7001AAD TPD by

LO1. Intercultural and transnational communication

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 15:34:32 UTC

Creating cross-cultural learning for students is very important. With the epidemic having less of an impact on people's lives and parents placing a high value on quality education, the number of students taking part in study abroad programs is gradually returning to normal and even increasing year on year. Some schools are even making it an educational indicator for the school.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:16:14 UTC

Many Chinese universities offer international cooperation programs such as '2+2' and '3+1', which allow students to obtain two undergraduate degrees at the same time. I believe that the efforts of these institutions to internationalize are effective, but it is questionable whether students can achieve the goal of improving intercultural competence simply by having the experience of studying abroad.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:19:32 UTC

The experience of international students suggests that most international students have limited interaction with UK students and spend most of their time with their own citizens or other international students. Many domestic students distance themselves from international students because they already have their own social circles plus cultural differences that prevent them from communicating much with international students. We need to focus on the intended learning outcomes of the study abroad experience; active participation in community service, civic engagement and internship opportunities abroad will integrate an atmosphere of intercultural communication skills into campus life.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:21:48 UTC

Therefore, how to develop intercultural communication skills requires not only a more rational curriculum in schools, but also active participation by students, as studying abroad can only develop intercultural communication skills when students interact with local people. It is therefore not enough to simply study or work abroad; cultural immersion is important.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:23:24 UTC

So, how can global communication be enhanced? Firstly, language learning may not be enough to improve intercultural communication skills. In my opinion, without language learning, we simply cannot master transnational communication because our mother tongue is not English. Language is often perceived as a barrier that slows down communication between people from different countries, thus hindering academic success and social integration, which is why many professors believe that international students are reluctant to interact and are afraid to communicate with their teachers when they first come to study in the UK, firstly because of the fear of the unknown, secondly because of the fear of not expressing themselves clearly, and finally because of the fear of other people's opinions. This leads to a vicious circle of boredom at the beginning.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:25:27 UTC

However, with time and the help of my teachers, I began to adapt to the learning life here, which has far-reaching implications in terms of building up my professional knowledge and communicating with my colleagues in the future. The concept of English as the first international language has become deeply rooted in people's minds due to the continuous development of international English. It is also an essential skill for social and professional communication. Therefore, acquiring bilingualism is particularly important in global communication.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:27:13 UTC

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:29:22 UTC

Cultural understanding is developed through education and international experience, which contributes to the development of knowledge, skills and mindsets, developing and encouraging greater contact with culturally diverse others. Our major has many practical courses, not just theoretical ones, which allows us to spend more time communicating and working with each other and learning about each other's cultures, food and festivals.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:31:23 UTC

When we eat with our Indian classmates, we learn that they do not eat pork or beef. This is the experience that cross-cultural communication gives us, so much so that we do not touch the taboos of others in future collaborations or exchanges. Cultural identity and the reduction of prejudice are therefore qualities that must be possessed and also contribute to the development of global communication.

LO2. Professional development

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:33:04 UTC

For professional development, in the field of product design, I have learned the use of Solidworks, a modeling software, and some other professional skills in the UK. Although I have not yet fully mastered it, this learning has not limited me to using one software for design. It has given me more choices on the way to design in the future and can better meet the needs of users.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:37:45 UTC

Secondly, I have my own hands-on skills and practical skills. The product design major has taught us many modeling classes and some product process flows, which gradually made me become a student with strong hands-on skills, rather than just talking on paper. In the future, I will be involved in landing projects, so these skills are very helpful for the development of my major.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:39:51 UTC

In terms of cross-cultural communication, at the beginning of the semester, I thought it was difficult for me to communicate with other international students because I couldn't adapt to the new environment and the atmosphere of all English communication. However, as I was forced to practice English, I gradually became accustomed to it. However, it also exercised my adaptability and enabled me to survive in any city or country.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:41:18 UTC

We have learned about the lifestyles of students from different countries, and we have shared a sense of respect for their cultures and habits. Over time, we have developed our empathy, which may affect my future design philosophy. I can design for people from different countries, religions, and beliefs.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:42:17 UTC

In terms of cooperation, I believe this is the most important part of my future work or entrepreneurship. Due to language barriers at the beginning, I often do not do group management and summary work, and generally wait for others to assign tasks to me. I think this is very passive. In professional classes, the professor will divide us into different groups, and each group member may be different. We discuss, learn, exchange ideas, and evaluate each other together.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:43:54 UTC

In the 7006 module, the professor divided everyone into different groups. This is a team in strictly speaking. We discussed and cooperated to complete the Bugatti design project, which was a milestone challenge for me. This is the first time I have worked with people from different countries, and also the first design project I completed in a foreign country. In terms of planning, professors will require us to make a schedule for our own projects to help us carry out our design ideas correctly. We mainly focus on early research to understand the needs of users, so that the entire project can be organized. These experiences are the epitome of future career work, and they are also laying the groundwork for career planning.

LO3. Leadership and motivation

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:45:39 UTC

Leadership and motivation play an important role in the development of your career. As a design major, teamwork is extremely frequent, so it is necessary to understand the theory and practice of leadership and motivation. In theory, there were initially assumptions that leaders were born, but they only had similar characteristics such as integrity, self-confidence, and so on. Therefore, we need to choose leaders based on our own types.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:46:48 UTC

On the other hand, motivation. Different leadership styles can bring different feelings to us. Friendly leadership can make employees feel happy and create harmony and loyalty; Democratic leadership will make employees more free; Visionary leaders enable employees to envision their future vision. But without exception, they will help us achieve a sense of satisfaction, which will always inspire us to progress when our needs are met.

