Learning With, From and About Each Other

7th Grade Jewish students skype with Muslim students from the Khartoum American School,  Sudan.

This is the third in a series of Skype calls to learn from and about other religions and teach other students about Judaism.

1. Becoming the Experts
2. Using Experience to Reach Others

Around the World With 80 Schools- Sudan from langwitches on Vimeo.

Experiencing the Winter Olympic Games via International Collaboration

Working with Sarah Soltau- Heller from Port Hardy, Canada has been an incredible pleasure. A prime example of “Collaboration Etiquette among Professionals“could be defined.

We started out by collaborating on a Google Doc between teachers. We had an idea section, a time line as well as an area to compile resource links.With e-mail and skype calls we crafted a project that both ends would feel comfortable with (tech skill & time wise).The idea was to collaboratively allow students to create a sports news cast about the Winter Olympics.

Then we created a wiki that would house all the media, information, documentation and resource links for our Olympics 2010 Collaboration project.

Brainstorming with Wallwisher

To stir enthusiasm even further for the second graders on our end, Sarah arranged for a Skype interview with one of the Olympic torchbearers from her home town.

Interview with Olympic Torch Runner from langwitches on Vimeo.

Sarah and I had a very interesting discussion on Skype about what our goals for a COLLABORATIVE project were going to be. We did not want to have our students gather information, deposit them on the wiki and then independently “do their own thing”. We wanted them to share the spirit of the Olympics

I have been thinking about the collaboration thing since we chatted on Skype.  Is this really collaborative?  Is it really collaborative learning for the students from each other?  How to make this about the children creating and producing and not just me spending hours on the computer.

Within our schools we collaborated with the art teacher and librarian to pull in more resources and connect what students were learning and experiences with other subjects.

Learning about Orcas from Canada

Learning about Orcas via the Arts

Learning about the Sport of Curling

We created a VoiceThread with images of all the sports disciplines represented in the Winter Olympics. As students were learning about each sport from books, TV at home or videos shown in school, they were to take note of facts or other helpful information to be recording in an audio comment on the VoiceThread.

The VoiceThread would then become the primary source of information for the students for background information as they were preparing their final Sports Newscast script.

Students then recorded their sports segment of the podcast, alternating between students from the USA and Canada to produce an international newscast.

We created the podcast in Garageband, each student on a different track. Sarah sent all her students’ tracks as mp3 files to me, which I then dragged and dropped onto the tracks in my Garageband project file. I added sound jingles for transitions and …voila… we had a collaborative international newscast.

We also arranged for the students to practice and play the Winter Olympic Wii game of Curling. Each class practiced individually.

Practicing Curling on the Wii

Cheering each other on

When then arranged a day and time to have a final competition. Unfortunately we had an accident on our end and our Wii console fell and would not operate. We still sang the Canadian and American National anthem for each other and watched the Canadian team do their Curling via Skype.

Singing the National Anthem of Canada and the USA

Besides learning about Winter Sports, the objective of the unit was global awareness, sportsman ship, patriotism, learning about other countries and flags.

For the teachers it was an incredible adventure of international collaboration. Thank you Mrs. S-H & Mrs. B.

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Global Awareness Going On…

If you are NOT teaching or attending an international school, nor live in a metropolitan city, raising global awareness among your students does not happen by osmosis.

As a teacher, you have to work hard to expose your students to multiple languages, cultures, geography, different customs and traditions.

Global Awareness, according to The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, includes:

• Using 21st century skills to understand and address global issues
• Learning from and working collaboratively with individuals representing diverse cultures, religions and lifestyles in a spirit of mutual respect and open dialogue in personal, work and community contexts
• Understanding  other nations and cultures, including the use of non-English languages

According to the National Geographic Roper Public Affairs Report 2006- Geographic Literacy Study  (pdf),

Young Americans appear to stick close to home, reporting limited contact with other
cultures outside the U.S.

• Three-quarters (74%) have traveled to another state in the past year, but seven in ten (70%) have not traveled abroad at all in the past three years.
• Six in ten (62%) cannot speak a second language “fluently.”
• Nine in ten (89%) do not correspond regularly with anyone outside the U.S.
• Only two in ten (22%) have a passport.

Raising global awareness and making global connections for teachers and students has been one of my goals this year. Although isolated, one time connections are better than none. I am witnessing a transformation in students and teachers who are regularly participating in global connections.

Let me give you an example:

Third graders have had opportunities to connect live via Skype to Italy, Israel, New Zealand, Finland, Canada and various states within the USA this year.

Alison Quinn, the teacher from Finland, wrote a reflective blog post about our connection:

They asked and answered great questions that highlighted both the differences (geographically and culturally) and similarities – this was so key. The similarities now seem insignificant – two kids on opposite sides of the ocean have art as their favourite subject – both groups of kids like pizza, the same TV shows – and the same Hannah Montana song. But these seemingly insignificant shared pieces of pop culture astounded and united the kids who were oceans away from each other.

I am in complete agreement with Alison. Although seemingly insignificant, these kinds of interactions contribute to a connected feeling, they contribute to a global awareness, that otherwise would not exist.

Seeing students being aware of a bigger world than their own backyard is a first step towards global education. Hearing students use names of far away countries, talk about different languages, cultures and traditions as if they were frequent travelers and jet-setters is a step in the right direction. Making connections with students from around the world is becoming “just the way it is”… normal… part of their lives in the 21st Century.

Take a moment to watch and listen to the third graders (from the US) talk about what had surprised them when skyping with third graders from Helsinki, Finland.

Around the World With 80 Schools- Helsinki from langwitches on Vimeo.