Enlaces by Eileen W. Glisan; Enlaces by Eileen W. Glisan; Judith L. Shrum; Cuaderno depráctica by Eileen W. Glisan; Judith L. Shrum; Laboratory Tape Program by Eileen W. Glisan;Judith L. Shrum; Teacher's Guide to Authentic Materials by Eileen W. Glisan; Judith L.Shrum; Testing Program by Eileen W. Glisan; Judith L. ShrumReview by: Mary Ellen KiddleThe Modern Language Journal, Vol. 76, No. 4 (Winter, 1992), pp. 577-578Published by: Wiley on behalf of the National Federation of Modern Language Teachers AssociationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/330099 .

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Reviews 577

GLISAN, EILEEN W. & JUDITH L. SHRUM. Enlaces. Boston: Heinle, 1991. Pp. xxii, 330. $31.75, paper & one cassette. S

& JUDITH L. SHRUM. Enlaces. Teacher's annotated ed. Pp. xxii, 330. Paper.

&- JUDITH L. SHRUM. Cuaderno de prdctica. Pp. vi, 138. $25.00, paper. - & JUDITH L. SHRUM. Laboratory Tape Program. Three cassettes.

- & JUDITH L. SHRUM. Teacher's Guide to Authentic Materials. Pp. iv, 62. -- &JUDITH L. SHRUM. Testing Program. Pp. vi, 136. Paper & one cassette.

Authentic materials are the heart and soul of Enlaces, an intermediate-level Spanish program that features realia, readings, and taped selec- tions from throughout the Spanish-speaking world. Authentic materials in and of them- selves, however, do not a good text make. Equally important is the approach to the mate- rials, that is, how the authors guide students through items that, because they are originally directed at native speakers, may well be beyond the immediate comprehension of most stu- dents. Teachers who have been asking "Why don't they come up with a text that reflects the current thinking about teaching reading and listening? Or one that integrates the receptive and productive skills?" can breathe a sigh of relief. Enlaces is their answer.

Each of the book's ten chapters has three ma- jor sections built around various functions and contexts, such as describing family life, narrat- ing events in one's childhood, or asking and answering questions about travel abroad. The Enlace inicial establishes chapter themes and functions in short listening and reading seg- ments. The Enlace principal follows with a cul- tural topic (e.g., Hispanic women in the work- place, la quinceafiera) and the presentation and practice of new vocabulary and grammar. A second set of longer authentic listening and reading segments expands on chapter themes. The culminating section, Enlace de todo, synthe- sizes grammar, vocabulary, and culture in inter- active exercises requiring the use of all four skills. A final round of more challenging au- thentic materials is followed by a brief basic grammar review, ?Necesita repasar un poco?

The authors believe that "students learn to listen and read more effectively by interacting with real language as it is used by native speak-

ers" (Teacher's Guide, p. 1), language that has not been altered or created specifically for teaching a foreign language. To help students develop comprehension strategies, the authors offer a clear plan, firmly rooted in the "reading and listening as process" school. Before each listening and reading segment, students brain- storm, activate previous knowledge, skim and scan, and guess at meanings of words. Post- listening/reading activities include comprehen- sion exercises, vocabulary expansion, debates, and imaginative tasks. The five-stage plans sur- rounding the final set of authentic items are the most complete and, taken with earlier guided activities, should indeed help students transfer reading/listening strategies from L1 to L2 .

Recent research corroborates the effective- ness of the Enlaces approach, particularly with respect to the advantages of a comprehension- based methodology that uses undoctored, au- thentic materials, and to the necessity of pre- paring students carefully to read and listen with more facility. Listening and reading, in turn, are the springboard for the development of the productive skills, and in Enlaces, students always speak about things they have read and write about what they have heard. It is the weaving together of the four skills, with an added dos- age of culture in the everyday world, that both explains the book's title and reveals its integra- tive focus.

Those who favor a proficiency-oriented or communicative approach to teaching will find much to like in Enlaces. Activities are for the most part interesting and creative, featuring in- terviews, dramatizations, and original writing and drawing tasks. Vocabulary and grammar exercises are contextualized and do indeed "progress from pre-communication through guided communication to personalized and more open-ended practice" (Preface, p. xi). Vo- cabulary and grammar are re-entered, and the authors carefully reinforce chapter themes and vocabulary in exercises, grammar examples, and realia. The authentic materials are gener- ally interesting to students and within their realm of experience and knowledge. Although some selections are at a high linguistic level (i + 1), the authors have edited the task, not the text, by creating accessible intermediate- level activities. A workbook/lab manual, with helpful marginal notes to students, successfully reinforces the intentions and content of the main text.

