del Jardín Zoológico. Aquí abajo te adjunto el enlace para que vayas iniciándote en los nombres de las calles del que será tu barrio.
Tu mamá de casa de familia se llama Susana Jiménez (This is my Host Mom). Ella es psicóloga y tiene tres hijos varones, ya mayores (She is a psychologist and has three sons). El menor hace poquito se fue de la casa familiar, pero todos vienen seguido a visitar a su madre (A little while ago the youngest moved out...but all sons come and visit their mom). Es una persona muy amable y coqueta: le encanta estar bien arreglada (She is a very nice person and flirtatious- she likes to be well put together). Cualquier regalo que quieras hacerle va a ser bien recibido (I'd asked Claudia about appropriate gifts in a previous e-mail) . A mí particularmente me parece que es bueno que las familias sepan de dónde vienen los estudiantes: un librito con fotos de Maryland, un calendario, un jarrito (mug) con el escudo de la universidad son objetos que no pueden encontrarse en ningún lugar más que de donde venís ( basically they'll be gracious about anything but they most enjoy gifts that indicate where a person is from- something one couldn't find any where else in the world other that where your from) . También podés pensar en algo más personal, como algo de vestir, como un pañuelo, pero ahí como los gustos personales son tan poco previsibles, no estoy tan segura. Chocolates también son una excelente alternativa (¡aquí los Reese's no existen!). So, a gift could also be something a little more personal but people have very specific tastes in Argentina.... haha, I think I will give her the scarf I made last December in TX... it is called an opera Scarf.... I got a lot of compliments/ comments about it as I was knitting from women on the plane ride home to Maryland. I figure Susana Jiménez might like it too! Maybe I'll wait to give her my gift- and figure out what her Style is like... I'm going to go to the Historic St. Mary's City gift shop on Monday and get some cool 17th century soap... and maybe a mug. Also, I'm definately going to take some Reese's Piecies... in case you didn't catch that very last line... it says (¡aquí los Reese's no existen!) "Reese's do not exist here!"
Alright so I apologize to all of you who do not enjoy bi-lingual literature (haha, not that anything above is even close to literature) but I think it is cool for people to see two languages mashed together- it exposes them to another world that they may not otherwise peer into voluntarily .... how very sneaky of me.
I should probably start packing one of these days... since I leave on Wednesday. . . I was pretty sick today so I didn't get anything done and tomorrow is TEACHER DAY at Staples so I'm going to go stand outside of the door with my mom so we can beat the stampede... or be part of the stampede. You know those So.MD. teachers- their vicious.... like in that book " teacher from the black lagoon," needless to say Staples will be an adventure... in the suburban safari... with neon highlighters AKA poison frogs and massive piles of college ruled notebooks AKA the rainforest formally known to be extremely tall trees...
now hows that for stream of consciousness writing?
¡nos hablaremos mas tarde!
1 comment:
Molly gates, off on another world-wind adventure! Enjoy
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