International Week for Non-teaching staff 2013

International week participants at Pispalanharju.

TAMK International Week For Non-Teaching Staff ended on Friday the 31st of May and the 34 participants from all over Europe said their goodbyes to Finland, TAMK and new friends. The theme of the week was Intercultural Communication Skills and the programme of the week concentrated on it very effectively.

Finnish-German-French teamwork

The lectures of the week about intercultural communication skills were presented by international coordinator and PhD Ms. Irja Pietilä. During the week programme the guests and TAMK personnel got to study and work together in both theoretical and practical tasks. The group also visited another interesting university at Tampere, the University of Technology.

Irja Pietilä presenting her lecture about intercultural communication

Intense international teamwork during the lecture of Irja Pietilä. Can you find the positive Portuquese João in the picture?

One of the tasks was to draw together as a group, not as easy as it may seem like

A pair of finished group drawings by participants from Finland, France, Czech Republic and Germany. Stunning similarities!

During the programme at TAMK the guests and TAMK participants were divided into seven different Special Interest Groups (SIGs) for example to IT and Library services. During the SIG sessions they compared and shared information, knowledge and experiences of their own fields. Possible future co-operation and projects were also discussed, and hopefully this will be a start or continuation to useful and valuable partnership.

Human resources Special Interest Group discussion

Marketing and Communications SIG sharing information and experiences

After an intense start of the week of working and getting to know each other the participants got to enjoy the recreational parts of the programme as well. Tampere and Finnish culture were also playing a big part in the week programme and the guests got to know a bit about them for example from a sightseeing bus ride in Tampere and in the evening event at restaurant Kaisla located in the harbour Mustalahti. The number one culturally oriented event of the week was nevertheless the day trip to Maisansalo in Teisko, which is located only 30 minutes bus ride from Tampere.

Tuesday evening dinner at the restaurant Kaisla. Great setting and fantastic food!

At Maisansalo the week participants started the day with a lecture from Ms. Pietilä and after it was finished a delicious lunch was served. The lunch consisted of some traditional Finnish dishes, especially the fish dishes were fantastic. After the lunch the group got to try some Finnish summer games like croquet, mölkky and darts. Many visitors also tried nordic walking with our sports specialist from TAMK, Mr. Esko Tirkkonen. Big thanks to Esko for helping with the sports and games, because of him our guests managed to get to know a bit more about the Finnish culture!

TAMK representative Noora Kahra and the guests enjoying a beautiful summer day at Maisansalo

Croquet, a Finnish summer game, also playable in a wheelchair!

Action shot from a Mölkky game.

Most of the guests wanted to try the traditional Finnish smoke sauna offered at Maisansalo, what a nice and exciting atmosphere it was! The regular Finnish sauna also had many users, and the bravest also took a quick swim in the lake even though the temperature of the water was only 12 degrees Celcius. Relaxed smiles in sunshine after the experience were everywhere and the guests would have wanted to stay there for days.

 

A typical Finnish lakeside scenery and swimming after sauna were the favorites of our guests.

Relaxing after sauna

On the final day of the week the guests were asked to summarize what they had learnt about Finland and the topic of intercultural communication skills. The resulting presentations were both funny and full of information and smiling people. Judging from the teams' presentations and guests' feedback it was a really successful week in all aspects! Many thanks to our guests and participating TAMK personnel as well as the organizers and lecturers.

Aww, what a nice message.

A little overview of the week and the experiences of the participants

Summary of our guests' feelings on the last day

Text: Panu Alanko

Photos: Panu Alanko, Noora Kahra & Tuula Härkönen

TAMK's Anna-Liisa Karjalainen and Sari Mettiäinen awarded for their research on E-education in conference in Japan

TAMK's IT designer, Anna-Liisa Karjalainen and Head of Degree Programme, Sari Mettiäinen, were awarded for their research during the e-Case & e-Tech 2013 conference organized in Kitakyushu, Japan. The conference was about the role of technology in different aspects of life and the topic of the award-winning research was "Teachers as Users of New Technology - Experiences of Using Electronic Assessment and Feedback System in Supervision of Clinical Training".

You can read their travel report below:

e-Case & e-Tech 2013 Kitakyushu Japan

We participated in an international conference on 3- 5 April 2013 in Kitakyushu, Japan. The event had more than 400 participants from 20 countries. The conference focused on the role of technology in different fields of life. We participated in e-Education sessions and our presentation was also part of those sessions.

We networked with several participants. We discussed with e.g. Tom Galea, who is the principal of Rosebank College in Australia. We found that Finland and Australia are at approximately the same level in using ICT. Based on a discussion with Japanese Dr Chien-Kuo Li, we found that Facebook is still very popular in Japan and it is also studied from the viewpoint of education. Professor Michael Stoica from Washburn University in Kansas told that use of ICT in education varies a lot in different parts of the United States.

