Building Global Communities of Learning

Just as schools should focus on rebuilding student learning so that the notion of context specific skills is diminished, schools should focus their efforts on rethinking what a classroom can really be.  As various technologies have increased human connectivity across the globe, schools need to harvest this power in order to better prepare students to function in this already connected world.  For lack of a better phrase, the idea would be to create INTER-National classrooms - classrooms that exist in multiple countries, with multiple students, all in one digital space.  The technology already exists as a means to connect an 8th grade English class in Michigan with an 8th grade English class in Taiwan - the students can form digital groups and communicate via programs like Skype or Google Hangout.  They can collaborate on written work or video projects via different Google Apps. They can incorporate 3D printers as a means to physically have the same tools and prototypes in classrooms that may be thousands of miles apart. In other words, technology does not just allow students to just talk and meet people from around the world, students can be assigned group projects with students from anywhere in the world.

 

Schools should move towards this view of their classroom as it promotes not only the skills of collaboration and communication, but it also helps students gain essential insights into the world around them.  They would gain empathy for people in different cultures.  And as educators realize that they are preparing students for a rapidly changing world, the sooner schools help students meet that changing world beyond the classroom walls, the better prepared they will be to engage and thrive within it.  The example provided below is one of the few ways in which students and schools are truly working towards this goal of INTER-National learning.