The day planned by the Norwegian students was based upon what they called a traditional family day, this involved a short hike up to inverted boat, fire making, twist bread and traditional Norwegian cheese. Also over the course of the day games were played.

As the day progressed it was evident how much the Norwegian students enjoyed being in the outdoors, this greatly contrasted to English students as they would not choose to spend time outside just for the fun of it, unless they were on an outdoor course such as the one I am on back in Worcester.

During a part of the day the Norwegian students asked us to make a fire, the method they showed us how to use was very effective, building a base and then piling the tinder on top, once the fire was lit building up the thicker wood around the burning tinder to make an evenly spread fire. This method is very useful, however it is different to the method I have always used, this method consists of making bundles of wood which increased in thickness from match stick to wrist sized, once the tinder is lit the bundles of wood are built up in a cross over the flames gradually getting thicker (O’Leary, 2010), both methods are very useful and it was helpful to see another method of building a fire. Over the fire we cooked twist bread, with this we had cheese, all previous times that I have made this we have made it sweet so trying it this new way was different and good.

This day allowed for the two groups of students to get to know each other better. The part of the day that was most effective at bringing the groups together was when we started to play games. The games were useful in developing communication between the groups as the participation in group activities allowed for the barriers to be broken own between each group (Magloff, 2017). The games also allowed for the sharing of ideas as we played a game that the Norwegian students suggested, after this I introduced a game called 21 that was new to most people.

Overall this was a very fun day spent getting to know the Norwegian students, which offered a lot of new experiences.

Similarities

• The use of games in forming friendships.
• Twist bread
• Fire

Differences/ new experience

• New method of making fire.
• New games
• Traditional Norwegian food
• The contrast in family days between England and Norway.

References

Magloff, L. (2017) ‘What are the benefits of team building?’, Small Business Chron, .

O’Leary, J. (2010) The Wilderness Survival Guide. 1st edn. London: Watkins.