Time goes fast when you're an Erasmus student!

Hello everyone!

It seems to me that winter has come, so my stay in Denmark is going to end very soon :(. Well, I am getting a little bit sad because I have to leave. Now when things are going better and better, when I've got used with people and people've got used with me, in one word when I started to fit into the system I have to leave. It is a kind of pity but this is life...at one point everything ends. The fact that things end at one point is something absolutely normal, but the good part here is the following: each new experience brings into your life many changes both personal and professional level. Having this opportunity of living for 3 months abroad, in a new country, a new culture, my perspective of life has changed. I've gained many knowledge. Some of them are:

- an improvement of English language (it has been a challenge for me to speak only in English and I have to confess that sometimes it was hard and it made me tired but now I am very happy because I can see that mz English has been improved).

- knowledge and methodes of work concerning my study area

- general knowledge about other countries ( Denmark, Hungary, Germany)

But I think that the most important achivements are those in my personal life. I discovered my person more and more, and also my abilities of getting easily adapt to another culture. I didn`t have enough confidence before to think that I am able to go by my own to another country and live there for a long time. But now after 3 months of living in Denmark and trying to assimilate with the culture and also trying to get in touch with Danish people I can say that maybe I become more open to diversity.

My thought that come into my mind now is that it was worth being an Erasmus student in Denmark and I am sure I will never forget this experience. And I am pretty positive that I can built another good experiences from it.

Tak for everything Denmark! :)

St. Severin Skole!!!

Wednesday, 19.11.2008




Hi everybody!



It seems that this period of time is very crowded with activities. Many things are happening for me in this time: visits to danish friends in my spare time, projects for school, etc. This week I have been enjoing my time at school very much. First of all because this week I had a meeting with Bjane, my psychologist teacher. This meeting was very challenging for me because I learnt some methods and tehnics used in cognitive therapy. Another nice event which happened this week was the visit to the biggest school from Haderselv, St. Severin Skole.



I visited the school in company with Judit. We went together to Severin Skole where we met with Lasse, the teacher who took care of us during our visit. The school is very big, around 800 pupils study there. We attended to the ninth and the forth degree on their English and Music classes. In the begining we started with the ninth degree where we presented our power point presentation about our countries. The pupils were curious about our culture and they asked some questions. Especially the girls they were interested in our language. They wanted to know how sound our language therefore they asked us to talk something in romanian and in hungarian. After we finished with the ninth degree we went to the forth degree where we also talked a little bit about our countires. In that class was a girl which is half romanian and she could recognize the food when I was talking about some romanian food. She also can speak some hungarian and Judit changed some words with her in hungarian. The last class was music with Lasse. It was the nicest class because we song some danish songs and they had the possibility to listen a romanian Christmas song and a hungarian song. The children were so enthusiastic because we were there. Judit recorded them while they were singing, they were really cute and funny:).




We spent a whole day in the school from 9:30 until 14:00, but we couldn't realise how the time just flew because was a nice experience being there.

Cooking!!!

Saturday 15.11.2008,

Hello again!

How are you doing? I hope the grey weather doesn't get you sad. On this cold weather is nice to stay home and to have a hygge time, isn't it? Actually, me and Judit have been doing this for a week. In the last week we took part at many hygge breakfasts and dinners. Last Thursday we had a german breakfast cooked by our friend Sarah. To be onest was a really big breakfast with salmon fish, omelette, jam and bread, and we didn't need to have lunch, we were enough filled up. We spent a nice time eating and having a girls disscution:). And I was quite curious to taste a german breakfast.

This time we were served by Sarah, she cooked for us, but on Saturday we cooked for Carsten's uncles some traditional food. They invited us to their house and they've got all the ingredients we needed for our meals.

So we went in Aabenraa on Saturday evening and we had a big romanian-hungarian dinner with Carsten, his parents and his uncles. I cooked cauliflower with mayonnise (made by hand) and garlic as an appetizer and romanian doughnuts as a dessert. I could have the opportunity to taste a delicious hungarian meal prepared by Judit: chicken (prepared in oven with nutmeg) with mashed potatoes and pickled cucumbers. It was a great meal and a great evening. Carsten's family enjoyed our food they really liked it. We ate quite much that evening but we also had timeto talk a little bit about the culture of our counties. And of course we are verry happy that we could show them a part of our cuisine.

