Hi everyone,
This week you will be starting Soliya and you will have your first chat session. A lot of the time will be spent resolving technical issues and understanding how the software works, but don't worry, it gets better!
After your session remember to select, copy and paste the text chat into a word document and then send it to yourself and also to me (francesca.helm@unipd.it).
Also you have to write your diaries and send them as a comment to this post in the blog. Also read each other's diaries and comment to them too if you like, you may have advice to give!
Why write diaries?
It is not sufficient simply to have an experience in order to learn. Without reflecting upon this experience it may quickly be forgotten, or its learning potential lost. It is from the feelings and thoughts emerging from this reflection that generalisations or concepts can be generated. And it is generalisations that allow new situations to be tackled effectively. (Gibbs, 1988, p. 9)
Reflective writing gives you the chance think about what you are doing more deeply and to learn from your experience. Writing your thoughts down makes it easier for you to think about them and make connections between what you are thinking, what you are being taught and what you are doing. Your written reflection will also serve as a source of reference and evidence for your final paper. It will help you understand the journey you have gone through and see the progress you have made.
In your reflection, you could write about:
• what you did,
• what was good and bad about it,
• why you found it good or bad,
• what you found easy or difficult,
• why you found it easy or difficult,
• what you liked about what you did,
• why you felt like that,
• how you might want to follow it up,
• what other people did and why they did it,
• what other information do you need,
• what you are going to do differently in this type of situation next time,
• what steps you are going to take on the basis of what you have learned,
Enjoy!!
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Hello everyone,
RispondiEliminaStarting a new experience such as Soliya's one is just wonderful, not only for the fact that we get to meet new persons but also for the amount of emotions that we feel during the session: seeing our peers,hear them talk, laughing together and exchanging informations about each others life,country,hobbies makes us so close that we almost forgot about the geografical distance that separate each one of us. It seems just normal to imagine that a group of persons are just meeting online to share informations but turning back to the fact and seeing that Sarah had to wake up on 4am to be there from New York, Sadie from her room in Coloroda at 4.30 in the morning,Shereen connecting from a storage room in Cairo and other students from Aman,Palestine and Egypt... made me realize that our differences in time and place,in culture or persons just disappear when we have the will to work together,when we refuse to transform our geografical border into a huge wall, making us strangers the ones to the others.
So on this first session of March 8th, we introduced ourselves,there were two facilitators leading the conversation but unfortunately, time passed away because we were facing tecnological problems: some of us couldn't hear the others, or see them..
There wasn't any difficulty and the conversation was simple and clear.Then before closing the session, we asked about some information for the final project .
They told us that Soliya has collected footage from Al Jazeera & AP covering on the recent conflict in Gaza and our objective will be to explain what led to the escalation of violence in December 08 and explore the role of third parties in the conflict.Then we will be asked to serve as an executive producer of a weekly news-show and will determine how to tell the story of the events, using only the Soliya material.
That's how we finished our first session..we'll be meeting again next monday..so good bye for now!
Ranà
I think Ranà basically said it all!!! :-) The first Soliya session was extremely nice because all the participants were happy to be there, to get to know each other, to laugh and share experiences together, even despite some technical problems. It was quite fascinating for me because I was the only non-Muslim participant in the group (except for the facilitators), and I immediately felt grateful for just being among people who will certainly teach something about their culture and religion. At the beginning, after introducing ourselves, the discussion immediately touched a 'crucial' point: "is it accepted in your culture to live on your own, even if you're not married nor employed?" Well..maybe in the end differences are not as huge as I thought: a girl from Jordan said she'd never be allowed to do that, but - when u think about it - there are also many Italian families in which this trend is not accepted at all, for both cultural and religious reasons. This is, however, one of the aspects I'd like to explore further, and this is the reason why Soliya may help me broad my horizons and see things from a different perspective.
RispondiEliminaMaybe for this reason, or maybe just because the two girls in the session were extremely nice, I aksed them about their Facebook account, and we later "met" on that platform, in a way keeping our conversation open outside the Soliya session. The session in itself was really very engaging, but I was sorry that everything must be over at the end of it: you can't get to know another person if you meet her/him just one hour per week, and that's why we were all happy to become more "intimate" outside the classroom..I do hope this will give us more chances to explore our lives and habits, see differences and common aspects and get familiar with them..till the next online session!
:-) Marta
Finally the Solyia program starts, and for me was an emotional release. During the morning before the session starts, I felt very nervous and excited. First of all for my English level, my speaking skills and my terrible grammar’s mistakes . But also because is my first time speaking online with people from all the world, and I didn’t know how it could be.
RispondiEliminaFortunately the first session was easy for me, I hadn’t any technical problem and the connection was perfect during all the two hours session. On the contrary for many members of the group there were lots of connecting problems, above all as regards the voice or the sound. But two co-facilitator and the technician expert were so kind helping people.
Except these technical problems the session was absolutely great. At the begin all the participants were a little bit shy and embarrassed, but with the help of facilitators and with more time, everything went better. At the end everyone was relaxed and comfortable and speaking was easier and more delightful.
