What is Your CQ?

Developing and Using Cultural Intelligence to Manage Differences

and Create Harmony in a Multicultural Setting

ActivitiesOCASI 2011

Melissa Pedersen pedersenm@thecentre.on.ca Peter Cory coryp@thecentre.on.ca

Activity 1: We Don’t Know What We Don’t KnowShare with your group 3 things you didn’t know about Canada when you came.If you are from Canada, share 3 things you didn’t know about another culture here or while travelling.

Activity 2: Self Reflection: Check Out Your Biases

To develop our Cultural Intelligence, we must first be aware of our own attitudes and biases. This is a short reflective exercise. Be honest with yourself!

1. How knowledgeable about the world views of different cultures and ethnic groups am I?

2. How aware of my biases and prejudices towards other cultural and ethnic groups am I?

3. How often do I seek out personal contacts with persons who are from different cultural or ethnic groups?

4. How do I react to a person who speaks English poorly?

5. What are my beliefs about persons who: Have different political views from mine? Practice a different religion or form of spirituality? Are very poor? Very rich? Have unusual clothing and grooming styles? Have or have had a mental illness? Have a physical disability? Have a different sexual orientation? Have a different level of education from mine? Are of the opposite gender? Are of a particular age group (teenagers, older seniors, etc.)?

Activity 3:Write your first name in English. Then choose the alphabet you don’t know and write your name in this alphabet.

Russian

Korean

Activitiy 4: Newcomer Letters: Voices of Culture Shock

A Long Way from ScotlandIt took me a while to feel Canadian. Coming from Scotland, I struggled to understand blue bins and two-fours. Now I take the elevator, not the lift.The first question I had while flying over Pearson airport, was "where are all the mountains?" My second question, as I drove from the airport to my new home, was "Why is there snow on the ground in the middle of November? I struggled to acclimatize to the freezing temperatures. More questions:" What's a snowbird?", "What's a blue bin?" and "How do we turn the heat up?" Next came the bureaucratic questions. "What's a SIN card?" "What's OHIP?" "Why does the bank charge us for taking our own money out of our account?"A gap in my cultural knowledge. "Who are the Group of Seven?" "Who are Margaret Atwood and Leonard Cohen?" Reluctant to give up BBC radio and news, I clung desperately to my past, maintaining a dual media. Once I began working in accounting, a new world of unwritten rules and customs was unveiled. I studied hard, trying to make myself as Canadian as possible. No matter how much I tried to adapt and fit in, still the questions came bubbling up. "Why do they use a different size of printer paper than in Europe?" And, most importantly, "three weeks' holiday a year? Is that it?" Each night I returned home exhausted. Scottish friends mocked me for sounding Canadian, while Canadians still treated me like a foreigner. I was in cultural limbo. Although I obviously enjoyed many advantages to help me settle in, I was experiencing genuine culture shock. I looked the part, but under the surface I was a mass of insecurity and unhappiness, terrified of unwitting social, or worse, work-related faux pas. Gradually, the agitated voice inside me quieted a little and asked fewer questions. And now that I'm a Canadian citizen and have the right to vote, and not so many “why’s.”. All except for one: "If the Leafs are so bad, why are tickets to the games so expensive?" Adapted from The Globe and Mail, October 2009.

From a Refugee Camp to CanadaIn the early 1990s the former king of Bhutan expelled more than 100,000 Nepali-speaking Bhutanese from the country. The expelled Bhutanese fled to Nepal, where they were corralled into refugee camps. After years of talks ended in stalemate, seven Western nations agreed to accept the Bhutanese. Vishnu Patel, his wife and three children, all born in the refugee camp, came to Canada in June 2009. Vishnu wrote this letter:

Before we came to Canada, all I knew was that it was freezing cold. I was lucky to learn English when I worked as a Security Guard in India, but my family cannot speak any English. My children are not happy. School is too hard for them and my 8 year old cried, telling his mother he cannot understand a word the teachers say to him. My family is finding everything confusing – light switches, flush toilets, refrigerators, even chilled food. We never had even telephones in our village; here people walk on the streets talking on cell phones. Right now I cannot find a job. The federal government will pay us assistance for one year but I am worried about what will happen when that ends. I registered for a Trades training program and hope to get a job when it ends. We can get food from a food bank and found cheap winter clothing at Value Village. We try not to use the electricity at night to save money. But sometimes it’s hard to sit in the dark. But we are amazed that our apartment has running water, plumbing and electricity. In Nepal, my eldest daughter rose at dawn every morning to fetch water and my wife cooked meals in a fire pit in the corner of our bamboo hut. For the first time in 17 years, I possess a document –Canadian permanent residence card – that gives me the right to work.Our greatest support, besides the official settlement services, has come from the total strangers who live nearby. A couple, who once lived in Asia, remembered the culture shock and loneliness of the beginning of their life there and have helped us get used to Canadian life, taking us sightseeing, grocery shopping and translating the letters the children bring home from school. They visit us often and rarely arrive empty-handed. We will never forget what they have done for us.