TASK 1

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:47:32 UTC

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:48:29 UTC

In practice, leaders need to establish trust with their employees. They must be honest and reliable, act with integrity, have lofty aspirations, maintain communication, and share information in order to lead a group. Not only this way of recognizing and rewarding employees can also meet the needs of people at different levels.

TASK 2

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:50:59 UTC

TASK 3

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:51:09 UTC

Reflection

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:51:28 UTC

In this module, I chosen 6 different courses: approaches to communication, team dynamics, on becoming a transnational professional, understanding large and complex organizations, the owner/managed business environment, leadership and motivation. After these courses, we shared and evaluated our analysis of this module with my teammates. So I will use Gibbs model to reflect this module.

Description

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:58:23 UTC

When I first chose the course, the content of the course interested me in the section on professional skills development as it would help me in my future career, the section on intercultural communication because I had previously taken Pre-sessional English Course, and finally the section on leadership, which gave me an insight into the benefits that different leadership styles bring.

Feelings

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 16:58:56 UTC

I think this module will have a big impact on whether we will become intercultural people in the future. Every time we interact with students from different countries and cultures in class, it is a way of learning about intercultural communication.

Evaluation

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 17:00:11 UTC

My strengths are that I am a good listener and summariser and that I can find creative ideas in group discussions, but my weaknesses are that I rarely speak up and I feel uncomfortable when I start to interact with students from different cultures.

Analysis

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 17:01:03 UTC

So why this happened was partly because of my own introverted personality and partly because I am not a native English speaker and did not feel comfortable communicating in English at first.Then my strengths feel related to my major, as in my major classes I often have to do brainstorming and come up with as many ideas as possible in a very short time.

Conclusion

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 17:01:50 UTC

Throughout the course I have learnt about the importance of intercultural communication, the importance of cultural inclusion and the importance of English. Teamwork is essential in learning and in my future work, how to play a role in a team and motivate group members.

Action Plan

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 17:02:12 UTC

After graduation, I plan to return to China to work first, because it is difficult to find internship opportunities in the United Kingdom. However, due to China's policy of "zero COVID-19", many companies have started to lay off staff due to the impact of the epidemic, which is not so friendly to new graduates, so it is difficult to enter a more famous product design company, but as a person interested in engaging in product design, I believe that combining practical experience with advanced academic training is crucial to achieving my goals. This will be very helpful for my future career.

Deeksha‘s draft of LO1

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 20:41:42 UTC

The author of the article focuses more on team design and teamwork, and as a designer he is able to assign work to each project with great care and attention to detail, and how to get valuable input from others in teamwork.

Bobbiya's draft of LO1

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 20:43:19 UTC

He is able to put himself in the shoes of a leader to show us that as a creative director we need not only to be professional and competent in design, but also to be able to communicate cross-culturally in different studios and agencies, to be responsible for team management and design solutions.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:04:29 UTC

He also touches on how to set up a quality business, something that was not considered in my article. The language style throughout the draft is concise and more about identifying and thinking as a team leader and assessing the challenges ahead, putting oneself in the shoes of a designer who can appreciate different cultural contexts and thus prevent cultural misunderstandings. This is something I hadn't thought about or where I was lacking,

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:05:12 UTC

because I probably didn't have a clear goal of where I wanted to be in my future career, whether I would have a studio, whether I would have a team, whether I would create a company or not, and it also has to do with my personality, because I'm afraid of communication, so I lack the ability to communicate across cultures, which is why I can't think from a leader's point of view. That's why I can't think from a leader's point of view, because my profession is product design and I sometimes prefer to work alone, so I think the author's ideas are worth learning from.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:16:25 UTC

In the article there is mention of ethical aspects, which I had not considered, and as a designer it is very important to make your product more ethical, which means that the designer needs to understand This means that designers need to be aware of different cultural backgrounds, the legal codes of different countries, the taboos and preferences of different people.

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:16:32 UTC

He also mentioned that a good quality we need to have as designers is patience, and that in my article I focused on how to develop professional skills and the importance of English, forgetting that patience is an important skill in the design field. I think it has something to do with my experience, as I am not a native English speaker, so I focused on learning English and neglected to develop my own character, which as a cross-cultural international exchange is essential to attracting others and being part of a design team.

Reference

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:19:17 UTC

Laura B. Perry & Leonie Southwell (2011) Developing intercultural understanding and skills: models and approaches, Intercultural Education, 22:6, 453-466.

Kate Ippolito (2007) Promoting intercultural learning in a multicultural university: ideals and realities, Teaching in Higher Education, 12:5-6, 749-763.

Mahon, J & Cushner, K 2020, ‘International Initiatives in K-12 and Higher Education’, in D Landis & D.P.S. Bhawuk (eds), The Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training: Learning from and Moving Beyond Disciplinary History from Part II – Practice of Intercultural Training, 4th Edn, Cambridge University Press Online, pp.357-376, Available at: .

Jackson, J. (2014) Introducing Language and Intercultural Communication (1st ed.) [Ebook]. Routledge.

www.yglx.org.cn

TASK 4

wangp27 — 2023-04-03 21:24:20 UTC