Pick one of your GCSE or ESF Advanced Diploma (other than ToK) subjects. What sorts of ‘knowledge’ and/or ‘truths’ does this subject convey? Reflecting upon your personal experience, how did you acquire your knowledge in this subject? Was it in an experiential, propositional or practical manner? Was it in more than one way? Remember Calvin and his wisdom about rocks.

I think that Spanish is a very unique subject, just like all languages. The reason for this uniqueness is that it is based on simple memorizing what’s given to you, so you can use it to communicate to people in different forms i.e. orally, or by writing etc… As I mentioned above, this is obviously the case in all languages. This in turn makes it a type of practical knowledge, as you rely on teachers and textbooks to teach you everything you need to know about Spanish. However it can also be experiential knowledge, as you can go to Spain for a year or so and you will learn to understand and speak at least basic day-to-day Spanish. I don’t really think it is propositional knowledge, as you can find out facts about Spain and learn from them but to actually learn Spanish as a modern language would be more to do with practical and experiential knowledge.

I have been learning Spanish for 6 years now, and I have never been to Spain so I haven’t directly acquired my knowledge about this subject experientially. What I think counts as experiential knowledge is that I have done listening exams and listening tasks throughout. This is experiential knowledge because by doing the listening exercises, I have become more familiar with the way Spanish people speak i.e. their accent, their speed of speaking etc…I have also watched a Spanish movie or two which again is experiential knowledge as like with the listening tasks, I became more familiar with their way of speaking. All in all, I think I have learnt majority of my Spanish using practical knowledge, as I learnt Spanish from my Spanish teachers I have had throughout my time at KGV, as well as through textbooks.