English program and my academic year...

Undoubtedly to handle the English language is a fundamental tool to perform well in academic and professional fields, therefore in this context is extremely important to learn English. On a personal level, learning a second language takes people out of their imprinted mindset and exposes them to the mores and customs of an entirely different group of people. Their view of the world expands beyond blurbs on the nightly news and into a deeper understanding of how other people think. In terms of community, learning a second language will also increase understanding and compassion for other cultures. This becomes a powerful tool in fighting stereotypes and bigotry. Pragmatically, with the advent of the global marketplace, having a second or even third language on a resume is almost a requirement of the job-seeking professional.
Considering this, my experience in English courses of the university in general has been positive, I have improved my skills in speaking, my pronunciation, also I've been able to learn more in terms of vocabulary and grammar, on the other hand, I could share a lot with my peers, which of course enhances the activity. I believe now I can understand better the listening and it is easier for me to elaborate in writing activities.
In this sense, I believe that regardless of subject in question the incorporation and use of technological resources in the activities makes the learning process something much more dynamic and contingent, allowing us to understand better and more easily the contents.
As a self evaluation of my academic year, I think that overall this year has been quite positive, I had a good performance, I got good grades and I had very interesting courses in which I could learn a lot. I'm at a stage in my career that it is very important to begin to define what area of psychology I would like to develop myself, and fortunately I have enough clarity on this, definitely I love the community social psychology.
In conclusion, I think this year has been quite significant in academic terms, I have discovered what is the area of psychology I like most and the themes that interest me to work, these are education, poverty and environmental problems, which are closely related. As I said before I got good results and I learn a lot. Regarding the English program I can say that it was a positive aspect too, a very good experience where I could learn many things.

The faculty facilities...

During the last time there have been many improvements in terms of infrastructure, such as a computer room bigger and with more computers. There are bathrooms on each floor, a cafeteria, a library and two computer rooms, among others. Between the areas for improvement are the number of copies of the books in the library, the absence of an adequate study room, the number of classrooms and the size of the cafetería, which is inadequate for the number of students and staff, also the product prices are high and there is not much variety. I think the first step is to review seriously the situation and put more resources in infrastructure. To solve this situation, I would allocate more resources for materials such as books and online platforms access, also deploy more classrooms or organize better the schedules, expand the cafeteria to make it more comfortable and ideally allow the installation of another to have more options of choice. In my opinion it would create a big impact, making the facilities more comfortable and appropriate, we may have more learning resources, which would undoubtedly enrich our learning process and social interactions. I believe that in general there should be a constant concern for the topic of infrastructure because a quality university requires interest of people and knowledge, but also appropriate technology and facilities. I hope this brief description of the current situation allows you to have an overview of the topic, on the positive side is that although there are plenty of things to improve and there are lots of good ideas to do it, see you soon, greetings!

Friends! :)

Personally, I don’t like to rank my friends because the relationship and bond with each of them is different, however if I should talk about my closest friend, I would talk about my friend Daniela. She is undoubtedly a very special person, whom I admire and love, she is very good, sensitive, reliable, funny, smart and organized, with her I always laugh a lot. I met her about 9 years ago at primary school and we have been friends since then, now both are studying in the same campus so fortunately it is easier to see us.
Generally, I consider myself a very sociable person, but I think for considering someone a true friend I should spend enough time to know, trust and have affection for the person. About making friends online, although I have been able to meet lots of people around the world with similar interests, which I find very entertaining, for me it is necessary to know someone directly so, without a doubt, I prefer to make friends face to face.
I value in a friend, above all, honesty, mutual trust and the possibility to share all kinds of moments and situations. Linked to this, a friend should be reliable, unconditional and sincere mainly. To me friends are for share, in a broad sense, life. I consider myself a good friend or at least I do everything possible to be one. Fortunately, a friend never let me down and if something similar happened I think that person was never a true friend.
It can seem incredible, but I still keep in touch with my childhood friends, even in kindergarten and school, which makes me very happy.

Friends are people who are always there, whose company never bothers, who love you, but above all, who make every moment more enjoyable.

