The Spanish IV class studies conditional and imperfect subjunctive verb tenses. Spanish IV is the second-highest class in the language that Country Day offers. (Photo by Ming Zhu)

Students play games, watch movies, learn vocabulary in Conversational Spanish Club

At the beginning of October, the Conversational Spanish Club began in Spanish teacher Patricia Portillo’s room with junior Jackson Margolis and senior Tori Van Vleck as co-presidents.

Margolis said he created the club to review his knowledge of Spanish since he has finished all of the school’s Spanish courses.

“I did Spanish IV freshman year, so I knew that I was going to be done with Spanish after sophomore year,” Margolis said.

”I wanted to take the AP Spanish Literature class, but it was canceled this year. I wanted to keep doing Spanish because I don’t want to forget it all.”

According to Margolis, the emphasis of this club is to learn more commonly used phrases and vocabulary in Latin American countries.

“I’ve taken AP Spanish Language and Culture, and that was about the culture of Latin American countries,” Margolis said. “Because we spent so much time learning about culture, we didn’t spend as much time learning vocabulary as I wanted to.”

During club meetings, members participate in a variety of activities, and snacks are provided.

“We watch movies, play board games (and) sometimes play hangman,” Margolis said. “It really depends on what people like.

“And the reason this is called a Conversational Spanish Club is so people can (communicate in Spanish) the whole time,” Margolis said.

Since October, the club has had four meetings.

“It’s never the same group (of people); there are usually around five to six people — kind of small, but hopefully our numbers are growing,” Margolis said.

However, Margolis is stepping down from the position of co-president due to his commitment to the new Fan Club, in which members make posters and prepare festivities for upcoming school events and competitions.

“Because I’m taking on that, I’m still going to go to the club, but I am going to step down and have Tori, who is co-president with me, be in charge of it,” Margolis said.

“For Conversational Spanish Club, the organization part of it is not why I wanted to do the club. I just wanted to practice my Spanish, and I can still do that while organizing the other club.”

Junior Anu Krishnan, who has finished all available Spanish courses, enjoys the club for similar reasons.

“Because I don’t take Spanish anymore, I like that I can keep remembering things,” Krishnan said. “I like to keep practicing, and I think it’s also fun to be immersed in a different culture. Plus, the food is good.”

Krishnan also mentioned that the club is open to everyone, including non-Spanish speakers.

Van Vleck said she doesn’t mind being the only president.

“Sometimes it was hard to coordinate snack, and this way I can just plan on my own,” Van Vleck said.

The last club meeting was a month ago.

“It was hard to organize things lately,” Van Vleck said. “I want to keep it up and do a lot more in the second semester because I (won’t) be as busy as I am now.”

—By Ming Zhu

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