ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
1
DateHoursWhat I DidTotal Hours
2
SUMMER MENTORSHIP HOURS
3
7/12/20143h 30mPracticed consecutive interpretation with simple Spanish audios per mentor's instructions. I recorded myself interpreting the audio and then checked how accurate I had been with a transcript of the audio. My mentor then gave me a book called Interpretation Techniques and Exercises by James Nolan and told me to read two chapters of it. This proved to be a very informative book. I also talked at length with my mentor asking her questions and discussing what a career in interpretation entails.3h 30m
4
7/19/20143h 30mPracticed a kind of simulatneous interpretation, this time with English audios of speeches. Some words of the speeches were muted out, and the task was to talk along with a speech (as if you were interpreting it simultaneously) and use the clues from both the speech and the sentence to fill in the missing word. My mentor said this was a mental agility exercise, and that fillling in missing words that get lost due to the speaker's lack of enunciation or technical difficulties is a vital skill. Today I also did some work with translation. The task was to take a passage of complicated legal text and make it say the same thing but in simple English. This is something legal translators must do all the time.7h
5
8/2/20143h 30mToday I listened to a presentation on the history of simultaneous interpretation and how it became the profession it is today. In trasnlation I attempted to translate a poem from English to Spanish per my mentor's instructions. The goal was to preserve the cohesiveness of the poem despite the different language. Then I observed/listened to other students' translation work on the same poem and also with a legal document.10h 30m
6
8/5/20142h 45mI watched the movie Emperor which was given to me by my mentor. The reason she wanted me to watch this movie was that there is an interpreter in it who gives a good picture of how consecutive interpreting works and of skills that consecutive interpreters must have, such a cultural awareness of their languages.13h 15m
7
8
MENTORSHIP HOURS
9
10/22/20143hThis was the first time I met my mentor, Anne Guzman. She was interpreting for a community budget meeting in Long Beach. We talked for about half an hour before it started and she told me about herself and her interpreting business, and about interpreting in general. Then the meeting started and I listened in to Anne interpreting in Spanish for the one lady who needed it. The meeting lasted for over an hour. Then I helped Anne put away the interpreting equipment (headphones, etc.). 3h
10
10/25/20143h Today I went with my mentor to a Building Healthy Communities event at Stevenson Elementary School in Long Beach. Anne was interpreting for a presentation that went along with the event. Before it started I was able to conduct my second interview with her. Then during the presentation I again listened to her interpreting in headphones, but this time I got to see her do consecutive interpretation as well as the usual simultaneous. During the presentation Anne had to interpret for someone rapping, as well as two videos.6h
11
10/27/20141h 30mI started my second mentorship at the LACOE office with Zully Garcia. I talked to her about what she does with LACOE and how the interpreting and translation department is run. Then I sat in on their interpreter staff meeting and met the other interpreters as well as the director of special ed for LACOE. She oversees them. At the meeting they mostly just talked about how travel time affects their work hours and how they need to record their lunch breaks.7h 30m
12
10/31/20142h 15mWent to the LACOE office. I could not go to Zully's IEP, so I stayed at the office and tried to translate some documents that another interpreter gave me. It was just for practice. That is what I did for two hours. Then I left.9h 45m
13
11/17/20141h 30mI again could not go to a meeting with Zully so I went to the LACOE office for a second time. I continued translating the same documents from last time and corrected one of my translations by comparing it to a Spanish version.11h 15m
14
11/21/20141h 30mFinally went to an IEP meeting where I was able to observe a LACOE interpreter (not Zully). The parent only spoke limited English. I noteced that Betty, the interpreter, used third person when she was interpreting instead of first. 12h 45m
15
12/9/20142h 30mI went to a First 5 LA community meeting in Southeast LA with Anne. I helped her set up and pass out equipment and listened to her interpret. The meeting was held in Spanish but there were a small amount of people who needed English. There was one presentation in English, so then she had to switch to Spanish.15h 15m