Planet's problems are multiplying

I selected this article because the area of psychology in which I want work is community psychology, which works on issues such as poverty, environmental issues and public politics. It really is not an article itself, but a series of letters to the editor with opinions about the proposals of George Monbiot, one of the best known writers in the environmental movement. Author of ten books on the subject and representative figure of the group People & Planet. Monbiot has been awarded the 500 from the UN for its work on environmental issues. As such, it has earned the cordial hatred of right-wing sectors in the current policy. These letters address the debate around environmental issues, on the one hand some people believe that the main responsibility lies with the richest countries, who through the economic system of production have devastated the planet, others point out that the exponential increase population, especially in poorer countries, has a significant effect in increasing environmental problems. Although this is not an article, as I already noted, I think it offers an interesting discussion and highly relevant considering the current environmental conditions of our planet, a subject on which I also would like to work at the level of policies and communities. The link to the website is http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/30/monbiot-wrong-population-climate-change, I hope you enjoy it.

Pets!

I have a wonderful pet, her name is Osita and she is the most beautiful and crazy dog, she is actually still a puppy. The story of how she came into my life is a very long tale, a friend of my mom found her abandoned in the street and took her home, where everyone welcome her. The problem was that they already had two dogs and space was tight, so they must seek a new home, so the friend of my mom talked to her and invited us to know her, it was really love at first sight, she was a totally sweet puppy. My mom and me took her home, this occurred in mid-January. I like many things about her, she is sweet, crazy, tender, cheerful, funny and she likes to run and jump a lot, without a doubt she is a member of the family. Without her life would be definitely very different because she is a very important and special company to me and my mom, she has a place in our lives and although she is very messy we would feel a great emptiness without her. I do not think it is absolutely necessary to have a pet, but I believe that animals are so genuine and loving beings who can teach us many things and give us constant joy filled moments, so I recommend keeping pets. I think that for children is very positive to have a pet, because it involves assume responsibility for one another and they can play and and also generate new emotional relationships. I would adopt a homeless animal if I had the space in my house to give it adequate living conditions. About the pets abandoned Chaiten I think it was a very sad situation, unfortunately there are not the necessary resources and the security conditions to evacuate them from the city.

Beautiful Santiago :)

Santiago... Well I must say that I love my city, there are many places that I like and they are very special to me. This city may surprise you, because there you can find characteristic spaces of a modern city, but also places of privileged nature. In my opinión there are many beautiful and interesting places to visit, such us the Palacio de la Moneda (Mint Palace), the Plaza de Armas (main square), the cathedral, the Pre-Columbian Art Museum and Casa Colorada are among the most popular sites. The Bellavista Bohemian Neighborhood stands out for its distinguished restaurants, art galleries, pubs and residences dwelled by well-known writers. Other neighborhoods which show off their modern buildings and quiet atmosphere are Las Condes and Providencia. Visiting San Cristóbal hill implies catching a beautiful panoramic sight of the city and touring around the Zoo. I also like Santa Lucía hill, Parque forestal, the Brazil neighborhood, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes and the Lastarria neighborhood, just to mention some places a foreign tourist should visit. What to do? The answer is simple… many things! If you are a food lover in Santiago you will find a variety of exquisite restaurants, although personally I'd recommend the Boulevard Lavaud located in the Yungay neighborhood, this restaurant is decorated with a French style and offers delicious food, without a doubt one of my favorite places. You can go to the movies, to the theater, ride through a park, or if you enjoy winter sports, Valle Nevado, La Parva, Farellones, El Colorado and Lagunillas ski resorts stand very close to the city and have very good accesses to feel poder snow. My top five places are the Quinta Normal is a public park Inside the Quinta Normal you can find the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, the Museo de Historia Natural and the Museo de Ciencia y Tecnología. I also recommend the aforementioned Boulevard Lavaud, the Parque Forestal, the Lastarria neighborhood and the Bellavista neighborhood. Finally, I just want to say… visit Santiago!

Transantiago...

The truth is that, although I often used the previous public transport system, this was not an everyday occurrence and I didn’t travel long distances, that is why I know better the current system, called Transantiago.
First I would like to talk about the positive aspects of the new sistem. In economic terms for users is cheaper than the previous one because in the new system you can perform various combinations and travel long distances by a single ticket. I think the new sistem is more organized, although in some cases the frequency is irregular, creating long waits and traffic jam. Also thanks to the renovation of some machines is less polluting, especially in terms of noise. In my personal case the creation of new routes favored me because now I have more ways to get around, but I don’t forget that for some people the change had a negative effect, because they have to walk far to take the bus. On the negative side I consider that sometimes you have to wait a lot of time for the bus and, as the subway, it is always crowded.
I think, as the first step to improve the current system, I would make a more community planning and design, because they usually think only from experts ignoring who actually use the system. Also, I would implement more buses, routes and regularize the frequencies.
Finally, I consider that the government authorities and the whole society must think about the public transport sistem more seriously, because it is an issue that affects quality of life of people in a very important way.

