Role Model at Stevensville North Public Library
"We Are Montana in the Classroom" and "SpectrUM" Invited me to be a role model for the science event at the North Public Library located in Stevensville, MT. Together with my colleague, Leora Bar-El (UM Linguistics), I led kids in activities that raised awareness about the nature of language sounds, both in articulation and perception.
Spanish Study abroad stand at the International Week Fair
In April 2017, I organized a stand at the International Fair in order to promote Spanish at UM and the Study Abroad opportunities. I engaged upper-division students of Spanish who helped reach out.
Language and Linguistics Table at Montana Science Fair
On March 27th, 2017 I co-organized the Language and Linguistics table at the Montana Science Fair with my colleagues Irene Appelbaum and Leora Bar-El (UM Linguistics) where hundreds of Middle- and High-School students engaged in activities that raised awareness about the greater cognitive flexibility in bilinguals, the way in which what we see impacts the sounds we perceive, and cool facts about world languages.
Service-learning translation project
In the Fall of 2016, my students of SPNS400: Spanish Applied Linguistics and I engaged in a translation project as a service-learning initiative. We translated into Spanish the welcome package of the Poverello center, a homeless shelter in the city of Missoula, MT. Throughout the process students learned about glossaries and translation challenges as well as collaborative work and community engagement. The pictures below show a visit that we made to the Poverello Center in order to familiarize ourselves with it before engaging in translation work.
Free community day at SpectrUM museum
Offered once per month, spectrUM's free days help ensure that all children in the Missoula (MT) community can experience hands-on enrichment and interact with career and higher education role models. Role models from all academic disciplines are invited to share a hands-on activity in the museum. On June 24th, 2016, with the support from "We Are Montana in the Classroom", I organized a language corner and invited faculty from Linguistics and Spanish with whom I organized games and activities that let children experience language (vowel sounds, Greek letters) and use language creatively (storytelling). Photos of the event are shown below.
Penn State Arts Festival with the Center for Language Science and Bilingualism Matters
In July 2015 I help execute the Penn State Arts Festival. Children learned about languages in the world and made masks that represented the countries where those languages are spoken.