International Education Week and Internet Connections

The theme for the seventh annual International Education Week (November 13-17) is International Education: Engaging in Global Partnerships and Opportunities. This special week gives us the wonderful opportunity to expand our horizons and extend our friendships and relationships globally. As Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings said, "we are committed to engaging all students in this effort to build global partnerships and create new opportunities." In celebration of this week, let us recommit ourselves to providing our students with an international learning environment, so that they will be prepared to work towards better understanding across the globe.

The following are some suggestions for activities taken from the International Education Week's official website (http://iew.state.gov/index.htm). World View also has compiled a list of resources to help you establish connections with schools abroad.

• Incorporate information on a country or culture into your regular lesson plan.
• Explore international aspects of the arts - music, film, theatre, visual arts, literature, dance - by creating, performing, or studying artworks with an international component. This could include a field trip to a museum or concert or showing a foreign film in class.
• Adopt a school in a developing country and donate school supplies, reference materials, and other items.
• Exchange questions and answers with students from another country through the Internet, pen pal clubs, or a Digital Video Conference. Below you will find several Internet Exchange Ideas for how to get connected with classrooms from around the world.
• Encourage cultural understanding for students using the online resource One World: Connecting Communities, Cultures, and Classrooms. Sponsored by the National Football League and Scholastic Inc., this unique education resource designed for teachers. The free, web-based program may be downloaded from Scholastic.
• Organize a cross-cultural potluck lunch in which students bring in or make foods from their homeland or ancestors' homeland.
• Ask students to write essays on countries they would like to visit and why they chose those countries.
• Feature local international experts as speakers: Fulbright Students and Scholars, former diplomats or Peace Corps volunteers, business leaders working for multi-national corporations, or journalists.
• Participate in a Model UN.
• Assign students to produce a video or website about their cross-cultural experiences. The video could explore issues of cultural idiosyncrasies, stereotypes, and/or their own experiences in another culture.
• Hold a geography, foreign language, or world history bee for your students.

These ideas were listed as suggested activities from the International Education Week Website.

The following are some additional ideas:

• Have students research their ancestry and give a presentation on different countries. This could include creating national flags, researching culture and native dress, or giving a fun historical fact.
• Use maps and globes to help students understand and remember locations and neighboring countries.
• Have students interview someone they know who has traveled abroad, and then present the information to the class, including why they were abroad, where they traveled, and some interesting stories or facts.

Internet Exchange Ideas

Creative Connections (www.creativeconnections.org): This organization sets up classroom-to-classroom exchanges between U.S. and foreign schools, and reaches over 12,000 students around the world. Currently there are three exchange programs: Classroom Connection, ArtLink, and MusicLink. Fees range from $95 to $350 per program per U.S. classroom.

Electronic Emissary (http://emissary.wm.edu): Electronic Emissary is a Web-based telementoring service and resource center that helps K-12 teachers, parents and students set up curriculum-based electronic mentoring exchanges.

ePALS.com Classroom Exchange (www.epals.com): This site provides a safe and free online community that connects students and teachers from 191 countries. You can search for ePAL connections based on age, grade, geography, curriculum, or language. The site also provides instant language translation in up to seven languages.

Global SchoolNet's Internet Projects Registry (www.globalschoolhouse.org/gsh/pr/index.cfm): This site provides descriptions and links to a multitude of free internet exchange projects for student-to-student or classroom-to-classroom exchanges. Projects are sorted by age level, start date, curriculum area, technologies used, project level and keyword. Global SchoolNet links teachers and students from 194 countries across the world.

ICONS Project (www.icons.umd.edu): The ICONS Project allows students and classes to log-in online and participate in mock political scenarios and situations.   It helps them to develop their cross-cultural communication skills as they work together to learn about and solve political issues online.   Note: this project is only available for high school and college level students.

iEARN: International Education and Resource Network (www.iearn.org):   iEARN is an organization that allows teachers and students from around the world to collaborate on projects over the internet.   Their network currently includes 20,000 schools in 115 countries, with a million students working together online daily.   The programs are designed by teachers to fit their curriculum, and then posted online, where other teachers and students can join and participate.   There are opportunities for all ages and subjects. 

Intercultural Email Classroom Connections (www.iecc.org): IECC helps link U.S. teachers with foreign counterparts to promote email classroom pen pals and project exchanges. More than 7,650 teachers in 82 countries are currently participating, and they have distributed more than 28,000 requests for email partnerships.

Kidlink (www.kidlink.org): Kidlink was started in 1990 to empower youth. Children from 170 countries have participated in collaborating with peers from around the world. Over 500 volunteers, mostly educators, in over 50 countries, support the network. They provide information in more than 30 languages.

Peace Corps World Wise Schools (www.peacecorps.gov/wws/): Peace Corps offers several programs to connect volunteers and classrooms around the world. The Correspondence Match program allows for an exchange of letters, emails, artifacts, and artwork with a volunteer in another country. The Speakers Match program partners classrooms with volunteers who have returned home and would like to share their experiences. The website is also rich with service learning opportunities, e-newsletters, videos, lesson plans, and classroom activities to share with your students.

People to People International's School and Classroom Program (www.ptpi.org/programs/school_class.jsp): This free service connects teachers and their students with similar-age classrooms in other countries. Classes interact by exchanging letters, packages, and electronic messages through teacher-supervised email accounts and private, online forums hosted by PTPI.