Dashed ExpectationsI wanted desperately to start a new life for myself and my family. Ithought that Canada was a rich country that could provide me with endlessemployment and financial opportunities. Before going, all I could think about was how wonderful the future was going to be. You can imagine how excited I was when we arrived at the airport. Pearson International airport in Toronto is huge, shiny and beautiful. Canada was going to be my home. But I had some trouble with the immigration officials. I couldn’t understand them and they were rude. They even looked me in the eye. When my and I family met our sponsor, we were taken to their home, which was much smaller and less luxurious than the one I had imagined. I was sure that when I and my family moved into our own place t would be bigger and nicer than the sponsor’s house. The first few days were hard; our sponsor was at work all day and we were left at home to wait for his return. We didn’t dare go outside. We didn’t speak English and the weather was very cold. My wife and I decided to begin looking for a job. Aftersome time, my wife found one as a dishwasher, but I didn’t have muchluck. I started getting frustrated because of having to cope with all of the changes in my life. Then our sponsor asked us to move out because it was too crowded inthe house. The sponsor suggested a place with Metro Housing, and we found a small apartment in a run down and poor neighbourhood. My jobsearch continued, but with no success. We started having financial problems.I felt depressed and also began having headaches, stomach aches and difficulty sleeping. How could my expectations of Canada have been so different from the reality of that first year?Adapted from CIC website: Culture Shock

Activity 5: Talk About Culture Shock: Culture Shock Time Lines

Euphoria Acceptance, Integration

________________________________________________________________

Anger, Disappointment, Frustration, Depression*

What are some positive and negative experiences you have had adjusting to Canada?

Where would they be on this graph? Share your experiences with a partner or your group.

Discuss the emotions you felt during these experiences. Compare and contrast with the others in your group.

*Adapted from CIC website: Culture Shock

Activity 6:

Every culture has a set of gestures which have idiomatic meaning. Look at the pictures below and discuss what the people are “saying” and what the gesture signifies in Canadian culture and your culture. What are some gestures in your home country that you don’t see Canadians using?

Activity 7: Scenario at Interconnect Inc.:

A newcomer employee is hired by Interconnect, Inc. to work in a team environment. He performs well and is trying to fit in. He takes extra tasks with no hesitation, is willing to work flexible hours, and other members of the team seek his professional advice. His efforts are praised by the management. However, during lunch time, in informal professional settings and social functions, his colleagues talk about events, hobbies or cultural activities and he is not able to participate at any level. He does not know music groups that existed before his arrival in Canada, knows nothing about Canadian Hockey, skiing, snowmobiling, etc. Colleagues have said things like, “You’ll have to come to my house and watch a game,” but an invitation has never been formally extended to him. He now feels that they only talk to him when they need his help. They now feel his questions and lack of knowledge are annoying, and that he is not trying to fit in. He is feeling more and more isolated. Resentment is growing on both sides; he does not want to share his expertise any more, his colleagues see him as a workaholic with no life.

Conclusion: The Elephant allegory

Six people who had never seen an elephant are told that there is one in a dark room and each of them has the right to go in and touch that strange animal to find out what it is like.

The six enter one at a time to discover what the elephant is like. The first touches the trunk, the second a tusk, the third an ear, the fourth a foot, the fifth the belly, and the sixth the tail. They all come back convinced they know exactly what an elephant is like.

They begin to describe the elephant. “Oh, it’s fantastic”, says the first. “so slow and soft, so long and strong”. “No!” says the one who touched the tusk, “it’s short and very hard”. “You’re both wrong”, says the third, who had felt the ear, “the elephant is flat and thin as a big leaf.” “Oh no”, says the fourth, who had touched the foot, “it’s like a tree”. And then the other two have their say: “It’s like a wall”, “it’s like a rope”. They argue and argue, until they lose their tempers and come to blows.

Finally someone brings the elephant out of the room and into the light and the six realize that they were all partly right: all the parts they had described, put together, make the elephant.

Activity 8:

Go to www.kwintessential.co.uk or www.culturalq.com or www.tapslhi.org and take the Cultural Intelligence quiz(es). Adapt some questions for your class…or ask them to go on-line.