In particular, the studies on game-based learning made us thoughtful as did the presentation on how use of tablets intensifies learning (Yu-Feng Lan and Yu-Feng Jheng, National Formosa University).  Several presentations we heard focused on students’ online discussions. The discussions had been studied from different viewpoints. The presentations did not contain anything outstandingly new education technology pedagogy, and thus according to our conception the same methods are used and studied abroad as in Finland.

 

From left: Anna-Liisa Karjalainen, Sari Mettiäinen, Tom Galea and three other conference visitors from Taiwan

The title of our presentation was “Teachers as Users of New Technology – Experiences of Using Electronic Assessment and Feedback System in Supervision of Clinical Training”. Our research report was rewarded as the best in the e-Education category. The award criteria included e.g. the scientific quality and practical exploitability.

The award was valued, which we noticed immediately when we registered at the conference. People came to congratulate us and wanted to take photos. When our own presentation started, a group of cameramen arrived and we were congratulated once more.

Anna-Liisa Karjalainen (left) and Sari Mettiäinen (middle) receiving the award on April 4th, 2013.

Japanese people seemed very friendly and helpful. Technology is advanced there and we saw in many everyday situations how automation and engineering competence were utilised. There were many skyscrapers in the city but we also managed to see some idyllic peace and old culture of the countryside. We learned to eat with sticks but it was partly thanks to the friendly Japanese as they came to help us hands-on. We came to the conclusion that they do not often see blond people in Kitakyushu as they paid much attention to us. People stopped us in the street and asked where we were from and why we were in Japan. Their first image of Finland was often the cold climate, some immediately remembered Nokia, Angry Birds were not as familiar in Kitakyushu as we assumed. Marimekko and the Moomin characters were well-known in Japan and the products were available in some shops.

On the terrace of a traditional wooden Japanese house. Kokura Castle and a Japanese garden in the background.

We both think the trip was successful. Our presentation was enriched by a Youtube video we had made in advance. In the video, Senior Lecturer Eija-Riitta Alho told about her experiences of using e-Taitava in supervision of clinical training. In our opinion, our presentation went well, and the listeners were so interested in use of mobile technology in supervision of clinical training that they even made us questions and asked the contact information for the software supplier. We received several contacts and had the chance to tell about Finland and TAMK to our colleagues from many different parts of the world.

Text and photos: Anna-Liisa Karjalainen and Sari Mettiäinen

Hague University of Applied Sciences: It is possible to feel comfortable there

Travel broadens – and especially visiting a university of applied sciences abroad. My first study trip to Holland made it possible to visit the main campus of The Hague University of Applied Sciences. The building impressed even if we only saw a fraction of it.

The ten-year-old campus building is located right at the centre of Hague. According to the staff, it is one of the most magnificent buildings in Holland.

I can’t deny that it stands out from the rest. The clean courtyard area and the round shape of the building make the first impression. Inside the building, the first eye-catchers are the glass roof and the terraces surrounding the light atrium. A couple of steps ahead reveal many interesting details: colours, shapes, spaces, sculptures, paintings, photos.

And people. More than 20 000 thousand people visit the campus daily, in the atrium and terraces people come and go to and from many directions all the time. But it does not feel crowded, groups are sitting here and there, and the atmosphere is convivial. The visitor tries to see what people are eating at the cafeteria. Next time I will also visit the campus shop and the library …

You can also visit the building on a virtual tour.

Text and photos: Leena Stenman, Head of Communications Services, TAMK

TAMK staff members learned new intercultural communication skills

For the last session participants brought some items reflecting 

their learning process of intercultural communication.

In the end of spring semester TAMK organized a course of Intercultural Communication to TAMK staff members working in multicultural environment.  The participants of the course were from all around TAMK: teachers from different fields and people from Research & Development, Admission office, International Services, etc. 

The objective of the course was to focus on how people from diverse cultures and with different communication styles come together to work and communicate with each other. 

The class room was full of vibrant discussions about participants’ own experiences. The teacher of the course, Dr. Irja Pietilä was giving small exercises, leading the conversation and explaining the main theories of the Intercultural Communication.

To me personally, the most valuable thing during the course was to share experiences and to understand them in the theoretical context.  I got some useful tools to process and to understand the situations that I’m facing in my work. 

The main topics of the course were the intercultural awareness, interaction, factors influencing intercultural communication situations and adaptation. Deeper understanding of these kinds of subjects is really important when working in a multicultural environment, like TAMK is. 

Text and photo: Kaisa Merilahti, International Services