While there is much to praise in the book,

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578 The Modern Language Journal 76 (1992) there are some problems. The vocabulary is at times presented pictorially but most often through questions and answers or thematic grouping of words, and sometimes long phrases in Spanish, with English in italics. Many of the phrases lend themselves to TPR and pic- tures, but many do not. The inexperienced or busy teacher short on preparation time may have trouble managing the great amount of new vocabulary in each chapter, not all of which is practiced.

Secondly, the grammar is skimpy. The au- thors laudably wish to avoid the troubling re- cycling that plagues our profession-forever reteaching the definite article-but there are some vital omissions. Take the formal com- mands and the comparisons. They are reviewed briefly in the optional ?Necesita repasar un poco?, but are not directly provided for elsewhere in the main text. Only the workbook offers a brief mechanical exercise. These grammar points do not necessarily need reteaching at the interme- diate level, but certainly they should be con- sciously used at some point in the year. In addi- tion, some teachers might wish for more pre-communication exercises throughout the book, and others might prefer the lab program to include practice of forms in some interesting way in addition to the authentic radio broad- casts.

Another concern is the use of English in all pre-listening /reading activities. At one point, in the final reading segment of each chapter, three activities in a row are in English, conceiv- ably occupying ten to twenty-five minutes of class time. Students might brainstorm or discuss a previous experience more readily in their na- tive language, but much of the remaining pre- paratory work can be done just as effectively in Spanish, while leaving the door open to En- glish. Occasional embedded translations also appear among the many excellent situational activities, e.g., "You need another pillow. Ask someone to bring you one" (p. 126).

Finally, a personal beef. In the culture vs. Culture debate, surely there is a middle ground between resuscitating the Visigoths and dis- cussing television and the metro. Why not mix in a lively and interesting presentation of twen- tieth-century Hispanic film, art, and music through Pedro Almod6var, Frida Kahlo, and Andr6s Segovia? Students do need to be intel- lectually challenged in language classes and En- laces could push things up a notch or two.

Despite these drawbacks, Enlaces is a good book. It offers a fresh and much-needed ap-

proach to teaching Spanish and should inform and enliven many an intermediate-level class.

MARY ELLEN KIDDLE Boston College

LABARCA, ANGELA & RAQUEL HALTY PFAFF. Convocaci6n de palabras: Lectura y Re- dacci6n. Teacher's ed. Boston: Heinle, 1991. Pp. xxxvii, 294. $24.95, paper.

This second- or third-year college reader is de- signed "to develop writing proficiency and criti- cal thinking through reading and discussion of representative literary texts" (p. v). These twen- tieth-century selections have been chosen from all areas of the Spanish-speaking world, includ- ing the Hispanic community of the United States. Both men and women writers are repre- sented, as well as writers of different ethnic and racial backgrounds. There are short stories, po- etry, drama, excerpts from novels, and a humorous piece. In most cases, the entire work is reproduced. The readings are organized around six broad topics: Familia, Mujeres, De- sencuentros, Indentidad, Sociedad, and Politica. Within each topic there are four or five read- ings graded according to difficulty.

The uniqueness of this reader lies in the vari- ety and abundance of pre-reading and post- reading activities that have been designed to help build cultural, linguistic, and strategic backgrounds for understanding and analyzing a literary text. Accompanying each work are several guided reading tasks, a section of ques- tions dealing with a literary analysis of each text, as well as vocabulary expansion activities. The post-reading section expands and person- alizes the ideas and issues of the text in an effort to make them more relevant to the student. Fi- nally, from four to seven topics for essays or further discussion complete each reading chap- ter. By the time the student has finished work- ing with a literary text, she or he will have dealt both orally and in writing with its ideas, theme, and issues from general, specific, and personal- ized perspectives.

Nearly every selection has a short explana- tion of cultural values and issues related to the text. Each story or poem is glossed, mostly with synonyms or a short explanation, rarely with the English translation. There is no end-of-text

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