The music in my mp3 :)

First, I must say I am a music lover, I love music in every way, love listening to music, dancing and singing. Unfortunately I have no talent for playing musical instruments, but also enjoy the art of others. The music covers many topics, so we could write millions of pages about it, but today I want to tell you about the songs in my mp3. Why did I choose this topic? Simply because I feel that these songs can tell a lot about myself and how I see life, these are songs that I like so much and they are with me constantly, for example, when I walk down the street or I am on the subway or I should wait somewhere. In my mp3 I have songs of many different styles and periods, such us The Beatles, Alanis Morissette, The Backstreet Boys, Mariah Carey, Nsync, Pablo Dacal, Kevin Johansen, Jorge Drexler, 31 minutos, Jarabe de Palo, Sarah Mclachlan, Andrés Calamaro, Colbie Caillat, Jason Mraz, Janis Joplin, Jeff Buckley, Holden, Cafeta Cuba, Carla Bruni, Michael Buble, Fito Paez, Katy Perry, Miranda, Yann Tiersen, among others. Generally, I used to listen more music in English, but lately I've been listening to music mostly in Spanish, especially Pablo Dacal, a great Argentine singer, very talented, Kevin Johansen and Jorge Drexler, they have in common soft melodies and very special lyrics, funny, simple and complex at the same time and express thoughts and feelings with which I identify sometimes. No matter what time I always listen to The Backstreet Boys, I assume that I love them and I am a really crazy fan. To finish, I can only say that I couldn’t live without music. See you!

A country I would like to visit...The wonderful Republic of Ireland

One of the countries I would like to visit someday is Ireland, The Republic of Ireland, I am interested in visiting that country because through literature, films and music I have learned something of its culture and landscapes, which I find very fascinating and beautiful, so I would love to be able to be there. I would like to do many activities there, which let me know their art and cultural scene, its heritage and its wonderful landscapes. I would love to know specially Dublin, go to the theater, visit art galleries, enjoy concerts, visit places of historical significance such as castles and monuments, visit national parks to enjoy the beauty of Irish scenery and wonderful wildlife, I would also love to explore some Irish island, and of course eat a traditional Irish breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausage, fruit, cereals, potato cake, tomato, bread and tea, an extremely caloric dish, but I imagine it must be delicious. Finally, I would like to know more deeply the Celtic culture and the diverse cultures that have built the history of Ireland. Moreover, if I had the chance I would like to live some time in Dublin and perform some specialized course in community psychology. I hope I can do all this at some point in my life.

My first term...

Hello everyone! We are back now, talking about new things, but it is also interesting to remember what happened the previous term. What about university? During the first term of 2009 I had six subjects: educational psichology, legal psychology, laboral psychology, clinical psychology, community psychology and english. Without a doubt my favorite subject was community psychology, in which we treated themes as poverty, environmental problems and interculture. In my opinion the most boring subject was laboral psychology, because talking about businesses and recruitment is not very interesting for me.
Last semester, in my free time, wich in general is very limited, I started working voluntarily as coordinator of the educational plan of Un techo para Chile in a rural area of Maipú called La Farfana, where I continued working until now, this experience has been wonderful because it relates to my personal and professional interests.
I also participated in some outdoor activities organized by a women association, these activities includes biodance and meditation, we usually developed these recreative activities in Parque Forestal, a very beautiful place in the centre of Santiago and one of my favorite places of the city.
I think the biggest challenge was to organize my time to respond to my responsibilities, enjoy what I was doing and to spend time with my friends and family.
Sincerely I believe that first term was very positive for me, so I hope this term will be also good.
See you!

