Classes

I just finished my third week of classes and here's a snippit of what I've been learning:

MONDAYS

9:00am-12:15pm: French Civilization

This class is by far my favorite. Although it's super early on Monday mornings it is so interesting! I have been learning all about the French culture. In the first class, we spent an hour talking about things we thought about France before we arrived. Answers ranged from wine and cheese to smelly people (apparently King Louis 14th only had two baths in his entire life..eww!). My teacher also showed us a map of France and went through every region and told us what they were famous for and where we should visit. Also every week for homework, we have to write a paragraph about something we read in the news about France and then we discuss our findings in class, so that's been very interesting. Did you know that France likes strikes?? And that only 7% of France is unionized? Anyone can go on strike in France. Last week, passengers on a train went on strike and wouldn't show their tickets to the ticket inspector because the train was late. We've also been looking at statistics of France and comparing them to our own countries. Did you know that France consumes more wine than Canada?? (shocking I know!) but I'm pretty sure Canada wins beer consumption!

1:00pm-4:00pm: Essentials of Project Management

I also enjoy this class. We have just been talking a bit about projects and defining what a project is and the difference between project management and business planning. We do a lot of group work where we have to plan a project and go through the steps needed to successfully complete the project. In my first class, we had to go one by one throughout the class saying our names and where we're from, etc. When I said I was from Canada, a girl sitting in front of me turned around and asked me what part. It turns out she went on exchange at Saint Mary's two years ago!! That was so cool! 

5:00pm-8:15pm: International Negotiation

This class has been a lot of fun. We also do a lot of group work in this class. In the first class, we had to use the concepts of game theory for a class exercise. 5 groups went into one classroom, and 5 groups stayed in another classroom. We had to chose an interest rate and write it down on a piece of paper and our prof would take it to the corresponding group in the other classroom -depending on the interest rate our corresponding group in the other classroom chose, depended on how much we gained. After a few rounds, we got to send one person out into the hallway and negotiate with the other group. My group sent me out, so I negotiated with this girl to both chose and interest rate of 5%. I went back to my group and we thought it would be fun to backstab them and chose an interest rate of 6%. I felt bad about it, but when the other group sent us their interest rate, they had tried to backstab us too! Oh mon dieu! This went on for the rest of the game, it was a lot of fun :) Then in class this week, we did another similar exercise except we were negotiating face to face with our corresponding group. We got assigned roles to take on, and my group was supposed to be harsh and direct when negotiating. Apparently our corresponding group was also. When we finally met to negotiate, it got intense. We were fighting and arguing and weren't accomplishing anything, but we tore the other group to shreds eventually. I don't think I've ever been as mean as I had been in the group (and didn't realize I could be as direct as I had been) but it was all role play and there were no harsh feelings afterwards (that I know of hahaha). But yea, fun class.

TUESDAYS

1:00-4:00: People Management and Leadership and Team Building

I think this is my least favorite class but I still enjoy it (most of the time). We've just been talking about a lot of stuff I've already learned and taking lots of personality and leadership tests. We do have to shadow a leader for a day in a group which I think may be fun. My group wants to shadow the Rouen Dragon's Hockey Team's coach. Everyone in my group is from the North and our common interest is Hockey, so we're looking into it.  

WEDNESDAY-SUNDAY: WEEKEND!!!!!