EDTC 6431 - Cultural Understanding & Global Awareness (ISTE 2)

ISTE 2 - Communication & Collaboration: "Develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures.”

My Module 2 Trigger Question: "What are the best online resources to introduce global awareness and facilitate community and dialogue between my students and their international peers?"

This week offered an exploration of some exciting resources that will provide the basis for substantial declarative knowledge-building where global perspectives and awareness are concerned. And, additionally, I found some powerful resources for collaboration and community on an international scale for my students to experience just how small and interconnected their world is.

On the declarative knowledge and global perspectives front...As I began to do my investigation, I encountered a resource and organization that played a major role in my online media literacy course in DC: the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Their mission so closely parallels my pursuit of journalism and history helping to give a "voice to the voiceless." They have dedicated resources to teaching journalism, global perspectives and driving experiential learning by bringing in journalists to classrooms all over the United States. Across the 3 years I worked with them in DC, we had on average 3 journalist presenters a semester that came into present and have workshops with my students or my US Government mentor teacher's classes. Our student loved the immediacy and purpose of the detailed and embedded journalism of the Pulitzer Center's journalists.

Also a substantial resource they provide are the CCSS-aligned lesson plans found on their website and the long-form narrative multimedia journalism that their grantees have created. I have used many of these multimedia projects in my class that investigate deep and off the beaten path issues that include: the millennials who live underground in China, the millions of people will live and work in the defunct garbage dump in Dandora, Kenya and the First Nation Residential Schools of Canada. Each of these topics in more in depth journalism and personal narrative storytelling that most students and adults are frankly familiar with. I have often described their work to people as Vice News with heart. Their work will continue to be a stellar resource for powerful global perspective and informing on issues that few people are paying attention to.

I am also intrigued by the focus on global perspective-taking using the resources and lessons produced by National Geographic which explores: The Debate Over Globalization. The National Geographic incorporates its compelling visual media and powerful storytelling to create this focused one hour lesson plan and materials geared toward middle and high school students to investigate the perspectives and arguments with substantial evidence

Lastly, the resource I am most excited about is one completely new to me that the US Department of Education created. They have compiled a list of international lesson plans and collaborative projects with teachers all across the work. Two that really caught my eye and I can already think of important connection to my courses are: "Helping Hands "- about student research to inform and advocate on behalf of homeless and hungry children. Also, the "Learning Democracy through International Collaboration" where students from multiple countries share a collaborative online classroom to teach each other about little known issues of fighting for democracy in their respective home country. This is a resource I am excited to spend some time digging into and developing some connection with international colleagues committed to this work.

My conclusions are that my simultaneous interest in student declarative knowledge about global awareness and perspective can unfold simultaneously with the resources (apps and projects) that enable international student collaboration.


Resources
Hunter, N (2016). National Geographic: Education. The Debate Over Globalization: What are the pros and cons? Retrieved from: https://www.nationalgeographic.org/activity/the-debate-over-globalization/ 

Pulitzer Center (2017). Pulitzer Center Lesson Builder. [Community] & [Model Lessons] Retrieved from: http://pulitzercenter.org/builder/dashboard/0

US Department of Education (2009). Teachers Improve Student Performance: Teacher's Guided to International Collaboration on the Internet - Social Studies Project Examples. Retrieved from: https://www2.ed.gov/teachers/how/tech/international/guide_pg9.html#social