Dance and Drama

Hello everyone!

I am coming with news about this wonderful course, because as far as I know I just mention about my first class. Since then many things have happened. On one of the classes we actually played a drama. It all started by looking at an image with a girl. According with the image we were asked to create a story about the girl. On the first picture the girl was a child and we had to put a past behind her. In the second picture the girl was a woman and in this situation we had to create her story between the period when she was a child until the period when she became a woman. After the story was created, we put it in movements and played it. In my opinion all what we've done was to work with our imagination and we did well. It was really nice :).

Another interesting thing, we did was to play a stomp. I have never played stomp before but it was really cool. We enjoyed it a lot. And we also learnt some dances and played at drums.

Let the art speak...

Who thought, when I come to Denmark I will discover my talent of drawing?:) Of course I am joking a little bit because I am not so skilled at this field but I am not bad at drawing like I thought earlier. After the art classes what we had for 2 weeks, I realised that I am able to draw and maybe if I practice more, who knows I could do nice drawings.

Art is a good way to express yourself, your emotions and feelings. It may be easily reflected on your drawings only by combining properly the colors. I like art, everytime I have the chance to see some exhibitions of drawings or paints, to be involved in some art projects or visit art museums, I gladly do these things. For example, this Summer, me and my friend made some earrings from clay, it was my first time when I did something like this. But I enjoyed it a lot working with my imagination, let it free to create. We spent 2 weeks with working on those earrings and when we finished we went to a Mediaeval Festival where we could sell them, of course for a symbolic amount of money, because the purpose of that trip wasn't to do business but to spend a nice time enjoying the mediaeval atmosphere. Although, I was so happy when my earrings were bought by people, it meant that we did a good job, and actually I was proud of me in those moments.

Going back to my art classes, we learnt how to draw a portrait and we were asked to draw our own portrait by sitting in front of the mirror. If I relate this to psychology, it is a good exercise for people to find out their own perception about themselves and also to be aware of their feelings. Again I had a nice sentiment of satisfaction because I had the courage to draw myself even if I haven't done it since I was in primary school. And I was glad about my drawing, it wasn't entirely similar to me but I managed to catch a few features. The following photos will show some of my drawings.

Psychotherapy

Cognitive psychology class

Last time when I met with Bjane I learnt how to lead a cognitive therapy session. Bjane surprised me by telling this: "Ok, now you have to talk to the person who comes and I will just stay, observe and guide you". My thought was: "great, I was waiting for this moment, and now is here...but how I should start, how I should behave, I have never done this before...it's ok, I said to myself, I will handle somehow. Having this thought in my mind I started to focus on what I have to do. And it was good, I think I did a good job because Bjane gave me a positive feedback. Now I need to prepare for the next meeting when I`m again "the psychologist". It was such a nice feeling to be in this position without any diploma, as you all know I haven't graduated yet:). I am proud of the activities I do here, through them I can improve my skills at Cognitive Psychology field.

My birthday in Denmark 04.11.2008

A really nice surprise!!!

Eh eh...another year is gone, it seems like I am getting old:). But this time was different, I've got one year old in Denmark... I think I will remember this day forever just for the simple fact that I didn't spend it in an usual way, in my country surrounded by my old friends or by my family. Now, my new friends, I' ve made since I am here, organized a surprise party for me. Judit was the head of all this, she was so mysterious in the last days before my birthday, that I could have a clue something is going on. She talked to the Germans and to the others friends of us (Carsten, Ovi) and they all came to our flate. Ines and the other girls baked a cake and until they prepared all inside the flat, Sarah invited me for a coffe just to avoid the possibility to get home on that time. Everything was so good planned and they succeeded to surprise me. Was such a good feeling to come home and to find a lot of people, a big cake, candles, wine...

On the evening, Lona, the owner of our flat brought me a birthday Danish cake, so I've got two birthday cakes... lucky me:). And I forgot to mention that my birthday started on Monday evening when Judit cooked a Hungarian meal and we (me, Sarah, Niles and a friend from school) could taste the delicious Hungarian food.

