Week 9: Personal Blog: 12.04.13 - 19.04.13

Our first day in Oslo

At the weekend I visited Oslo with my friend Lütfullah. We were very lucky to purchase our return flights for a total of 14€ each! I also registered on www.couchsurfing.org which is a website designed for travellers to meet other people who are travelling. I was so excited to go on this trip as I had never visited Norway and I had been told by many other Erasmus students how great an experience couchsurfing is. 

Standing on the Opera's roof

As I explored the website I discovered that there are so many people who are willing to open their homes to complete strangers! Most of them seemed to be motivated by their interest in other people, different cultures and new experiences. These people’s state of mind is reflected in the phrase once said by Fay Weldon; “The freedom of travel opens the mind to unlimited possibilities” (Global seekers, 2013).

The main benefit of couchsurfing is that it enabled us to find a native Norwegian who could ‘host’ us, which means to supply us with somewhere to sleep and show us some of the Norwegian culture.  Thomas or ‘Melby’, was our host, who was an open minded, lively and very funny guy. Unfortunately he had to practice a lot with his punk band that weekend, which prevented him from being able to guide us around, however this did not stop us seeing Oslo! Within the two days we visited many places including the parliament building ‘Stortinget’, The Royal palace park ‘Slottsparken’ and the Opera ‘Opergen’.

The one thing that we were disappointed about was that the Norwegian prices are not very similar to the Polish prices, quite the opposite in fact! We had been warned about this already and had brought sandwiches with us for the first day. We also brought our host, Thomas some beverages over from Poland to thank him for his trouble, which he very much appreciated.

The Royal Palace

Thomas lived in GrØnland, a very central part of Oslo in which Lütfullah felt very at home, as it is known as the ‘multi-cultural melting pot’ which includes a large community of Turkish people. Thankfully, in this area of Oslo, it was a little less expensive therefore we went for dinner in a Turkish restaurant both nights as it was more in our price range than the other restaurants in the centre.

The Parliament Buidling

In general, we found the Norwegian people to be very friendly people, who were happy to help us and give us directions. We also noticed that everyone’s English was almost perfect, even the older generation, which I was especially surprised about.

However, when we arrived back in Poland, we rejoiced in hearing people speaking Polish, even if we didn't understand it, it now somehow seemed familiar to us.

“Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.” (Pratchett, 2005)

References:

Pratchett, T. (2005) ‘A Hat Full of Sky’ Corgi Childrens

Global seekers (2013)  available at: https://twitter.com/Global_Seekers/statuses/215123738897825792 accessed on 18/04/13

Week 8: Cultural Blog 05.04.13- 12.04.13

Lutfullah and Me watching a Turkish football game

As I was making dinner this week my friend Muhammet told me that I have changed a lot since I first arrived here. He told me that at the beginning of Erasmus, for example, when I joined them for a Turkish meal, I seemed a little unsure and awkward. Now, after two months (I still cannot believe it has been that long), I am very at ease and comfortable with my Turkish friends’ culture and rituals. At first I disagreed with him and told him that I had always felt relaxed around them, however when I began to think back to my first week there were certain things that seemed very alien to me.

Turkish Coffee and Turkish Delight

The first time I ate with my Turkish friends they made potatoes and egg, similar to a Spanish Omelette, which I found very normal. However, when we began to eat, I realised they do not use forks to eat with, but bread and had tomatoes and ‘Turkish cheese’ to add to their food. They also did not use individual plates, but ate together from the saucepan in the middle of the table. Now that I have experienced this for a couple of months, I understand that the cultural reason for this is that eating together from the same plate brings the people together. I also discovered that they eat bread with almost everything! During Erasmus I have learnt that there are very important Turkish rituals such as the expression which is used to compliment someone when they have prepared a meal for you, “Eline sağlık”. This literally translates as ‘health to your hand’ and when said, the person replies “Afiyet olsun” which is similar to the French “bon appétit” which means “May there be good appetite”.

