Title: Cultural communication
Course: Study PrepProg - Improve Your English from B1 to B2 Level

This topic focuses on cultural communication, in general and more specifically in the Finnish higher education environment.

1) Contents

- Influence of culture on communication
- Cultural differences in communication
- Cultural barriers to communication
- Impact of one's background on interpersonal communication
- Avoiding cultural clashes (sample cases)

2) Learning goals

The student understands

- how one's cultural background influences their communication.
- what differences in communication there might be among people from different cultural backgrounds.
- what barriers to communication might be caused by different cultural backgrounds.
- how one's own cultural background may affect the way they communicate.
- how cultural clashes can be avoided in communication.

3) Instructions: how to study, what is being evaluated, schedule and how much time it will take.

- lectures (real-time and video recordings)
- reading materials
- group discussion (written/spoken)
- writing assignment (short description of personal experience in terms of cultural clashes/barriers/difficulties/misunderstandings)

Assessment is based on the student's English skills and their capability of discussing the study materials and describing potential similarities and differences between their home culture and Finnish culture.

Materials

1. Introduction to culture and communication (by Encyclopedia) (opens in a new window)
2. Cultural differences in workplace communication (by Science of People) (opens in a new window)
3. Cultural barriers to communication (by Study Smarter) (opens in a new window)
4. Common workplace culture clashes (by Cubo) (opens in a new window)

For teachers: replace the Padlet links with your own Padlet/Flinga/similar! These are here just as examples!