methodology

new developments

Within the Office InterActors courses, the participants work their way together through roles and tasks within fictitious scenarios (to minimize the learners’ stress) which are at the same time true-to-life and relevant to their profession.

The participants and their tutors are organized in face-to-face groups in different locations (e.g. countries), from where they meet each other regularly on an online learning platform in order to carry out the tasks within the scenarios.

The features of the online learning platform include the staged release of information by the tutors, authoring tools, internal e-mail and chat mechanisms, on-line editing and exchange of electronic files etc.

The roles and tasks are designed in such a way as to require intense and engaging teamwork and negotiation at the level of both the national groups and internationally.

The presence of persons working in various departments in a business will encourage dialogue and negotiation skills in the mother tongue while the communication among the international groups will structure the context for real linguistic and intercultural business dialogue.

The need to learn basic linguistic and cultural information about the partners will thus emerge naturally and the input in that direction will be welcome by the participants. Moreover, initial, formative and summative (self-/peer-) assessment and evaluation activities will be deeply embedded within the scripts.

The self/peer review exercises will also model strategies of quality assurance based of self-assessment. The delivery of InterAct courses can best be achieved with approval and support from employers/educational managers.