My 'Turkish Culture' Teachers

Just as certain idioms and colloquialisms are unique to each language and culture, so are body gestures, as I realised during my first month.  I subsequently discovered that a gesture in one culture may be meaningless or insignificant in another culture or worse may indicate a completely different meaning. I had occasionally thought that my Turkish friends were being dismissive or were disapproving of me as they would often ‘tut’. This had made me very uncomfortable and anxious. Eventually I plucked up the courage to ask why they continued to do this and to tell me what I was doing wrong. They explained that Turkish people often tilt their head upwards while making a ‘tut’ sound to indicate “no”.  I felt a massive sigh of relief once they explained this to me as I finally understood!

It is easy to focus on language barriers when meeting people from different countries however, I never realised how important facial and body gestures can be in communicating information. Unfortunately a lack of knowledge of these gestures can often lead to a miscommunication and sometimes even offending someone.  According to Dörnyei & Thurrell (1994), body and facial gestures are non-linguistic tools that can be used by learners and teachers to overcome communication breakdowns, however for this to work in a multicultural class, teachers must introduce children to these gestures before assuming knowledge, which may often be forgotten about.

References:

Dörnyei, Z. & Thurrell, S. (1994). Strategic competence and how to teach it. ELT Journal, 45, 16-23

NMELRC (2013).  Available at, http://nmelrc.org/documents/Handbooks/TurkishHandbook.pdf accessed on 14/03/13

Week 7: Professional Blog 19.03.13- 05.04.13

The week started off well when Marisa, Brian and I, received our Polish language test results. We were pleasantly surprised when we received a decent mark, the equivalent of a 2:1, in our exam. Polish language is an extremely complicated language to learn, especially as Polish has different ‘Cases’ which influence verbs and nouns. The majority of the people in our Polish language class have already stopped attending class, I assume for this reason. However, I feel that these language classes are very important for our professional development, as last year I encountered two Polish P.1 children who spoke no English in my class in Northern Ireland. As the teacher did not know any Polish, it was very hard for her to communicate properly with the children and furthermore, with their parents.  I hope that, even if I can only remember a little bit of Polish, it will help me with my future teaching in Northern Ireland to avoid this communication problem.

Our Polish Language Class

This week we also had an interesting seminar in ‘Developing teacher’s critical thinking through the educational designing’ on defining educational goals. We discussed the different types of goals in teaching, such as learning intentions and aims, and discussed how these are influenced. We began debating the cultural influence on education and education’s influence on culture awareness.

Zane and I enjoying a glass of wine

In Northern Ireland, even though all schools share the same curriculum, the division between Maintained schools and State schools could influence what children are being taught in a massive way. I started to consider if being taught subjects like religion, geography and history differently could affect a child’s attitude to culture and the different communities in Northern Ireland’s society. This division within the education system in Northern Ireland shows how interrelationships between schools and the communities they are in are so vitally important (GTC 12, 2007). 

This is also made me think about how the teacher's attitudes and opinions can affect how they teach children and the content they teach. It is very difficult to teach with a completely unbiased view, especially if the topic is something close to your heart. However, I feel that it is good for a collection of teachers in a school to collaborate with each other, especially if they have differing opinions, points of view and experiences about a topic, as this will ensure children are given a wide variety of  view points to consider. This will also enable children to have the opportunity to develop their own opinion and appreciate other opinions, developing their 'Thinking Skills and Personal Capabilities' (CCEA,2007).

Poland for Beginners class

In this class we also spoke about different teaching styles and the lecturer encouraged us to teach in an interactive way in which children learn how to live. He told us; “Non scholae, sed vitae discimus” which is a Latin phrase meaning “we do not teach for school but for life”. I became very proud of our Northern Ireland Curriculum, as all the strategies our lecturer was encouraging were within our curriculum, such as the AFL strategies, KWL boards, connected learning and the TS&PC (CCEA, 2007).

The Emergency Supplies Box I received from Home! 

