My first semester is done and three more to go! So, how is my Swedish experience so far?! Interesting and sometimes challenging. I didn't go home for Christmas and New Year's Eve, so I've spent the winter holidays in Sweden, to be more precise, in my room. :) 

On Christmas Eve, the family I stay with, celebrated with some friends and me skyping a bit with my parents. On Christmas day I went  to Copenhagen, to celebrate in Tivoli park. The round trip train ticket was 210 sek (one way - 110 sek). When arrived at Copenhagen train station I had to just exit on the right side and literally bumped into Tivoli park. You just have to cross the street and here you go, welcome to the amusement park. The admission ticket is 110 DKK, that was my choice, I thought that it's better and more fun to try the "rides" with my family. Next time, Tivoli! The Christmas in Tivoli was fantastic, with snow and cold weather, full of lights and Christmas decorations, Christmas carols in the background, music & light show on the water, in the evening fireworks festival, hot tasty latte and fish & chips. Yeah....who says that you can't enjoy Christmas alone?! The New Year's Eve I've spent it at home, and around 10:30 I went out in the little park next to my house and watched the fireworks until 12:30. :) I had a great view over the city, surrounded from everywhere by loud noise and colours. :) But I really enjoyed it.

The winter holidays are way gone and my first semester is done. The last course was called Embodied Design. Of course, the main literature was Paul Dourish book "Where the action is". I found it quite interesting, but I have to be admit that I am still unsure about embodiment, as well as with interaction design. All these notions are so profound, and opened, they tend to overlap with other fields. Everyone here was encouraged to develop his/her definition based on the readings, in every course.  I tried and wrote my own definition of embodiment related to our project work on my last paper. While waiting for the teacher's feedback, I kinda start doubting my thinking. Anyway, what is done, is done. In the worst case I have to rewrite the paper.  :)

Final observations & tips, based on my own personal experience:

- get involved in class presentations, even if the teacher says at the beginning that is it ok for just one person to present your group work; if not, make sure to talk  when you receive feedback and questions from teachers and colleagues; communication, here, is very appreciated;

- if you don't feel comfortable with your group and not satisfied with the work & methods, try to speak up; talk and express your concerns, tell them how you see things, how would you like to work together, take control and change the path of your group; after all, you are part of this and want to succeed;

- first thing to do when working in a group, take a couple of minutes to talk about yourselves - who are you, what you like, why are you here, what can you do in this group, how would you like to work - then decide some rules related to working hours, methods, conflicts, taking decisions; after these  you can focus on your task;

- when you receive a task/an assignment for a group project, take time to understand it, discuss about it, research on it, allow time for individual work, after you know for sure what were you asked to do and what are the teacher's expectations, then you can focus on creating a calendar with important deadlines, goals, methods; of course, you can change on the way, but don't disregard planning;

- now, while working, keep in mind to always question an idea - think about it, analyze it from all angles, don't jump to prototyping or to a final concept, without researching very deep; without a proper research, not only of the beginning of your project - do it all the way, you might end up with a concept which is already on the market or with a very banal concept.

Yesterday I finished the first course "Introduction to multidisciplinary Interaction Design".  Three projects with two different teams in two months. Since at home this education system is not applied, I had to adapt quickly and it seems I did well. The first project aim was to learn how to do fieldwork, ethnographic research using different methods like: observations (different methods), interviews, questionnaires, in order to identify  a design problem and its design opportunities. The second was about video sketching and bodysorming, and how to use these methods to get creative when are you stuck, to analyze and understand better the interaction process behind an concept design. The last task focused on prototyping and how to validate a prototype. A protoype can be made of paper or other materials, a validation can be user testing or even better "fake it - Wizard of Oz".

During this course we had three tutoring sessions, after the projects presentation. It was a good idea, but personally I didn't find it very useful, because we talked mostly about my contribution to the group work. But each tutor has his own style, so this depends on people. 

After each project we had a wrap-up activity with another teacher where we discussed the group dynamics, how we worked as a process, which was our style, how we succeed to combine our varied work styles and personalities. This was one of the most useful and interesting activity which I loved at thos course. Maybe because the teacher was awesome too.

Regarding theory, the teachers gave us a few lectures in different steps of our projects for helping us move on with the projects when we were stuck. I may be tempted to say that their knowledge was presented to us too late, after we struggled with the projects or with our mistakes, and they could have helped us to avoid stress, conflicts, save time. But somehow I believed that we learn our lesson more quickly and profound by making the mistake first, and then having access to the right information.

All this time we had to read from all kind of sources and books, in order to understand deeply the design process. 

The books which were very useful for me were:

Designing for Interaction, Dan Saffer - for beginners, when you don't know how to start or to do in a design process

Sketching User Experiences, Bill Buxton - read together with the workbook

Also the Moggridge book "Designing Interactions" is a must, but mostly for understanding the evolution of Ixd and for inspiration, for learning from others people experiencess and success stories.