Cultural Encounters

Blog Post#5

Multiculturalism at EMSB

The EMSB welcomes and respects the ethnic and cultural diversity of its student population. It is estimated that more than 50 different cultural groups are represented within the EMSB. Our goal is to foster the successful integration of ethnocultural groups into social life through various means, including the provision of in-service training for staff, and the development of methods for creating learning environments free of prejudice, stereotyping and discrimination.
A "Glossary of Key Terms" in the area of Multicultural Education has been developed and distributed to schools to familiarize administrators, teachers and staff in general with terms such as anti-racist education and heritage languages. A revised 1999 edition of the international calendar, containing the dates of religious and national holidays worldwide, was also prepared and distributed to all schools.

In the office I am working in, there's a calendar with holidays of all religions.

As I had said in one of my earlier blogs ;

My first meeting was better than I expected. The minute I walked through the door I was greeted by the security at the front desk. Then when I met my supervisor and director of the establishment they seemed very intrigued with having a intern. They briefed me on what meetings,conferences I will be attending in the future, and that I will be translating english documents to the french language. Also as a first task, my supervisor sent me a link to the french website where I would search through each tab and look for spelling mistakes and notify them of what I have found. I had also read the school board's newspaper the first day of my internship in which I found quite intriguing in some aspects.

I have used some idioms form my class notes, however I have not used all 5 of them, I'm waiting for the right moment to use them.

 

There have been some complications in my internship, but I will work hard to defeat those problems.

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Inverse Worlds

 Blog Post#4

Interactions in English and what I have learned from them

Communicating through body language is an effective way to get your point across to the person you are talking to also it can help the person correct you by giving the right word you are trying to express. In my internship, I used body language when I was explaining the errors on the french site that I had to correct. Also Speaking with people in your surroundings is a great way to acquire language without a traditional sturctured classroom setting. However, it is possible to feel more stress because your in a work environment and try your best to not make mistakes when confronted by your superior. Some learning strategies that have been effective are " Looking for patterns in a language" and "Using mnemonic techniques". The first one consists of not worrying about the grammar as often and concentrating more on communicating. Meaning, learning a language is best when talking to someone than just reading or trying to remember the correct verb tense. It's all about trial and error. That is the main way of learning or enhancing a language. The next one is thinking or cognates or false-cognates also called "faux-amis" in french, where you make associations of words that sound-alike but do not have the same meaning. For example : Library and Librarie; library means book store and librarie is a synonym for bibliotheque. These two learning strategies in particular have been a significant help during my internship and even in other classes. They are rather more effective than I though in one's daily life. I have taken noticed that I have been using these strategies for my french class, history class, exploration class and even my other english class.

 I have yet to face any challenges regarding languages in a anglophone domaine.  Also I have not learned any new expressions, words or sentence structures. However, I am always eager to learn new things regarding languages, I always have an open mind.


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Diving In

My interaction with the other staff members is very limited due to the fact that I am secluded
in a seperate office. So the most interaction I have gotten is when my supervisor checks the task
that I am working on and asks me how it's going or if there are any questions to the content
of the task. I haven't learned any new expressions, intonations, nor polite language due to the fact
that I am a born anglophone, therefore my vocabulary is pretty diverse compared to a born
francophone.

My observations of the Anglophone culture

Obviously, it's different from a french environment; The way people greet. If it's your first day
at a job, your going to adress your boss as Mr/Mrs, however once you get more aquanted ,
you start using just their first name. Have conversations, talk more about their daily lives, for
example what they did during the weekend. Anglophones have more of a humorous side.
People in the school board make jokes about each other, also some of them have nicknames.
The anglophone community act more like family compared to french environments. They
dress like everyday people, no ones in suits and ties or in women tuxs. The cafeteria has a pretty
normal menu and everyone drinks coffee most of the times.



Recent.

My task was to gather information of Quebec media outlets such as newpapers, radio stations,
tv stations, etc. This task was a formidable task due to it's time span. It was a long task,
I had done some "in home" work due to complications. I spent 10 hours, a total of 2 hours a day working in this task. In the end, it seems it wasn't good enough for my supervisor. He told me that I should've wrote more even though I wrote down 20 different newspaper companies, their assignment editor's name and number. I also compiled a list of over 150 radio stations. None the less, I'll be improving.