The whole week was so great, a lot of happiness, smiles, and celebration atmosphere surrounded us.

Here ends my nice birthday in Denmark!

Back to school!

Hi everyone!

The first week after autumn holiday just ended. I can say that for me and I think for the other Erasmus students, as well, was nice to come back to college after a long period of time spent it in different schools where we did our practice.
This week I started the program at the College so I met with my Danish colleagues from the Danish psychology class, and the German group. On Tuesday we attended at the Comparative Pedagogics class and we found out more about Danish, German, Hungarian and Romanian educational systems. It was an exchange of pieces of information, which gave us a perspective over other foreign education systems. Also on Wednesday we had the last lesson on weblogs and we were taught how to create labels for our blogs in order to make them look more pretty and organized. Something very interesting happened this week, we started the dance and drama course which takes place in Aabenraa. We enjoyed 2 hours of dancing and playing "icebreaker games" and doing massage to each other. The music was so great and we asked if it could be possibale to have it in the end of this course. Friday came and it seems that we missed the interaction with Danish students by the time we did our practice. Therefore me, Judit, a Romanian guy who we met here and some of the Germans went to "Fridaybar" to have some fun and to make some friends.
This is all for now!
I wish you a good week!

Autumn holiday!

Hi everyone!

Here I am with news from my holiday. I have not written for a while because it was a really busy week for me with full of trips but now I have some reflections and impressions collected and I would like to share them with you. So I started my hoilday with a trip to Copenhagen, which took 3 days from Monday until Wednesday. It was a great trip, we walked a lot through Copenhagen trying to see as many places as we could. We went to the Art Museum, the Rosenborg Castle, the Round Tower (from where we had a beautiful view over the whole city), and of course we couldn't miss the Nyhavn. On Wednesday Judit had her birthday. We started to celebrate her birthday on Tuesday night with a live guitar concert which took place in our hostel, afterwards we went to an English pub where we listened to another guitar concert and the singer sang Happy Birthday to Judit. This was a big surprise for her because she didn't know anything about this and suddenly an unknown person started to sing for her. I can tell that it was also an international night because we met with 3 Erasmus students(one boy and 2 girls). They study in Finland but they are from different parts of Europe; the boy is from England and the girls are from Portugal. They were also on holiday and they came to visit Denmark. I was so glad to met with them especially with the Portugese girls because I could practice a little bit my Spanish and also I could feel more my Erasmus experience;). I enjoyed a lot my time in Copenhagen but my curiosity to see Sweden (which is just for a half an hour by train to Copenhagen) pushed me to buy a ticket and went to Malmo for 40 minutes. Of course I didn't do this crazy think by myself I took my girlfriends with me Judit and Sarah. They had the same desire as I had. And we did it. We went to Malmo, took some photos with the center of the town and turned back to Copenhagen from where we continued our trip to Haderslev. When I arrived to Haderslev, Judit invited me for a dinner and we continued to celebrate her birthday with eating a delicious pizza.

On Thursday we finaly could rest and prepare for Friday when we went to Legoland in Bilund with Charlotte and her family. I had a lot of fun rideing almost all those funny things for children:). And I was also amazed on what I found there, I didn't imagine that people can build so many things from lego.












My week ended with a trip to Legoland. Next, the week end came and I spent it with an half danish and half romanian family which invited us (me an Judit) for a dinner on Saturday and on Sunday as well.I had the opportunity to speak romanian and to meet romanians because also in this week-end a romanian friend moved in Haderslev. So it was a romanian week end in Denmark:).
This was my busy but very nice week!
I wish you a good week!

06-10.10.2008 at Aabenraa...practice

Everything can be possible!!!

