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American School of Bombay (ASB) Online Academy is pleased to offer "Global Collaborative Projects" beginning on October 15, 2012 and running for 5 weeks.

Graduate credits: 3

The culminating event of the course is participation in the Global Education Conference in November 2012.

Description and Purpose of the Course
Meaningful and learning-rich collaborative projects between classrooms have been thriving for more than a decade with the growing availability and reliability of Internet and mobile connectivity. In this course, we will explore the educational advantages of exposing our students to new cultures, perspectives and cross-cultural communication. We will examine a variety of existing projects as well as the various tools and online platforms that exist to support them. Project management approaches will also be presented and discussed. Many educational organizations sponsor and support such projects, while a number of educators have found partners for projects independently through their own personal learning networks. Course participants will be challenged to choose and plan a short-term project with the aid of technology and social media tools that will support the educational goals and standards of their specific learner group and subject area.

The coursework is designed around the ISTE NETS teacher standards for collaboration, creativity and innovation, information fluency, critical thinking and digital citizenship. At the end of the course, participants will have gained a better appreciation of the rationale for global collaborative projects and a working knowledge of some of the technology tools that are available to facilitate such projects. They will have explored the planning and implementation of a small-scope project. Coursework will involve reading, sharing, and exploring articles, blogs and products from existing global collaborative projects as well as their ongoing development of their own project.