16
1/14/20152h 30mThis was a community meeting for Housing Long Beach. I again helped set up equipment and listened to the meeting/Anne interpreting. There was also a Khmer (Cambodian) interpreter there, so I got to listen to them as well.17h 45m
17
1/30/20158hToday Anne and Edna (an interpreter Anne employs) interpreted at an all-day retreat for the leadership team of First Five in Central Long Beach. Anne and Edna switched off interpreting English or Spanish every half hour or so. There was a lot less interpreting from Spanish into Englsih needed at the meeting, so the person doing that got a break. I sat and listened the whole day. One cool thing that happened was that Edna interpreted "brainstorm" as "lluvia de ideas" which literally means "rain of ideas". I thought that was awesome. It was like my EQ answer came to life right in front of me!25h 45m
18
2/4/20151h 20mWent to a tranlation/interpretation workshop/reading group/club at Cal Poly. We talked about why translation is important, some challenges that some with it, and strategies that can be used to ensure that the meaning of the text is preserved in the target language.27h 5m
19
2/7/20153h 30mToday I went to the student orientation for the interpreting program at Cal State Fullerton. Edna was sitting on a panel of interpreters that answered questions about interpreting for the first half of the oreintation. The second half of it was information about the program, how it works, what is expected of students, etc. The panel was awesome and I learned a lot. 30h 35m
20
2/8/20151h 30mI sat in the Spanish-speaking service at my church. I didn't understand a lot of what was being said, but I found it interesting how the songs they sang were the same as the ones we sing in the English service, except that the words were completely different. Does that mean it's a different song? Or the same song with different words?32h 5m
21
2/18/20151h 20mWent to another translation reading group meeting. Professor Tamayo went over the text we were supposed to have attempted to translate and gave some tips for translating. He also talked about interpreting, so I did learn some information relevant to my project. Overall it was a very interesting hour.33h 25m
22
2/26/20155h 30mI sat in on two meetings today, both in Long Beach. The first one, with Edna, was a steering committee meeting for Housing Long Beach. However no one who needed interpretation showed up to the meeting, so Edna never actually did anything. Unfortunately we still had to stay for almost the whole time. Good thing she still got paid. The next meeting was for Best Start with Anne. I just listened to her interpret. It was pretty long and boring, but the food was good.37h 55m
23
3/4/20151h 20mThis was the last translation reading group at Cal Poly for the rest of the quarter. We talked about how films are translated, specifically the example of The Sound of Music. We reviewed what we had talked about throughout the session and ended with a discussion question about translation in general.39h 15m
24
4/20/20153h 15mTonight I met Anne at Starbucks to watch her translate. She told me how she does it and talked about it while she worked. I thought before that translation was not something I would want to persue, but after tonight I may reconsider that.42h 30m
25
5/4/20152h 35mToday Cal Poly hosted a "Translation Slam", which I attended. Two translators had translated the same chapter of a book and during the event they compared their work and talked about the process they went through to translate and why they translated certain things certain ways. 45h 5m
26
4/20/20155hWent to Starbucks with Anne again. This time I brought my computer and was able to try some translations myself. Mine were pretty close to her's! 50h 5m
27
28
29
INDEPENDENT COMPONENT 1 HOURS
30
10/2/20144h 20mWe started out with a mini quiz in Spanish. Then we talked about the letter "y" and classification of words based on their accented syllable. Last, we started watching the movie El Norte. In Chinese we reviewed Lesson 2 vocabulary and dialogue and had a quiz on it.4h 20m
31
10/7/20144h 20mIn Spanish first we reviewed word classification and identification of the tonic vowel, and practiced with some different words. Then we corrected an excerise from last class and watched a little more of El Norte. In Chinese, we did an activity to help us memorize characters and presented the second dialogue, which was about asking someone their nationality.8h 40m
32
10/9/20144h 20mIn Spanish class we first had a little quiz about word classification. Then we talked about how to say and write nationalities in Spanish and also possessive pronouns and adjectives. There was also a presentation on the Spanish major and minor programs at Cal Poly. In Chinese we reviewed the vocablulary we are working on, which is contries and nationalities, and did talked about Chinese culture.13h
