Group items tagged

"Thank you to all the amazing students and teachers who participated. If you are interested in Flat Classroom Projects, go to http://www.flatclassroomproject.net/about.html." This is what makes Flat Classroom so special and unique - A Project Manager who takes the time to blog about the project and suggest improvements.

This is what makes Flat Classroom so special and unique - A Project Manager who takes the time to blog about the project and suggest improvements.

An outstanding post from Jodi Amri from Stafford Primary School as she shares her end of project reflection via this teacher blog for the A Week in the Life project, a Flat Classroom Project for Grades 3-5 (8-10 year old). Her last paragraph: "We are teachers and students who want to make a difference in our world. We know we can do this when we reach out to others around the globe to share our common interests and concerns and build bridges of understanding between us. The Week in the Life project has given us this opportunity. It has also shown us what technology integration should look like. In this season when we give special focus to the things we are grateful for, we want to acknowledge the opportunity we have each day to learn with and from each other, as well as to be inspired by the learning all around us."

"Collaborative projects broaden teachers' horizons, too, connecting them with colleagues from around the world. Vicki Davis (@coolcatteacher) and Julie Lindsay (@julielindsay), founders of the Flat Classroom Project, had never met face-to-face when they launched their first collaborative project several years ago. Now, they have co-authored a book, Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds to share their field-tested insights about collaborative PBL. They lead teachers from around the world on several "flat" projects annually, using technology to overcome distances and connect learners in shared inquiry and problem solving. "

"My best advice is to tap into an existing project. There are lots of them! But before you begin your search, take a few minutes to define what kind of project you're looking for. What areyour project goals? How will you incorporate your content area standards in addition to giving your students opportunities for developing global competencies? What time frame do you have in mind? Are you looking for a long-term project or a short-term one? What scope do you have in mind? Are you looking to connect with a single teacher/classroom/school or multiple partners? What kind of partner(s) are you looking for? Grade level? Subject area? Location?"

Australia/Sydney-based award winning educator, Chris Betcher, talks about the long-term advantages for students of connecting and collaborating globally. He includes footage from his students today who worked on global projects over 10 years ago and the impact this had on their lives and future careers. This keynote was produced for the Flat Classroom Project 12-2, November 2012. http://fcp12-2.flatclassroomproject.org/Keynote Chris Betcher: http://www.chrisbetcher.com http://twitter.com/betchaboy

"I wanted to create a post about our current project we are exploring in 6th grade. I am working with a small group of students for a global debate project, Eracism, conducted by Flat Class. We are debating the following topic: "The use of Facebook by students around the world to communicate with one another does more harm than good.""

Honor Morman, a Flat Classroom Certified Teacher, shares her thoughts about introducing global collaboration into the curriculum. "Here's what two of my students said about our participation in the Flat Classroom Project, a 12-week project in which we collaborated with 15 other classes in seven different countries to create a vision for the future of education and society based on emerging technologies and the characteristics of the net generation: "[I learned] how important it is to be a member of a global society-communicating globally and working together as a global community is the only way we can solve global issues and improve the lives of all of us. Communicating and collaborating via the web with global partners is how we will do it in future." -Lara "[Participating in this project helped me become] a global leader, able to communicate important global ideas and different perspectives across cultures and borders and share those ideas for the betterment of my community and the world." -Katherine"

Project Summary: Curricular focus is community with an emphasis on culture and geography Incorporates higher level thinking and integrates technology Targets students in kindergarten to grade 3 Five week project that begins on October 8, 2012

From my friend Kyle Dunbar - if you want to join in - sign up on her blog. "I am giddy with excitement about the opportunity to host a Virtual Book Club discussing the fantastic book Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds: Move to Global Collaboration One Step at a Time by Julie Lindsay and Vicki A. Davis. The book club was announced last Sunday night in my school division and I am thrilled that we already have thirteen teachers signed up! Even better, we have teachers from across our school division and from all different grade levels. It is a wonderful thing when already busy teachers find time in their lives to discuss powerful educational ideas with their peers.  Now, I am ready to get some global participation in this book club. I can't think of a better way to brainstorm about global projects than to have teachers from across the globe in the session together. So, we are inviting all teachers, parents, students, thinkers and learners out there to join us for six live meetings to share what they think about the projects, resources, and research discussed in Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds. We will be meeting on Mondays at 7:30pm EST on the following dates: January 7th January 21st February 4th February 18th March 4th March 18th (find the time in your area here) Meetings will be live using Blackboard Collaborate and will last one hour. We will spend the time sharing thoughts about ideas raised in the book. It will also be a great opportunity to connect with other educators that share similar passions and beliefs about flattening our classrooms walls. We will share strategies and resources for building those 21st century skills like collaboration, communication and creativity in authentic ways.

Created by Theresa Allen, Flat Classroom Certified teacher and Project Manager for Digiteen project for the ISTE 2013 Spotlight presentation - 'Do you co-create at the Elementary Level? Flat Classrooms Do!'

Interesting project that potentially joins students across countries and cultures to discuss and create media based on 'Does my digital me reflect the real me?'

I had a great conversation with Theresa Allen, IT director in Illinois who has facilitated global connections from Kindergarten through 8th grade. She talks about the "Hello Little world Skypers" project and other projects she does with her students and how you can facilitate change.

""The use of Facebook by students around the world to communicate with one another does more harm than good."" This is our topic for the Eracism 2013 project. You may wonder - why did we limit it to Facebook - well, after much-- yes, --- debate-- on our end, every good debate topic should have compelling topics on both sides - we wanted to have compelling discussions around social media and keep with the original spirit of the 4 students who envisioned this project. They wanted to debate topics of importance to promote cultural understanding. If you want to sign up, this is linked to the 2013 press release that will tell you how to enter a team from middle up to high school (there are 2 brackets). We debate asynchronously in a method we call "simulated synchronous" until the finals, when we have a synchronous live debate in blackboard collaborate. 

Pinterest of global classroom projects across the world! You must explore this and go global this year. Thank you Wezie Morgan for compiling this!

First graders from Dallas, Texas share their 'handshake' introduction via this video for the K-2 Building Bridges to Tomorrow global collaborative project, a Flat Classroom Project.

Louis Morgan shares her discovery of global projects for her Gr2 class.

Jason Graham completed this video as part of the Flat Classroom Certified teacher course, and the Flat Classroom project for teachers assignment.

If you have experience with debate and are an educator, we need you. Will you take one or two hours of your time (at most) and serve as a judge for the Eracism global debate project? We have students around the world debating now and need a few more educators. Here's information on signing up. We'll train you on how to share. it is done using voicethread. Thanks for your consideration. If you coach debate, you might want to familiarize yourself with this new debate format "simulated sychronous" using voicethread.

The first example of the use of the term 'teacherpreneur' I can find online by Vicki Davis as we completed our first Flat Classroom Project

There is a fantastic feature on wikispaces that lets you drill down by student and see what work they've done. If you click on "recent changes" and then type in the userid and date, you can see the work. I now have students turn in their work on a google checklist - when they edit over a period of time, they type in their id and the dates and paste the link and I can grade with one click. This saves so much time and gives me a digital dashboard of all of the work they've done on a project.