“I have learned many things about coding and work life that I know I will find useful in the future.”
Aada
Upper secondary school student, Oulu, FinlandBefore attending the camp my experience in coding was limited and I never thought of learning more about it. Well, that was before I heard about this camp.
I have always been interested in languages and different cultures so meeting students my age from another country seemed interesting. That was the first reason why I applied – cultural exchange combined with learning a new skill that will probably come in handy in the future.
Japan as a country was somewhat familiar to me before the camp because of its rich culture. I had heard a lot about Manga and Anime before and also I had listened to some Japanese artists, so I did know something. Even though I was somewhat familiar with the culture I was still pretty much unaware of many things which made me quite nervous because usually I like to know things before they happen so I can’t mess up.
The camp started with a welcoming party before the actual week which was nice. All the Finnish students came from their schools a bit earlier to wait for the Japanese students to arrive. At the beginning, we learned a bit about the Code School Finland that was the organizer of the camp, and the Japanese students listened to a short presentation about Oulu, so they got to know it a bit better. After that, we got to know our teams and started working.
During the first meeting, it was a bit awkward because some of our teammates didn’t speak English that well, so some conversations were a bit slow, but I didn’t mind it. We first started to think about our company and what our company values are. It was a bit hard at the beginning but when we found the common ground everything went smoothly.
After the weekend the feeling around everybody became more relaxed which was nice. On Monday we started the coding tasks. I had not done coding tasks that complex so the hardness of some of the tasks was a bit shocking to me at first but after the first shock, I kind of got familiar with some easy coding and got things done with my group and by myself. The first camp day felt a bit draining because we had a lot of work and the day was a whopping eight hours. Everybody probably felt a bit tired afterward.
After the long Monday, we had a relatively easy Tuesday. We did our company presentations where we introduced our companies to the other students and continued with our work. Wednesday was also a good day. We focused on getting our work done and I also finished our final presentation for Thursday which combined all of our work done during the camp. The atmosphere in the camp became more relaxed each day and even people who I haven’t spoken with started talking with me. The four days were such a short time to get to know people and finally on the last day when things were going smoothly, we had to say goodbye.
During the week we also got to experience a bit of Japanese culture. At the end of each camp day we had cultural exchange sessions where we experienced fun Japanese things like bingo or origami. When you got a bingo row you also got some Japanese candy which was nice.
The last day of the camp was at the same time fun and sad. We had gotten to meet many interesting people and do a lot of fun stuff together so it was kind of sad that the whole group would not be meeting anymore. On the last day, we presented our final presentations and had a farewell party organized by the Japanese students which was nice. It was great to see all the Japanese and Finnish students just chatting around and doing stuff like origami taught by the Japanese students. After the farewell party, we said goodbye to the Japanese and to the other Finnish students and then the camp ended.
I got many amazing experiences and learned many things about coding and also about working that I know I will find useful in the future. At the end of the camp, I felt like I had learned some coding and felt proud of myself. I feel grateful for the opportunity to meet many new Japanese and Finnish people. I also feel like this camp will be one of the best memories for a while and I am glad I applied to it.
-Aada, 17 years old, (upper secondary school student in Oulu, Finland)
Code School Finland Future Skills Camps
No matter what the future brings, students will need skills such as abstraction, problem solving, design thinking, finding and applying knowledge and entrepreneurial skills. Our camps help participants to develop their mindset, adopt Finnish-style learning techniques, build relationships with Finnish students, express themselves and find inspiration for the future. Read more here.
Key topics: coding, coding camps, digital skills, digital skills in schools, teaching digital skills, school programmes, worklife skills, entrepreneurship, teamwork, collaboration, presentation skills.
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