33
10/14/20144h 20mSpanish started with a review of nationalities, then we talked about words that change their pronunciation. Then we taked about the past participle in Spanish and were given an activity to do. Then we corrected a textbook exercise and finished class by talking about subjunctive and adjective clauses. In Chinese we went around the room and answered exercises in the textbook, and translated sentences with words and grammar that we are learning. Then we went over the homework from last time.17h 20m
34
10/16/20144h 20mIn Spanish we started with another little quiz. Then we talked about Spanish dipthongs and the present perfect tense. We also went over a textbook exercise about the uses of "por" and "para". Chinese started as usual with a review of characters and vocabulary. Then we got with partners and asked them how their day was using the grammar we are learning.21h 40m
35
10/21/20144h 20mFirst in Spanish we had a short review of dipthongs and accents. Then we talked about the past participle. After that we were introduced to the future tense. Finally, we did a textbook exercise and did a group activity after reading a story out of the textbook. In Chinese we played a character matching game and learned radicals, which are the basic forms of chinese characters.26h
36
10/23/20144h 20mIn Spanish we reviewed for the midterm and talked about the conditional tense. Then we finished El Norte. In Chinese we continued to work on the textbook lesson with new grammar, and we had a vocabulary quiz.30h 20m
37
10/28/20144h 20mToday was our Spanish midterm. That is all we did in class. As usual at the beginning of Chinese we reviewed characters and vocab, and did some oral exercises. Then we did a word search as a class on date and time Chinese characters. We also did some sentense practice from the textbook. We also went over homework from the weekend.34h 40m
38
10/30/20142h 30mSpanish was canceled today. In Chinese, we reviewed the chapter vocab as usual. We did some exercises with the new lesson grammar concepts and new vocab. Then we had a test on Chapter 3 of the textbook, on dates and times in Chinese. That took the rest of the class.37h 10m
39
11/4/20141h 50mIn Spanish we got our medterms back and went over the correct answers together. Then we went over the use of the subjunctive and imperfect tense and corrected our homework worksheet together. Last, we started another movie, Real Women Have Curves. I did not go to Chinese class today.39h
40
11/6/20144h 20mIn Spanish class we stared out with a little quiz on the subjunctive and imperfect tenses. After that we corrected our homework worksheet on the subjunctive. Then we talked about cognates, words that sound similar and mean the same thing in Spanish and English. Finally, our professor gave a little intro about El Salvador before we watched some more of the movie. In Chinese, we reviewed vocab as usual, and reviewed the homework. We also had a vocab test. Then we started the next section of the lesson and acted out the dialogue with a partner.43h 20m
41
11/11/20142h 30mToday was Veterans Day, so there was no Spanish class. In Chinese, our teacher introduced the final project we will be doing with a group. Then she taught the new grammar concepts from the textbook section we are working on, and we did some speaking practice exercises. Then we went over the homework in the workbook. After that we did a Chinese crossword as a class using our vocabulary. Finally, we started a new textbook lesson about visiting friends.45h 50m
42
11/13/20144h 20m Spanish started with us getting our quizes back. Then our professor talked again abour the subjuective tense and when it is used. Then we did a subjunctive grammar worksheet as a class. For the rest of the class we finished the movie Real Women Have Curves. Not much happened in Chinese. We reviewed vocab, went over our workbook exercises, and then continued in the new lesson by reading the textbook dialogue.50h 10m
43
11/18/20144h 20m Spanish started with a review of the subjunctive tense and how it is used in Spanish versus in English. We did another worksheet on it as well. Then we went over the textbook homework and read a story from the textbook. Then the professor discussed the themes of the story and how they relate to Spanish culture. In Chinese we had the opportunity to work on our final projects for one day.54h 30m
44