Yes, it is true. I have got this positive attitude after I spent a week in Aabenraa at a special school, a school with autistic children in a level of lower function. These children don't have language and sometimes they are aggressive with themselves, they are able to spend a whole day crying and screaming. But in spite of these facts, I saw them working, and taking lessons. How could it be possible? If they can't talk to you. I spoke with the teacher and she told me that she and her colleagues have started to work with them in August when they were very "small", beginners in their development. She said that it was a hard work to get them in this situation when they are able to work and to keep their attention awake for more than 10 minutes. And than she started to explain to me the program which they use in order to teach these children. The name of the program is "Board marker" and it is very useful because this programme is based on pictures. The teachers use only pictures which describe all the activities like the action of feeding, of playing, of working, etc. The pictures are showed by the teachers to the children and in this way they know what they have to do. For example they know that first of all they have to work and after they get reward with games or sweets, mostly with things on which they are interested. Using pictures is more easier for the teachers and for the parents to figure out the needs of their pupils/children. The children have the possibility to express their desires only by showing the pictures which have those meanings. Also they don't need to keep the eye contact if this hurts them because they can understand things without having the eye contact with people who are in contact with them. And they are free to decide when they are prepared to look into your eyes. But the school prepare them in this way by introducing in their schedule swimming lessons, where they are more close to the teachers who hold them and teach them how to swim. And then the relationship between children and teachers becomes more and more close. During the time, they work (do some puzzle, learn the name of animals, etc,) and of course they work separatly, each one in his own corner, they are listening to relaxing music which calm them and can reduce their possible crises.

For me this practice was wery useful, I have learned many new things. I have got a background of working with autistic children but I worked in a different way. And I am very pleased that I could work and experience new things at Aabenraa Fjordskolen .
So this was my story about my practice! (it was a really nice time:)).

Visiting...

Hello again!

What do you think about this title? :) ... is not that serious like the others, I am not doing only serious things in Denmark, I am having fun as well :), visiting beautiful places. The last weekend was really pretty. Me, my flatmate and our buddy went to Flensburg on Friday, we were lucky to have a nice weather, it was sunny all the time. We had a lot of fun, walking on the shopping street surrounded by big white houses which gave a shiny look to the city and gave us a positive feeling. Everyone was on the street because it was a holiday, they celebrated the union of West and East of Germany but unfortunately we didn't find any stores open, only the supermarkets were opened, which wasn't bad at all because we had the opportunity to buy cheap chocolates which we actually did ;).

On Saturday we went to Aalborg and again we were lucky to have a nice weather and we could walk through all the center of Aalborg . We have visited the Uzon Center, a cute building which has got an interesting design, very pretty. I could see the differences regarding the architecture of a big city and the architecture of a small city; the houses are more bigger but their designs have remained like in the old times, we could admire some narrow streets as well. It is a lovely city with an active students life. We saw the students house where they usually have party more often and in a cheaper way. :)

This is all about my trips for the time being! I am looking forward to my Copenhagen trip!:)

30.09.2008 - 01-02-03.10.2008 at Aabenraa

How did I spend the rest of the week in Aabenraa?
I have had a very nice time at Aabenraa to Fjordskolen. I have participated to all the activities that children should do every day at school. For some of the subjects like Danish or maths, the children work by themselves in their room, receiveing help individualy because they are sensitive to noices and they need their own space. But theier schedule is pretty nice, they start the day singing a song or walking in the forest after this they talk about the date of the day, the weather of the day and they also discuss about the activities they did the day before. After they have these discussions they begin to work on subjects like Danish, Maths, English, etc. Once a week they are taught how to cook. First of all the recipe divided in pictures which explains the things that should be made is given to them and after several times of repeating the children can use a normal recipe (without pictures), this being learnt by heart. It is really interesting because they learn to live a normal life, to do normal things. Some of the oldest children from school(15-16 years) are selling inside of school food like bakery cakes made by them, and others which are bought. The aim of this activity is to teach children to use money in order not to have problems in their own life when they go to shop. I noticed that teachers teach the children more how to behave normally (everything being based on practical activities), than delivering information. For me was a good experience to spend a week there because I could see how they work, which are their needs and what the teachers and psychologists should do in order to help them.I also could speak with some of the children who can speak English and I could work with them and play with them as well:). They tried to teach me danish and I could fell their enthusiasm and their emotions during our conversations, they were realy nice. Another good side of this experience is that I was permanentlly in contact with the psychologist of the school, she was doing some tests on pupils, and for one of the pupil I could help her because she was speaking English. But the most important thing was that I had the opportunity to talk with her more about the children from school, about their problemes and as well I found out more information about psychology tests, I have improved my knowledges about tests, about one of them which I didn't hear before. I can say that it was an interesting week because I did nice things, I have met nice people and I heard useful information. In the end of the week on Friday my last day at Fjordskolen I gave them a poster with some pictures and information about Romania, and I wrote the information in Danish in order to understand everyone what I wanted to transmit. And I gave them also some bracelets made by me in the summer, they were surprised and we enjoyed those moments:).
This is all from Fjordskolen! Tomorrow and the days after tomorrow I will go to another school which belongs to Fjordskolen as well but it is a different building with differnt children, more autistic children who are in a level of lower function.

