Project Workshop’s feedback from the Czech participants (16. 10. 2019) 

 The Project Workshop’s topic corresponded with the main focus of our semestral course about Holocaust in Norwegian literature. We have heard five contributions from professors and the history students of the University of Agder in Kristiansand. All of them were presented very clearly and confidently, with regard to them who began with Norwegian, only one year ago. Besides our Norwegian guests, we heard three presentations of the students of three degrees, bachelor, master and doctor. They invested much time in their speeches as well. It was pleasure to get to know our guests, not only from an academic perspective but also from a personal one. During our evening program on Thursday, we were for example talking about how it is like to study far away from home, what kind of job they’d like to do with their study field, and how their attitude to the language situation in Norway is.

At the beginning, I would like to thank to all of them, who took part on organisation. I think, that it was well prepared and all of us truly enjoyed it. In my point of view was really important, that before discussion were we separated into groups where always was at least one of the magister program students. We could ask them, if we did not understand something and then could we ask more relevant questions. All the presentations were interesting. After this workshop I feel much more comfortable to talk to native speakers, which is quite important.

The workshop was in my opinion quite beneficial in terms of learning more about the Norwegian history and culture, and being able to practice our language skills. What I especially appreciated was how the discussions were handled. Being dealt into groups allowed us to organize our thoughts and discuss them with others. In result, that helped us to think of more meaningful questions. Also the presentations were quite engaging. All of our guests made sure to speak slowly and clearly, which made it much more easier for us to understand. For the next time, I can imagine doing maybe more group work of some sort with the Norwegian students.

I really appreciated the discussions right after the presentations – it was very enriching, everyone came with some interesting points and the idea of working in small groups came in handy. This way we could discuss the topic and change our point of views before coming up with questions, even if some of us might not have caught the idea. Overall, I consider the project very convenient for both sides, glad for being involved and would definitely take part in it anytime in future.

The workshop was very beneficial and all the people were great and thoughtful. The atmosphere of all of it was only the best. About the educative side, it was interesting for me, that I could find out, how much I do not know, how much I do not understand and how much more should I learn. But the topics were interesting and the way how we did participate was ideal for me.