These are my notes from Janice Cheng’s presentation, “THINK Global School: Education without Walls” at the 21st Century Learning @ the West Lake Expo held Oct 31 – Nov 3, 2009 at Xi Hu, China, also known as West Lake. West Lake is in the center of Hangzhou, China, which is about an hour by bus southwest of Shanghai. MY THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS ARE IN ALL CAPS.
Think Global School
Think Global School Blog
http://twitter.com/janicepcheng
http://twitter.com/tgsthinkglobal
MY COMMENT: INTERESTINGLY AND AMAZINGLY THE THINK GLOBAL SCHOOL WEBSITE (AND ALL FOUR OF THE ABOVE WEBSITES, INCIDENTALLY) IS/ARE ACTUALLY BLOCKED HERE IN CHINA. FOR SOME REASON I CANNOT EVEN USE THE PROXY SITE PROXIFY TO ACCESS THE MAIN PROJECT WEBSITE OR BLOG, ALTHOUGH I CAN ACCESS THESE TWITTER SITES WITH A PROXY. 🙁
While we live in a global society, many schools today have failed to provide the set of experiences and tools for young people to excel in our globalized, interdependent world
Education has become more passive in a world that has become more active
– our world is more connected than in any other time of history
– our focus is to help students become more responsible citizens in the world and in their communities
– the experiential learning will provide students with tools and experiences to engage with the world and engage in real learning
We balance activities and hands-on activities with technology
– through collaboration, dialog, and cultural literacy we will instill in our students the desire to build bridges between our nations, our cities, and our cultures
TGS Social Media Experience
– “the system” is in the center, the following are all spokes
— capture and share
— connect and engage
— portfolio
— power modern learning practices
Principles for social media system
– post once, use everywhere
– everything posted is searchable
– easy sharing with PUSH notification
– single login access to everything
– always natural, intuitive workflows and collaboration
– many points of content input / output: web, MacBook and iPhone
Aron Solomon says there are 2 types of technology: technologies people use, and technologies people don’t use
– others observe there are two types of people: those who use technology and those who don’t
🙂
THIS IS SO AWESOME. THIS IS A LOT LIKE WHAT WE’VE TALKED AND DREAMED ABOUT PROMOTING WITH STORYCHASERS.
Activity streams insure the participating students, parents at home, and others remain highly connected with the activities and learning of participating students
We will use tags to help students stay organized, allow for informational organization of online activity
Not everything posted is public: this is an important value and skill of being a digital citizen
– some are public
– some are school-only
– some are private
TGS learning community is global
– we will travel to 3 international cities each year
JANICE IS PRESENTING WITH PRESI. WHILE I’VE SEEN PRESI PRESENTATIONS ONLINE, I HAVE NEVER SEEN A SPEAKER USE PRESI IN A LIVE SETTING PREVIOUSLY. THE RESOLUTION AND QUALITY OF THE SLIDES SHE IS SHARING ARE FANTASTIC. THIS IS REALLY AN INTERESTING AND ENTHRALLING WAY TO PRESENT, AND I’M GOING TO HAVE TO GIVE THIS A TRY SOON. I HOPE I CAN GET A LINK TO HER PRESENTATION.
Key Success Factors:
– effective activities and interactions in host cities
– effective transition from face-to-face to online interaction while in host cities
– activities which allow host cities to interact with each other
– engaging participatory curriculum for partner schools
– projects and activities which promote interaction between partner and host schools
– an online, social media system that is natural, easy and fun for students to use
– making the network self-sustaining: TGS becomes the builder but relies on other schools and organizations to help keep activities going year to year
Our goal is to change the world one person at a time, one city at a time
Many Chinese parents have reservations about our program because they are very examination focused, and our approach seems
– we are well funded, so we are not necessarily just looking for kids who are rich
– we are looking for students who want to grow, to develop beyond their comfort zone
Technorati Tags:
china, education, integration, iste, technology, #xihu09, nets
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[…] Many education systems worldwide are behind the times. Janice Cheng of Think Global School, stated that “while we live in a global society, many schools today have failed to provide the set […]