I wish a good week!!!

My practice at Aabenraa

29.09.2008 My practice at Aabenraa

As I said in the last message I will be in Aabenraa at Fjordskolen doing my practice all this week. Today was my first day and it was a long one, I have spent 5 hours at school but I did many interesting things. I find out more information about the children and about the way how teachers work with them and I could also see all these live. The children from the class I am attending are nice, some of them are quite sociable and some of them are less but all were curious about my presence there. I have presented myself in danish, and this brought some smiles on their faces, a very expressive body language, which gave me the feeling that I am welcome in their classroom. During the day I also met the school psychologist and I assisted her while she was testing a pupil and afterwards we talked about different kind of IQ testes used by the Association of Psychologists.
This was my practice day and I can't wait the next one which I hope will bring me and you a lots of smiles :).

Discovering danish education second episode

Diversity vs Education vs Freedom

Hello everyone!

How are you today? Are you enjoying the cultural festival in Haderslev? I think so...;) Ehh I can speak from my own experience that I enjoyed it these days, but I will tell you how in the next episode because now I would like to focus more on the education. And I start talking about my last events I have participate at. Ok then... After I visited Fjordskolen from Aabenraa on Monday and met my psychologist teacher on Tuesday ( information which I gave you in the last episode), on Wednesday I assisted to a presentation held by Isabel, a teacher from Portugal. It was a nice presentation, she spoke about their educational system and while she was speaking I can say that I had the feeling of being home in my country. Why? because I could identify many common features between portuguese educational system and romanian educational system. They have the same structure of education, they use in universities Bologna education system which means only 3 years of university and 2 years of master. Hmm...I am not very proud of this system because I feel like I am runing through all the subjects and I don't have the time to focus on the information that I really need; the rhythm of studing is a little bit fast. It was interesting for me to meet Isabel because she is a clinical psychologist and after she finished her presentation I could have the opportunity to talk to her about this field. She was realy nice and now I can say that I am having an international experience here in Denmark;). On Thursday I went with Judit at school where she is doing the practice and was a nice coincidence to met Isabel there.I had the chance to farewell to her because in the afternoon she was going to Copenhagen and from there to Portugal. It was useful for me to visit that school because it's almost a normal school and now I can see the difference between a special school and a normal school. In my opinion the difference is not that big because I could see freedom in education in each one. In special schools is normal to exist more freedom in education because the children who attend these type of courses learn in another rhythm and they can't be force to do more than they can do or to respect some rules.I think that I was expected to see more authority from teachers in a normal school (maybe because I am used with the romanian educational system which is a little bit different) and it wasan't like this. Teachers are called by their first name and the position of chairs and tables is different becasue they are arranged in a way which allow pupils see one each other and they can easly communicate. It was great to see all these. In my country I have experienced this only at the college, in the others institutes like primary school, gymnasium and highschool things are more formal, the position of chairs and tables is in line which give you the possibility to see only the teacher and the colleague who sit next to you and this can make the communication harder sometimes. And my week ended with the visit at Skolen ved Stadion, a special school, which is located in the back of our college and which looks very pretty. It offers to the children very good conditions.They can have swimming lessons and most of them know how to swim even those affected by some disabilities.I was surprised to see that the school is not a private one and they've got all the equipements and materials they needed.

Discovering danish education system

Hello again!