I am continuing my previous task. The most important one of my whole internship that will be needed for the press conference in January, that I will be attending. I must research thoroughly. I must put all my communication abilities to the test for this task. Although I am not very fond of speaking on the phone to companies, I will try my best.

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TWITTER

Please Follow ESMB on Twitter

LINKS

@emsb109

https://twitter.com/emsb109

@csem109

https://twitter.com/CSEM109

THANKS ALOT :)

Day 1 (CONT'D) - First Impressions

I entered the building and what mostly caught my sight was the kindness of the staff at EMSB. In terms of linguistic observations, the staff are laid back, they do not focus on grammatical errors, or miss pronunciations when speaking, although they will correct themselves. They do not speak in formal manor frequently, but mostly in informal manor as the normal public.

Which I found very comforting since I will be working with some staff members.

Now in terms of cultural observations, whenever an individual was walking in the hallway passing by one another they always greeted eachother even though if they pass the exact same hallway twice. They seem very immerse in each others space, very caring as if they we're all related as family, which from my experience , people form the NDG district are usually very kind.

ESMB is an anglophone organization, therefore their main language is english, but I have come across some francophones in the hallway. I have not learned any new languages in this establishment as I am already perfectly bilingual in english and french.I have not learned new words, expressions or sentence structures but I am expecting to learn new vocabulary in the future internship days to come. I am anxious to see what formal vocabulary and expressions are used during a meeting and a press conference.

As it is the first day of my internship at ESMB, I have not stumbled across any important misundertandings exept for the two of the tasks I was given which are to update and gather followers for their Twitter, and to update their facebook. Those two tasks had thrown me of edge because I wasn't expecting such a task. As I had said previously, I have not come across any misunderstandings and therefore have not made any mistakes to learn from.




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Day 1

My goals for this internship are to immerse myself in a governmental perspective, meaning getting a base knowledge of what a press conference involving a provincial school board and it's members. Also improving my communication skills in a manor of speaking to high officials, for example when in a press conference it is required to speak formally, also I am required to translate french documents and speak french in certain circumstances in the future, so it shall help me improve my french skills.

The most important language learning strategies that might help me during my internship in this anglophone establishment are using mnemonic techniques meaning thinking of cognates or false-cognates, making associations with the words. Practicing, for when I have my press conference speech. Constant searches for meaning, using internet means to know the definition of a difficult word.

My first meeting was better than I expected. The minute I walked through the door I was greeted by the security at the front desk. Then when I met my supervisor and director of the establishment they seemed very intrigued with having a intern. They briefed me on what meetings,conferences I will be attending in the future, and that I will be translating english documents to the french language. Also as a first task, my supervisor sent me a link to the french website where I would search through each tab and look for spelling mistakes and notify them of what I have found

BeforeHand

My previous expectations before starting where pretty lineant, I expected my supervisor to be as you call

"uptight" and I was concerned about my dress code , if I didn't look professional enough and also I expected my internship to be in the Montreal district but as it turns out its located in NDG, therefore I know it will take time to arrive.

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Internship Location

My internship destination is the English Montreal School Board.

The English Montreal School Board (EMSB) is the largest English public school board in Quebec.

Established on July 1 th 1998, their network consists of  81 schools and centres.

The mission of ESMB :

Is to support its schools and centres in their efforts to educate students within a caring, safe and inclusive learning community. Providing all students with the opportunity to develop their talents and achieve their personal best.

Body Says It All

You walk into the office,
You're ready for anything,
Any question they shhot at you,
You're dress proper and think you got it......
WRONG!?

How so ?

After watching a YouTube, apperently your internship host judges you on your confidence.

CONFIDENCE ?

Yes, confidence.

Confidence is a sign, a signal that lights up in their head

telling them that you're ready.

UWAHHHH

Yes Body language says it all.

So remember keep yourself PUMPED UP and READY to tackle that shyness in you with CONFIDENCE.

CLICK HERE - *Video Link*

Shout Out

Hello,

I'm not really good at writting blogs, but it's better late than never :)

So this is my official first post to my blog "Action in Mtl" where you'll be following me around as I go on dynamic adventures in my anglais en action 1 course through out my semester.

So let's break the ice and learn more about me.