…we saw sunlight and a bit of blue sky. Antony and I were both pretty excited, as this time of year in Finland it seems to be a rare thing. I checked with some people passing by, and they confirmed that it was indeed the sun light. Antony recommended I take a picture of it, [...]

I have been involved in a lot of interest and discussion lately about 1. How can I frame good research questions? and then 2. How can I match them with an appropriate methodology? There are a lot of sources you could use to answer these questions (and I am interested in what other people know in response to these [...]

We had a great PhD day seminar, with about 13 participants from Finland, Estonia, Australia, UK, USA, and Spain. We want to thank Ulla and Eeva for allowing us to use the Kitee Folk High School, and even teaching us about “toivon, valvon, and kiitan”. In addition to building two excellent snow men (pictures to soon [...]

Today Maxim Mozgovoy, from the University of Joensuu, defended his dissertation titled “Enhancing Computer-Aided Plagiarism Detection” against his opponent Prof. Kinshuk, from Athabasca University. After responding to 18 slides-worth of pointed and well-thought through questions, Maxim had a look of relief on his face as Prof. Kinshuk announced that he would recommend Maxim and his [...]

Most people already know the sad news about why the Finnish government ordered a day of nationwide mourning today. Click here to see associated press article Today I was at a house meeting where several people were talking about how to work through the grieving process. While he was talking, one Lutheran minister mentioned that one in [...]

Today I sent an email where I raised this discussion and these questions on the ITForum Listserve. I will try to summarize the best comments I receive from them as they come, but I am also interested in anyone else’s thoughts and feelings. ___ I realize that this email ventures into the realm of one of the [...]

**Warning** This blog post might not be suitable for young children I can’t believe fall is almost over and I have not yet blogged about my “cultural experience” thus far in the land of the Finns (a.k.a Finland). I hope it is entertaining for you – at least as entertaining as it has [...]

Thanks for all who participated in an interesting seminar! Don’t forget the next seminar at Kitee on 21.11.2007 (see http://www.clintrogersonline.com/blog/?p=77) We still need some work on figuring out the best ways to handle video and audio in this environment (especially for people who wish to join us from developing countries), but at least this represents [...]

I present today at the European Distance and E-learning Network’s (EDEN) 6th Open Classroom Conference. The theme of the conference is “Real Learning in Virtual Worlds”. I have already learned some valuable things and will blog them throughout the conference, but here is one of my initial reactions. I have sat through a few of the [...]

From my friend Sabine, near San Diego “The sun looks quite red and foggy this morning. This is the sun at 8:30am, seen from my doorsteps. The fires continue and nobody stays outside. The dust makes the air too difficult to breathe.”

To begin with, click here to subscribe to the EdTech Google calender that Ilkka has kindly created:   University of Joensuu EdTech Ph.D. Seminar Program for 30.10.2007 **This will be at 10:00am (GMT +3) in the EdTech Lab - but as we will be including any of our students or faculty around the world who want to [...]

What is it that makes intercultural communication, especially about sensitive issues, difficult? I can think of many reasons - and I’d be interested in also hearing your thoughts. As one of many of the difficulty, I think the following pattern frequently occurs: _________________________________ When people get defensive about sensitive issues they often make generalizations and give labels intended [...]

In studying cross-cultural issues, as I do, it is virtually impossible to ignore the influence of faith on human identity and relationships. I’m not a spokesperson for my Church, and I’m not interested in imposing my personal beliefs on anyone else. At the same time I think it is good to have thoughtful conversations about [...]

Yesterday was my friend Mikko’s turn to sweat, although he handled everything quite elegantly (I think that is the right word). Whereas in the U.S. we have 5 committee members that approve our initial dissertation proposal and then they are also the same ones in our defense to ask us the tough questions, it is done [...]

I am currently in the Helsinki airport, returning from a great trip to China. One of the books that I read during my visit was China Shakes the World, by James Kynge. I had been to China three times previously and could sense the scope of what is happening there, but it wasn’t until I [...]

I had never heard of it before a few weeks ago, and I was one of only a handful of Caucasians that I saw during my 4 days there. I do not think many people from the West have ever heard of it, even my friends working at the US Embassy in Shanghai were not [...]

It is true that with 1/5th the world’s population (1.3 billion people), an exploding industrial economy, and sketchy national restrictions - there is cause for concern over China’s environmental policy. Recently walking the streets of Shanghai, however, I came across a new experimental initiative to increase recycling (see picture). So if you have any extra cash sitting [...]

I presented yesterday at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University E-Learning Lab, and was impressed by what they are doing. Although it is not the only thing they do, I quite simply have not seen anyone as advanced in mobile learning functionality - and I think it is because they have a nice combination of (#1) [...]

As a part of the IMPDET Cross-Cultural Research Group, we have started a “Reflection Wiki” that allows us to post situations in cross-cultural interactions that we wish we had more perspective on - to check if our initial interpretations of the situation were accurate or misleading. The hypothesis behind it is this: In most interactions we [...]

I went to an official Finnish university ceremony today. I found out that, first of all, there is no college graduation ceremony in Finland - you just kind of get your degree and that’s it (although every four years after that there is a “promotion” ceremony). But instead of getting a robe and a hood [...]

Rome, Georgia - that is. (notice the American flag in the picture). I was here on a two and a half day stop over before Europe, attending a conference at the beautiful Berry College. I took this picture on my run this morning, mainly because it had columns and looked like the most Italian-like building I [...]