My blogging experience

Hello! Here I go again and for last time. Well, first I really enjoyed the activity, I have never done this before and in general it was a very funny experience, I found it interesting to have the opportunity to discuss issues wich interest me as my favorite subject, community psychology, my career and important authors as Michel Focault, among other themes. I think the development of this activity allowed me to improve my level of English, because I should reflect on the issues and be able to present arguments and ideas.
I consider that a very important advantage of this working method is that it provides the possibility of incorporating technology into learning, you can learn vocabulary and expressions while delves into topics of personal interest, it also allows you to interact with classmates through the comments, generating a feedback that enriches the process.
Although I make a positive assessment of the activity, I could point out as a disadvantage of blogging in the English class is the time required for its development, that is related to the need to work on the computer, which in my case, due to vision problems, it is sometimes more difficult. But really I have no negative criticism regarding structural aspects of this methodology of work.
Finally, I would like to say that, in a very special way, I will miss the blogging activity because it was fun to talk about topics that I like, thinking, generating criticism, new ideas and sharing this with others who may also be interested, also through the blogs of my classmates I learnt about them and their own interests which impacts not only on learning of academic content, but on the development of interpersonal relationships.
So, it is time to say good bye, this was nice experience, I hope we will meet in another opportunity without forget what we learnt.

Creativity and Education

Hi everyone!, today I’m going to talk to you about a video from Ken Robinson, considered an expert on creativity. On this video he manifests how interesting education is for him and also the way this topic is deep-rooted in people as a basis for their lives. The most important themes in his approach are the children capacity of innovation and the great talents that many children have. He points out the relevance of creativity and the need to consider it as important as education. Moreover he says children usually are not afraid of being wrong and make a mistake, this idea doesn’t mean creativity is the same as being wrong, what he really means is that if you don’t take the risk probably you will never create something really original. The main theme is that children start losing their capacity of innovation as they grow up, because educational system considers the mistake in a very negative way and punishes it. After that, he talks about a hierarchy of subjects which cross the countries, mathematic and languages, then humanities and in the bottom the arts, but also within the arts there is a hierarchy too, in general music and art have a higher status than drama and dance. Another theme treated by him is the public education wich seems to be focused on generating university professionals who are disembodied and live in their head. Finally, believes that our only hope is to assume a different conception of human ecology to re-establish the conception of the richness of human capacity and rethink the principle in wich the education of our children is based. I think this is a very interesting proposal, so I invite you to internalize in his tought.

My favorite subject =)

Hi everyone! Today I am going to talk to you about my favorite subject this term, this is community psychology. The subject is developed by a group of teachers formed by Germán Rozas, Rodolfo Sapiains and Rodrigo Quiroz. I really like this subject because I am very interested in issues of social conflicts, specially poverty and environmental problems, I also like the community perspective of social processes. This semester I have learnt about perspectives on the discipline, its goals and objectives, forms and general working definitions of community psychology in relation to historical, geographical and sociocultural contexts wich it was developed in. We also treated the concept of community and the evolution of this concept, the sense of community, the types of community, the notion of social practice, the modernity and the construction of social problems in community psychology. Other themes treated were the community mental health approach, the systemic perspective, the strengthening and social change approach, and finally the approach of social capital and citizenship. Some of the most interesting themes for me were poverty, social and urban segregation, social representations, collective memory and its relationship with the community, and the relationship between community psychology and public politics. I invite you to internalize in this interesting branch of psychology, greetings!

Dreaming about my future...

I consider it is funny to think about what I would like to be doing five years from now. Professionally, I would love to work as a communitarian psychologist in issues such as poverty and environmental problems, having direct contact with people everyday and working together to achieve a transformation of social reality. Furthermore, I would like to do some post-graduate course maybe about communitarian interventions, in Chile or abroad. On a personal level, I do not know if I could point out specific expectatives, but overall I would like to continue growing as a person and also working about my spiritual development. I would like to live in an old apartment in the Barrio Bellas Artes, near Parque Forestal, or continue living with my mom, which would be very nice. Finally I would like to continue participating as volunteer of Un techo para Chile, going out with friends, sharing with my family, meeting new people, places and traditions, and enjoying every moment. Dreaming is wonderful, but so is putting all our energies on making those dreams a reality. See you, greetings!