Did you miss me?:) I hope yes:) because now I come with a different kind of story than you heard in the last message, is about school in Denmark...what do you think? it sounds interesting nuh? yes in fact it is really interesting to do your studies in Denmark. And now comes the question why? I will give you the answer: the education system is really nice because you have the possibility to follow a college without paying anything and also each student receives money in every month for living. This is great because you have all the time in the world to focus on your studies. On the other hand what I have noticed is the majority of practical things which students are doing at school, they learn only those pieces of information they need.

Now, I would like to talk a little bit about me, about what I am doing here. Well, how I have wrote in my profile I am interested in becoming a psihoterapeut and my coordinator, who is a really nice person made a special programme for me and gave me the opportunity to do many practical things than I do in my country. This means that I will go to do my practice in a school with autistic children. I have already been there this week on Monday to meet with the teachers who I will work with. I got to know the town a little bit, as well. Jens, the leader of the school, talked to me more about the activities and the projects which they do in order to involve all the children. He said that this school is a normal school because the pupils study all the subjects which are normaly studied in schools (maths, chemistry, phyisics, German, English).But the difference is on the way of teaching, the teachers have to pay attention on the rhythm of learning of every pupil. I have worked with autistic children for a month in my country but they were more autistic then the pupils from this school because those didn't have language, eye contact and they were agrassive with themselves. And it was a surprise for me that I could talk to them and not in their native language but in English. I attended at English class, it was so interesting because they asked me questions about Romania and actually we had a discussion on Dracula's story and Romanian's lifestyle. It was fantastic to see that they can have a normal life. Of course the work is hard but it worths and the teachers I have met with are so nice, you can see on their eyes the happiness of practicing this job:). I'm looking forward to spend my next week there.
I think it comes the time to finish my story but before I do it I want to say some words about my cognitive therapy class. I am very thankful to my coordinator for this class because my wish is to know more about therapy, about the way of using therapy with clients. And now I can see all these and actually I've got involved in one of my teacher's therapy session this week and for me this means one step in my future career ;).
Ending in a "cognitive style"( cognitive therapy= pozitive thoughts, optimism) I wish you all the best until next time!

First time in denmark - impressions

Yes I am in Denmark for almost 3 weeks now and I can't still believe that I am here, it seems to me a dream but it isn't:). How did I spend my first 3 weeks in Denmark? Well I did more things that I was expected to do. I have visited many places in Denmark: in my first week-end I went to Aarhus with Judit my flatmate; our buddy and his friend arranged this trip and they invited us. It was a nice trip and I liked a lot Aarhus because it reminded me of Venice with those bridges and water canales and I find out that there is the second biggest town (in sizes) after Copenhagen. This was on Saturday but on Friday evening we wanted to know more about how the Danish students are having fun that's way we just went to the Friday bar, (the students's bar because it is placed on the college's yard) where we could find some of the students we've met on classes and it was more easier for us to interact with them;). And we drunk a beer or a øl with them and after this we went to a pub to listen a rock concert. And on Sunday we were too tired to do something and we just slept a lot and we stayed at home, watching tv, drank a cup of tea with biscuits in one word we practised hygge in danish style;). The first week-end ended in this way but it came another one which was full of adventures because we got baptized. Ooo it was really funny all the walk around the lake and the games that we had to play and after the whole walk which was longer than I thought, what came next was actually the purpose of the day. The most funny part of the day was on the way:), we walked and crawled through sticky things and in the end we jumped into a pool with dirty water inside...ya we needed too much energy for that day because after all these, the party was coming. Of course we went to the party and we danced a lot until 3 p.m when we finally came home and rest. Here came the Saturday when " we charged our battery" for the following day when we went to the North Sea and to the German's boarder. I could taste the feeling to be with one foot in Denmark and with the other in Germany. And I was also impressed by the huge beach from North Sea and it was soo nice to sit with the feet in the sea and in the rest of your body to be dressed for the autum with your jacket on:).

During this trip we could know more the germans and we could share our intercultural experience because we were speaking danish, german, english, hungarian an roumanian. I think this is the most beautiful part of this experience you are in contact with so many foreign languages and cultures;).
So a general impresion about Denmark- happy and nice people, everything so well organized, each stone has a history behind, small but cute houses, windmill, remoulade souce(my favorite), a good education system.
I think that's all for today. see you later!
wish you all the best!