Furthermore, I have realised how valuable the past two years of Teaching Practice has been for my professional development as in comparison with the other Erasmus students (who have not had the opportunity to have teaching practice), Marisa, Brian and I are very knowledgeable about the practicalities of teaching. Even though we may complain about the stressful period of teaching practice, I can now see how it has helped us to build and expand our capabilities as teachers. 

References:

CCEA (2007) available at, http://www.nicurriculum.org.uk/ accessed 15/03/13

GTCNI(2007) available at, http://epublishbyus.com/ebook/ebook?id=10020354#/52 accessed on 15/03/13

Week 6: Cultural Blog 22/03/13 - 29/03/13

Catching up with Mateusz

The Salt Mine Hall

Over the last week I have travelled to many different places, including Toruń, a place famous for Gingerbread and being the birth place of Copernicus.

I also went to visit Krakὀw, which is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. I got in touch with a friend from Krakὀw who I hadn’t seen in a couple of years and he joined my friend, Zane, and I on the tour of the salt mine, which was very impressive, especially the salt mine hall. We also visited the Main Square, some Cathedrals and a synagogue museum, but the place that struck me the most was Shindler’s Factory.

Oskar Shindler was a German spy and a member of the Nazi party who has been credited with saving the lives of over 1,200 Jews during the holocaust, by employing them in his enamelware factories which were in Poland and the Czech Republic. The Shindler’s Factory is a Museum which takes you through the story of the tragedy of the WWII in Poland and how this affected the Polish people. The museum is distributed in many different rooms, with multimedia elements and sound effects which creates a real experience, as you look at photographs, read letters and read the descriptions on the walls.

 As I was walking throughout this museum, I read about the terror people felt, in particular, the fear the Jewish people shared in the Jewish Ghetto. I had chills as I read about the accounts from different people, some from children of 8 years old.

“Even if you hid in the darkest of gates... someone would always see you enter that gate as a Jew and walk out of it as – as who? .. Your Jewishness came out with every anxious move, with every hesitant step, whenever you hunched your back, as if burdened with the yoke of bondage, whenever you gave that look of a baited animal; it was evident in your whole figure, your face, your eyes, all bearing the stamp of the ghetto.”

Gusta Drӓnger, teacher, fighter of the ZOB. (Shindler’s Factory, 2010)

I had always thought about the treatment of the Jewish people in terms of the Holocaust; however the museum showed the influence the treatment of the Jewish people had on the people around them who were not Jewish. It seems that citizens who were non-Jews came across a moral crossroads. 

Some people attempted to rescue their Jewish friends and neighbours from the Nazi death sentence by hiding them and their identity; however they did this at great risk to their own safety. In this situation, everyone was forced to live in secrecy:

“Secrecy, secrecy with every move. Mind everything and everyone. Every fluff may end with tragedy. A moment’s inattention may cost your freedom; it may cost your life” Jacek Sosnowski (Shindler’s Factory, 2010).

Others fell down another path:

 “The war favoured moral decay. The ethical standards applicable before the occupation declined. In return for a bottle of vodka, a bag of sugar or five hundred zlotys, Polish and Jewish informers denounced Jews to the Germans. Some made quite a lot of money on blackmailing Jews in hiding” (Shindler’s Factory, 2010).

Some did nothing:

“First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out--Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out-- Because I was not a Trade Unionist

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out--  Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me--and there was no one left to speak for me.” Martin Niemöller (HMM ,2013)

Liquidation of the Jewish Ghetto

It’s very easy to say what we would have done in this situation, but in reality, we cannot know and therefore we should resist judging the individuals and their choices at this terrible time. This is the message I received from the museum, and I think it’s a very important one, and to learn from the mistakes made to never allow this to be repeated.

References:

HMM, 2013 'Holocaust Encylopedia' available at http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007392 accessed on 30/03/13

Shindler's Factory, 2010 available at http://www.oskarschindlersfactory.com/ accessed on 30/03/13