Your Name and Title: Dr Katya Toneva, Director of ICT, E-resources consultant

School or OrganizationName: International Community School (ICS), London; Middlesex university, London, UK

Co-Presenter Name(s): Haldor Lønningdal, Norway/Stavanger - Buøy Skole, Teacher, Editor and Producer IKT Forlaget / ict21st.com

Area of the World fromWhich You Will Present: London (UK) & Stavanger (Norway)

Language in Which You WillPresent: English

Target Audience(s): teachers, curriculum leaders, school managers

Short Session Description(one line): Introduction of two cross-school case studies demonstrating building up collaborative knowledge and life skills facilitated by using innovative online technologies.

Full Session Description:

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Since September 2010, ICS (London) has provided netbooks for all students and staff with Internet connectivity via wireless network.

The introduction of the netbooks has given ICS a powerful tool for learning. Students value the fact that everyone has a Netbook, which they do not need to share. The autonomy that this hands to young learners has had a significant impact on the students’ learning in a short period of time.

Flexibility and connectivity have also been great catalysts to the success of collaborative activities, for example within the recent E-safety project: http://ict4teachers.blogspot.com/2011/05/welcome-to-my-blog.html 

Sometimes people are unaware that they hold certain values. One way people can become aware is by sharing ideas, thoughts, opinions and perspectives with others.

The Web 2.0 technologies allow us to create a learning environment for students that is “beyond borders” in many ways (location and time, cultures and values). Through this global communication and collaboration, the beliefs may be reinforced so they have validity, or beliefs may change because they are seen to be unsubstantiated or assumptions.

Web 2.0 offers educators a set of tools to support forms of learning that may be strongly collaborative and can encourage publications, multiple literacy and inquiry.

We have joined two international projects (Flatclassroom Project and Open Borders Project) aiming to involve our students to develop personal identity and cultivate relationships by posting and exchanging digital materials, joining project groups, sharing information and building up knowledge.

Teachers from the International Community School - London in collaboration with Flatclassroom management team and with the co-manager of the Open Borders project (Haldor Lønningdal) have taken up the opportunity to organise two pilot project groups of students to share and explore ideas and values, to collaborate, to provide and receive feedback.

The students have been excited to introduce themselves to their peers from all over the World and to share ideas for their Flatclassroom project topic research: http://fcp11-3.flatclassroomproject.org/ICS+-+London. In parallel, they are in a process of developing video storyboards related to their project topics. The students are excited to take up the opportunity to offer and to receive help from other students across the Globe. By the time of this online event we will be able to demonstrate screenshots showing the process of collaboration students-students, teachers-teachers and teachers-students via Flatclassroom communication tools. All the project activities set up for the students are linked to core curriculum objectives (English department, International Community School, London).

The Open Borders project (Theme: UNDERSTANDING DEMOCRACY) has been discussed and planned as a cross school project (Norway/Stavanger - Haldor Lønningdal, the UK/London - Dr Katya Toneva and USA/San Diego - Scott Moss).

The idea came from the tragic events in Norway this summer (2011) – the shooting of young people and the bomb in Oslo. Later, there was another series of horrific incidents in the UK  – rioting, looting and fires.  Both incidents must have an impact on every young person.

Recently, the World reflected on 9/11 and grieving children, parents and presidents united in a solemn tribute to American victims of the attacks. Perhaps our students could also connect with their perceptions of 9/11. It might be interesting to get the opinions of Americans who never knew a time before 9/11/2001. The students from the American partner school from San Diego were 3-5 years old at that time…

We all aim to prepare our students to participate in an increasingly diverse and global society. By giving our students the resources to be challenged and connected beyond the classroom walls, we fully intend to reach this ambitious goal … Together we can make all the difference in the world!

For more details, please visit our collaborative blog: http://openbordersinitiative.wordpress.com/projectblog/

By the time of Global education online event we will be able to share highlights from the process of project development. In particular, my co-presenter Haldor Lønningdal will share the first case study linked to curriculum objectives. 

By introducing two case studies from international projects, we hope to draw the attention of other practitioners to the potential that innovative online technologies have to support collaborative learning in line with social constructivism approaches. Web 2.0 and other collaborative and interactive online technologies create the opportunity for students and teachers to develop personal identity and cultivate relationships with their peers across the Globe by posting and exchanging digital materials, joining project groups, sharing information and building up knowledge at anytime and remotely. We have provided web-links to the relevant publications which could be used as practical examples for developing similar pedagogical approaches.