June 2008 — News
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Global Learning Initiative Helps Kansas Students Collaborate with Peers Around the World
In further discussions, our superintendent, Jim Keller, and I learned that local businesses wanted more than simple communication. Our friends at Boeing, Cessna, Coca-Cola, and Learjet kept telling us that they need our graduates not only to be able to communicate with different cultures but to go a step further and be able to create a product with them.
In response, and with assistance from Kay Gibson and Glyn Rimmington of Wichita State University, our district designed a curriculum that brings students together using various technologies and then asks them to collaborate on projects in science, language arts, math, music and art.
For example, we recently completed projects on rain forests. We brought fourth- and fifth-graders in Hong Kong and Douglass together, and they started by comparing each others' cultures. Then they progressed to doing research on the rain forest. Each class produced a small report and drew artwork. We shipped them back and forth and displayed them in each others' schools.
The kids were responsible not only for producing a report, but for explaining the guest mural, from the cultural context of whoever created it. My kids had to explain why Hong Kong kids draw faces on trees and that trees in Hong Kong have a whole different historical reference than they do in the United Sates. Because there are good and bad spirits in trees, according to Chinese culture, and our kids have to know that.
Making It Work
Jim Keller and I have been careful to take a step by step approach in asking our students to work with peers in other cultures. We have also been able to take advantage a number of cultural exchange programs to make it happen. I have been able to travel to China, Europe, and Japan and this summer will go to Korea to explore the culture and bring back contacts for Douglass students. In the process, we have built regular working relationships with schools in mainland China, Japan, and Hong Kong.
The little kids--in grades K-2--need something in their hands. So we concentrate on scrapbooks and snail mail them to Hong Kong. Then in grades 3 through 5 we start establishing ePal e-mail accounts and begin calling using Skype and doing videoconferences. By middle school, students are collaborating on science, music, and art projects, and, in high school--starting with a pilot program in the fall--there will be a fully integrated program teaching language arts, social studies, and Mandarin Chinese in conjunction with schools around the world.
At each level, our instructors have been careful to introduce students to the technology fairly slowly, and to give students across the world a chance to get to know each other before starting the heavier conversations or more elaborate projects. If you and I sat down, we'd shake hands and probably start out by talking about what we're interested in or about our families. It's the same thing with kids. You can't ask them to talk about global warming without giving them a chance to form a personal relationship. Then you can guide them into the topics that you want.