Michel Foucault

I think a very important person for psychology’s field is Michel Foucault, he is not a psychologist but he developed significant contributions considered and used by social psychology, especially in its most critical current and legal psychology. Michel Foucault was a french philosopher, historian, critic and sociologist. He held a chair at the Collège de France with the title “History of Systems of Thought", and also taught at the University of California, Berkeley. Foucault is best known for his critical studies of social institutions, most notably psychiatry, medicine, the human sciences, and the prison system, as well as for his work on the history of human sexuality. Foucault's work on power, and the relationships between power, knowledge, and discourse has been widely discussed. In the 1960s Foucault was often associated with the structuralist movement. Foucault later distanced himself from structuralism. While Foucault was always typically characterized by the post-structuralist and postmodernist labels, he personally rejected the postmodernist and post-structuralist labels, preferring to classify his thought as a critical history of modernity, rooted in Kant. Although Foucault is not defined as a psychologist I consider him the best in thinking about power relations in various fields, and whose principles have been widely used by social psychology in general. I like Foucault because he proposed a new way of understanding knowledge, subjectivity and social structure among others.
I hope you like learning more about him, greetings!

My lovely career

First, I think that it is difficult to imagine a single reason to study psychology, so that there are multiple reasons. I am interested in psychology since I was about 12, basically because I consider it theoretically interesting and it is also possible to understand people and help them in various aspects. Psychologists can help in many areas of society, as in the clinical, educational, forensic, organizational and communitarian areas, mainly integrating their knowledge and using it in relation to the different situations they face. It is difficult to define a unique profile of psychologist, but I believe that some features cross the different branches of psychology. I guess some of these skills are the ability to work in interdisciplinary teams, in situations of crisis, with people of low economic level, ability to work in communitarian programs, ability to write psychological reports, knowledge of empirical research and methodology, to communicate the work by charts, tables and statistics, manage informatic softwares and English language. My favorite subject is communitarian psychology, because I am very interested in issues of social conflicts, specially poverty and environmental problems, I also like the communitarian perspective of social processes. Finally, I invite you to internalize in the different approaches and areas of psychology.

Summer jobs =)

Hi everyone!
Today I will talk to you about a very special photo for me, this photo was took by a Colombian friend called Cristina, while we were participating in summer jobs from Un Techo para Chile last January. This photo was took in a school of Lota, a very beautiful and historical city in the South of Chile. The photo shows the group of volunteers who participated in the jobs, we were from different countries such as Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Panama. I really like this photo because it reminds me this wonderful experience and the lovely moments that I lived. This is a photo full of happiness for me, because I felt really blessed at that time with the people I met, the friendship we developed and what I learned from other people and from me. Finally, I hope that through this photo you will discover a little bit of what this experience meant to me.

Cybertesis: A very useful website!

Hi everyone! Today I will talk to you about a psychology related website and this is http://www.cybertesis.net/ . This portal, developed by the University of Chile, provides an easy accessible tool to full text electronic thesis published in different universities of the world. It is a powerful tool of consultation that allows to make simultaneous searches through a single web interface, and to recuperate thesis texts stored in different servers and university repositories. Each university is responsible for the production, preservation and diffusion of its thesis. The great innovation of this site is the integration of high standards in the production and electronic text transference. I found this webpage searching for information about different psychological topics for several university works. I usually visit this site everytime I'm doing reseach for university or I'm interested in an specific subject about psychology or another social science. I really like it because there is always the information I'm searching for and it offers many possibilities, I definitely recommend it!

My pc =)

Well, I will talk to you about my notebook, the truth is that I don't know too much about technology, but I will try to explain what this object means to me. My mom gave it to me last year, because considering all the university works, the required information, etc., it was a need for me. I use it to surf the net, make research and works for university, talk with friends, download music, search for different types of information and to store documents, photos and music. I use it everyday, usually in the afternoon or at night. I love it because it is very useful for me. I really don't know what I would do without it, because I do my homeworks in it, I got many important archives there and it is very comfortable because I can take it anywhere and work quietly. I hope you will understand what my notebook means to me, see you and take care, bye!

Who I am =)

Hello! As you can see my name is Constanza Biscarra, I'm studying psychology and I'm in my tirth year at Universidad de Chile, about my English level I think I have good writing, reading and speaking skills, but I need to practice listening and learning vocabulary, I hope I'll do it at pre-intermediate level, I like languages in general and I think English is very interesting, so I have positive expectatives about this course. I mean knowing English is a very important ability for professional development either to communicate with other people or to read foreign researches for example. This is a little introduction of who I am, so good bye and I'll see you soon.