11/20/20144h 20mIn Spanish class we had a pop quiz on the subjunctive tense. Then we watched two videos, one about the Panama Canal, and one about biodiversity in Central America. We discussed them as a class. After that we did an excercise with partners about cognates. In Chinese we had a vocabulary quiz, and then began a new lesson on visiting friends. We looked at and translated the new dialogue and practiced it with partners. 58h 50m
45
11/25/20144h 20m In Spanish the professor talked about what the final will be on and that we should start thinking about what we will write for our composition. Then we reviewed dipthongs, cognates, and word classification/dividing syllables, In Chinese we did a word search combining all the vocabulary we have learned so far, and then we had another quiz. Then we continued working through our textbook lesson. 63h 10m
46
12/2/20144h 20mIn Spanish we talked about the future conditional tense, reviewed nationalities, and did some group exerciese from the textbook. Then we did a worksheet about the conditional in class and went over it. We were also reminded that the final is coming up and were told how it woud be formatted. In Chinese we went around teh room and answered exerciese about the textbook lesson about food and drinks. We told the people at our tables what our favorite food and drink was in Chinese.67h 30m
47
12/4/20144h 20m In Spanish we had a practice final to get an idea of how we would do on the actual thing. Then we went over homework that was assigned last class and turned it in. We reviewed more about the tenses we have learned and about adjective-noun agreement. In Chinese it was our first day of presenting our final projects. That is all we did the whole class. About half of the groups presented.71h 50m
48
12/9/20144h 20m Today in Spanish we spent the whole class reviewing for the final. People asked questions they needed clarification on and we also did a class evaluation for Cal Poly. In Chinese we finished up the rest of the presentations. That took the whole class.76h 10m
49
12/11/20144h 20m Finals day! The entirety of both classes was dedicated to testing.80h 30m
50
51
INDEPENDENT COMPONENT 2 HOURS
52
2/15/201530mTalked to Ching, my friend who speaks Chinese, about when we could meet. I told her about my Chinese class and some of what I know in Chinese. 30m
53
2/18/20151hToday I met with Ching. I showed her the textbook that was used in my Chinese class and we talked a little so she could figure out what I know already. We basically started continuing with where I had left off in my Chinese textbook.1h 30m
54
2/20/20152hThis evening I volunteered at a food/clothing distribution center that my church runs. I folded clothes that had been donated and was able to converse in Spanish with one of the other workers as well as someone who was receiving clothes.3h 30m
55
3/1/20151h 30mMet with Ching again. We talked about how to talk about things that will happen in the near future in Chinese, like what will happen tomorrow and such. We kept going through my Chinese textbook where I left off in the class. 5h
56
3/7/20152h Watched the movie House of Flying Daggers, which Ching gave me, in Chinese. It was cool to recognize some of what they were saying in the movie without having to look at the subtitles. It was a very good movie.7h
57
3/13/20151h 45mThis afternoon I went to 85 degrees (a Chinese bakery) with Ching. We basically just talked in Chinese and ate Chinese pastries.8h 45m
58
3/20/201536hI went to Mexico for two days with a group from my church. We were at an orphanage in Ensenada hanging out with the kids. We also made them food and taught them how to clean their kitchen. I got to speak a lot of Spanish and experience the culture of Mexico as well. I was proud of myself for being able to understand most of what my team members and the kids said to each other and for being able to respond to them. And I even interpreted for my brother and a non-spanish speaking friend! See March blog post: http://clairendix.blogspot.com/2015/03/mi-viaje-mexico.html 44h 45m
59
4/18/20152hToday I watched Curse of the Golden Flower, another Chinese movie Ching gave me. This one did not have as much plot or dialogue as the first one, but it had a ton of ancient Chinese culture. The movie takes place almost entirely in the palace and is largely focused on relationships within the imperial family, so it was very traditional and a great example of Chinese culture back then, some of which I know is still present in China today.46h 45m
60
4/19/201530mI had my last meeting with Ching today. We talked about the movie and how it ties into Chinese culture today, and about the general theme of Chinese movies in general. All three Chinese movies I have watched in my life have ended very depressingly. Ching agreed that in general they are very meloncholy and dramatic.47h 15m
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100