Bill's mails from DK - A foreign student at DFL's thoughts of Denmark

Bill sat at his desk. A lot has happened since he had arrived to Denmark. He had promised his best friend George to write at least once a week. Two weeks had already gone by and he was trying to sum up what has happened. George was to receive a rapport on what Denmark was like. It had been the plan from the beginning that the two young men were going to Denmark to see how the education for teachers was like in a country so far from home in the United States. But one week before departure George fell seriously ill. The doctors were still searching to find a diagnosis and there were no way George could go abroad any time soon.
Bill started his e-mail to his friend.

“What’s up Geogie boy? Are you missing me?”

Everything is fine in Denmark. The flight went well as you know - although I did lose some of my luggage in the airport. But I got those back yesterday after they had been on a little trip to Egypt and back!
I’ve started in school. People are very nice and open. They do party a lot. I’m doing my best to keep up, but it’s hard, man. There are some heavy badass drinkers in this country. It’s nothing like California. I have already been knocked out twice and carried home. Don’t tell though!

School is different from what we know. You come to classes and think the professors will start teaching but they don’t. They present their ideas for the semester and then the students decide whether they like it or not. If the students don’t like the teacher’s suggestions, they have to come up with something else. I tell you, George, it takes a long time.
Well, after we had decided on WHAT to learn I felt ready and happy that we were moving on. But before the professor could carry on, we also had to decide HOW to learn. You have to think of methods of teaching.
I tried to follow the best I could. It’s a good thing I took Danish lesson before coming. Otherwise I would have been totally lost.
You know me I can’t stop turning things over in my head. I like the way Danes are participating in their education. And on many levels their methods aren’t that far from ours, but on the other hand it couldn’t be further away - can’t put my finger on it right now, but eventually I will.

The family is nice. Kurt and Tove, says hi. They are really sad you didn’t come too. They ask about you a lot. They seem really concerned for you. I attached a photo of them, me and the family dog. I hope you’re getting better and the doctor let you go soon.

Take care and remember to water our ‘Beertree’!! William

Some Danish verbs to practise on:

Erik den Røde – a second storey room

Stormøde eventuelt – Dane use it after lunch, but no one have explained exactly what it means. Maybe they don’t know!


Bill read his mail through once and corrected a few obvious errors and pressed the send button. He was concerned about the health of his friend. Hopefully George would mail him soon with good news. He tried not to think too much about it and push the thoughts away whenever he felt they had taken over in his mind.

George wrote back, but there where no news about his medical state. Apparently the doctor couldn’t agree on a diagnosis. Weeks went on and Bill wrote George every week as he had promised telling him about Denmark and the Danes.

Hi again Georgie

It’s nice to know that you’re feeling better although the doctors still haven’t figured out what is wrong. Tell them not to let you out of sight and do their job properly!!!
With the time it’s taking, it’s good your family has got health insurance!!
Here in Denmark everyone can visit the doctor or stay in the hospital for free. Even people in welfare programmes can be treated for free. It’s wonderland… you don’t have to be careful about your health at all. But on the other hand taxes are sky high. They don’t decide themselves, what to do with their money. The state does.

Maybe that’s why it is legal for kids to smoke and drink. They don’t have to pay in years to come. Well again in our country the government decides when a kid can drink and takes the responsibility away from the parents.

As I told you in my first letter I wanted to find out what it is that makes Denmark dissimilar from the US. Well there are many things, I discovered one major difference in Danish and American mentality.

Here in Denmark they have a term called ‘hygge’. It means something like having a nice time or being cosy. ‘Hyggelig’ is cosiness and it’s reflected in the way they live. They have high morality in some areas, where as things like getting to school and taking responsibility is very hard for them.

I had this one incident where I was at this bar and I promised to look after this pack of cigarettes for a guy. As I sat down I put the cigarettes and my wallet on the table. Then later on I got a bit drunk (as usual) and a bit careless. I promise you I would never have done this in the states, but I somehow left the table. 3 hours later the guy wanted his smokes. I realized my stupid mistake and ran heart pounding back to the table. The cigarettes where gone, BUT MY WALLET WAS STILL THERE!!
People in Denmark don’t steal stuff which is worth too much. They actually steal with a conscience.

I met someone, Laura. I have told you about her before. She is the girl with the annoying boyfriend who always talks politics and hates America. Well, they’re not together anymore – never really got what she saw in the guy. Well, hell Georgie – William is in love.. arg.. She’s amazing. I took her on a date yesterday. She was overwhelmed to be asked on a date. Guys in this country apparently don’t asked women out on dates. They just grab her ass and then see if she likes it. If not they move on to the next. Very romantic!! (ha ha) Well we really had the best time and we’re seeing each other in an hour so I have to move on.

If the Beertree doesn’t start to grow soon, we’ll have to get the Beertree doctor. How is Phil anyway? Does he ever visit? Heard he had something wild going on at Club XXL. Well say hi to every one. Take care and get well!

Bill

Words to work on:

Kanon – a set of rules that would be best to follow

Hyggelig- Living in a plastic bubble not thinking too hard!

English Lesson

Immigrants in Great Britain.

Identity
Citizenship
Britishness

(What makes you Danish?)
What makes a group?

Till next Lesson:
Read Handouts
Make 2 questions for the class.

Handouts given:
"What makes you british?" BBC-Blog
"Short History of Immigration"
Short Story: "My son is a fanatic"

Blogged with Flock

Engelsk 070906

New Media Project.

In class we reviewed our idea for working with our new media project.

We’ll use our Thursdays together mostly for working with the project.

And our time frame is from now till X-mas. We also discussed that we after X-mas can keep working and creating media for posting on the web. And we can invite others to participate. ;-)

Our work will simulate that of a group of editors. All of the class including Ed will be equal participants of the group. The group sets editorial guidelines in terms of aesthetics and ethics.

From this group we form smaller workgroups, which produce the media content for our channel. The group of editors take the responsibility to give the constructive, creative criticism to propel the group in the best possible direction.

Erik will in the beginning take the responsibility with being the technical head and get the technical side of things running.

Ideas:

Media and Education.
Interview different people. Inspired by “60 min” and DR’s “Taskforce”. (Civic Journalism.)

“Gert and Danny on thin ice.”
Learning from each other. Inspired by Bubber og BS. Danny will be challenged with the “wilderness” and Gert will be challenge with performing a song in public. Challenge comedy.

Poetry/video shorts.
Modern poetry in small movie clips. Black comedy, absurd.

Jingles
in audio and small video clips for the school and/or the channel.

Commercials
for the place at the school, with a twist

Podcast
“What is DfL to you?” Interview keypeople, teacher and students. Starting with Thorstein.

Visual docu
about a day in life of a Student at DfL...

Enjoy and please tell me if i got it right :-)
Love and Light
Erik

First lesson of the term.

First day of teaching...
Mr. Ed suggested a plan for the next term:

Tuesdays:
Working with literature and grammar.

Reading new British literature. Concentration on immigrants stories and views on living in Great Britain.
Some also suggested working with literature from other English speaking countries like USA and Australia...
Grammar:
We all need to work with grammar, both from a didactic point of view but also working with our own skills.
Ed says that he finds that the better we are at speaking the language the better teachers we'll be.

Our Thursdays should be spend on more practical and creative work. We talked about making a film with student from a school and make use of the internet and other medias in our work. Mr Rosenberg Media Consult is happy to take on the responsibility to be a consultant on the hole thing.

And a personal note from me :
"I'm looking forward to explore the possibilities I never knew existed and expand my horizon."

- Michelle