The role of the two co-facilitators was very important to “break the ice”. We started with a little personal presentation and then we did a funny game called “two truths and one lie”. Everyone said two truths and one lie about himself and then the others tried to find out the lie. It was very funny, there were lots of moments where everybody was laughing. In spite of the different cultures, different backgrounds and geographical distances I felt myself near the others, involved in the group: at the same time it was strange and fantastic !!
Finally the facilitators gave us information about the final footage we must prepare and answered our question. The time finished quickly and we were sad to end the session, but luckily one week is short.
Giacomo
I agree with other guys about the First Session of Soliya Project.
RispondiEliminaI was worried like Giacomo during the morning before the first session about my English level & my language skills & I was afraid because I thought that I could have been some technical problem. Instead with regard to the possibility to talk with people from all the world I was very excited and very calm.
The first session was very interesting & exciting!
Though there wasn’t all the participant (3-4 guys was missing), it was a wonderful experience & I think it was a difficult session for some girls (for example Janice was connected from Colorado at the 4:00 AM!).
Amanda & Amany are fantastic facilitators, very friendly & patient, as well as Nihal that was very busy about our connecting problems!
I’m very satisfied because I met people from all the world (Egypt, USA, Israel...) and from all the ages (Brittany is 19 years old while Muhammad is 32 and married!), so I will find several habits & customs (for example Muhammad loves eating pasta & Mousa loves drumming like me!)
In the first session, in addition to the presentations of all the members of the project, we did a game called “7 elements” (we had to write 7 elements that classifies our identity & then we crossed out the 4 elements less important for us… it was very difficult to choose them!) & at the end facilitators presented us the Soliya video project that we have to do in this month, the final reflection paper and… the time is flown!
I look forward to do the second session!
( Expecially thanks to Ranà that helped me in the first session about the connection, hear-microphones & webcam & Marta that helped me at the end of the session about the video project… Girls, you saved me! :) )
Emanuele
Hello everyone!
RispondiEliminaMy Soliya first session started on the 9th of March and it was almost difficult for me. At the beginning I was in trouble as the session started and I wasn’t able to understand the discussion because I had a lot of technical problems: so I wasn’t able to hear and to speak. At last, when I found a solution of my technical problems (after half an hour) the discussion had yet begun and for this reason it was difficult for me to follow it. But after a few minutes I begun to understand.
During this first session we were only five girls and two facilitators. Two of the five girls are from Jordan, one is from Marocco, one is from Colorado. One of the two facilitators is from Egypt and the other one is from Washington D.C..
We started our session introducing ourselves: everyone said to to be very interested to participate to the Soliya to know other people coming from different countries and everyone said to want to know more about different cultures. Facilitators encouraged us to express our thoughts and to share our ideas, and they also explained us how to write down our final reflection paper and to create our video project from video footage. Then everyone tried to explain what they want to get out of Soliya: almost everyone said to want to share their culture and their ideas, but improving our english is the most important purpose we have. Then we made a play that consisted in making three assertions: two of these assertions were true and one was a lie. During this play I tried to provoke (in a good sense) others by saying that “I love my boyfriend, I have a brother and I love Berlusconi”. These were my three assertions and obviously (in my opinion) the third one was a lie. No one knew about our president Berlusconi and only a girl guessed my lie!
I’m very excited to participate to the next session of Soliya beacause I think it will be very interesting for me to learn about other people (their countries, their thoughts, their cultures). In my opinion, Soliya’s project is a great opportunity for us who are studying international politics: first of all we’ll improve our english, we’ll learn to exchange different points of view, we’ll improve our knowledge about international dynamics and overall we’ll improve our knowledege about western and middle east relations (which is a fundamental part of inernational dynamics today). Maybe, exchanging our thoughts, we could find more in common than our governments. I think that, probably, this series of sessions will show that a solution of the international problems will be found only if everyone (as citizen) takes part in the international dynamics.
Elvira.
Maybe for the snowy and windy day, maybe for my worries, maybe for the technical issues, but my first session of Soliya Program was really hard to manage...but so exciting too!!!!!!!
RispondiEliminaIf I had to give a title to my first online meeting, this would be "The awareness' meeting".
The session was difficult, of course, but first of all illuminating.
So what I realized in particular?
First, the computer wants to be my friend but I refuse systematically its friendship.
It loves me, but I'm afraid of its speed so we live in two different worlds: when I enter into its territory it takes revenge against me.
Second, I have to commit myself to improve my level of English.
This is the necessary condition for an exchange of views on sensitive issues such as the dialogue between the West and the Islamic world. Despite the first discussion did not include hot topics, I found it hard to explain my point of view, for example when the facilitators asked the group to put in order of importance categories like religion, pesonality, family, friends, nationality.
Third, Soliya will be a great experience and I felt proud of my choice to take part in this good oportunity to reflect, to know people, to understand other points of views and cultures.
At the beginning I experienced the atmosphere of Orwell's 1984, feeling disarmed and observed by a camera and by unknown people who speak a language that is not my daily one.
Then eveything got better with the help of Casper, the angel-facilitator who led the discussion very well.
My "Soliya-partners" from the USA and Jordan, seem enthusiastic, open-minded and really nice.
Unfortunately 3 members of the group did not come to the first session...but I'm really curious to know them next week!
Silvia