Case Studies

The case studies at the end of the “The Global Educator” consist of different opportunities for professional learning and collaboration. These case studies consist of online virtual courses and conferences along with face-to-face events. The different global collaboration events mentioned in the case studies are diverse and exciting.

Case Study 4.1

Lucy Gray and Steve Hargadon: The Global Education Conference

This conference is located in the United States and is collaborative and inclusive. It involves students and educators at all levels. This conference is meant to increase the number of opportunities to connect classrooms while also supporting cultural awareness and diversity.

Case Study 4.2

The Learning2 Conference 

This conference is innovated, engaging, and envolves there to be a number of face-to-face conferences that focus on technology that supports learning globally. Learning2 conferences are held over four continents. With some hard work from a few leaders, Learning2 has taken off within the past few years.

Case Study 4.3

THINK Global School: Learning to Be Global While Living Globally.

 Think Global School is also known as TGS. TGS moves around the globe in order to be able to implement place-based learning fully to extend. This school is unique because it is constantly moving locations every semester. THINK Global School is 12 teachers and 60 students in grades 9-12. This school is very unique, moving to a new environment every semester helps to re-develop new curriculum objectives and learning outcomes based on where they are located. To me this sounds unreasonable to have a school constantly moving around the globe, there is no way to get comfortable with your environment. This group takes global learning and global collaboration to a whole new level. It is impressive to me that this school can pull this off. I could not see myself wanting to be a part of a group like this because I personally am not a fan of change.

Case Study 4.4

Peggy George and Wesley Fryer: The K12 Online Conference

This is a free online yearly event that is run by educators who volunteer their time in order to provide a good experience for everyone who participates in the event.

Case Study 4.5

Our Global Friendship

Our Global Friendships is a global tool I could see myself using in my own classroom one day. Our Global Friendship is a small virtual community of global collaborative educators. I like that this group is smaller because you are able to learn more to be more personal with one another rather than a larger group that you do not know everyone in. Having a smaller group can be just as valuable as having a large group if everyone in the group has the same goals. This group is a community of practice with the purpose of learning from one another and alongside one another. I like this group because it is very unique and futuristic. This group brings together a group of educators who are passionate about their vision and design and who involve global projects in their classrooms on a daily basis. Having a globally connected classroom is important to me and groups such as this one makes it much easier to do so.

Case Study 4.6

Judy O’Connell: Leadership for Global Learning- A reflection on Higher Education Experiences in Australia.

Undergrad and postgraduate students in education and information studies. This program focuses on open education, social media, digital innovation, learning frameworks, and a new direction for knowledge networks in digitally enriched environments.

Writing a Blog About a Digital Storytelling app…

This weeks blog post is about my experience creating a digital story and it makes a good story.

When I first read this weeks blog post prompt I was very confused. I had no clue what a digital story was. In a past class, I made a virtual book but I quickly realized that is not the same thing as a digital story. “It is your choice of which tools to examine, Here is the website that will explain a number of different tools and how they are used.” Now I am thinking I have to make a choice oh boy… “experiment with one of the storytelling apps by creating your own story and blog about the process.” Well, I might as well check out the website with the different tools and pick the first one that pops up. Sharalike was the first one that caught my eye. I liked the idea of using photos so I decided to use that one!

“You can tell us any kind of story that is about you.” This is one of the hardest prompts to write about. I instantly convinced myself I am the most uninteresting person in the world and there is absolutely nothing I could possibly tell people about myself to interest them.

I continued reading…

“Here is a helpful link that will give you 100 ideas.” Well, I guess I need to get 100 ideas on what to make my digital about. As I began reading through the list of ideas BOOM I got an idea.

My four months I spent studying abroad will make a great digital story. This link below is the final work of my experience with making a digital story using sharalike.

https://sharalike.com/s/rH7W

Sharalike Reflection

Overall Sharalike was easy to use. It directed you through uploading pictures and let you place them in a specific order. What I did not like is that it did not let you add words or descriptions. Shatalike is a good tool for simply showing pictures and telling and story through pictures but next time I would use an app that allows you to do more.

 

https://www.nationalgeographic.org/projects/out-of-eden-walk/the-journey/chapters/3-autumn-wars/?sort_dir=asc&editors_pick=true

Check out this link to learn about “Out of Eden Walk”

Out of Eden Walk

The Out of Eden Walk is a story about Paul Salopek who is walking 21,000-miles for almost a decade as an experiment in journalism. He is walking to the beat of his own drum as he walks the pathways that the first people that migrated out of Africa in the Stone Age walk. Along Pauls journey, he is covering the major current stories about things such as climate and technological innovation. He is also writing journals about mass migration to cultural survival by giving voice to the people who inhabit them every day. Pauls journals, pictures, videos, and audio, together create a global record of human life. This journey gives voice to villagers, nomads, traders, farmers, soldiers, and artists who do not often make the news. Paul’s goal is to slow down, observe carefully, and carefully rediscover our world.

The image below shows in red the route traveled by foot and the black dotted line is the route traveled by water.

 

“Walking is falling forward. Each step we take is an arrested plunge, a collapse averted, a disaster braked. In this way, to walk becomes an act of faith.”

Paul Salopek | From To Walk the World

Honey, I’m Dead

During this part of the journey, he found that people in the past used honey to embalm some of the bodies when people passed away. During the bronze age there were many grave sites and these people were digging up the sites to find many different artifacts.

Blood on Snow

During this part of the journey, he was walking in negative 40 degrees Fahrenheit and someone denied to let him stay with him overnight. He continued walking through some of the coldest conditions. I could not imagine how cold and tired he could have been during this part of his journey and what thoughts were going through his head at this time.

My Views

This journey is absolutely amazing. Who would have thought to retrace the steps of some of the very first people to migrate here. Seeing the route that these people traveled and the different things that they went through during their travels is incredible. Learning that someone is out there taking the route that was once traveled by people migrating here is unbelievable. Some of the different stories that he has shared on this web site are incredible. This journey is extraordinary and having it documented is even more amazing.