Global Learning: Helping Kids Compete Internationally
My students need an iPad mini to help them maximize their research opportunities while building cultural leadership skills in timed group activities that demand results.
Helen Keller once said, "Alone we can do so little. Together we can do so much." Pushing students to move beyond their individual cultural differences and utilize the best assets in each other to work efficiently; creates a winning team both in the classroom and in the competitive world market.
My ninth grade English Language Development class consists of students from many different cultures and international experiences.
A diverse classroom, with a minimum of ten different languages spoken at any time with successful parents who have relocated internationally to compete in the global economy. As part of the South Bay community built around the aerospace industry, South High students work hard to follow in their parents' footsteps to secure college degrees that will help them succeed in today's high tech international marketplace. As an English development class, students must use multiple modalities to practice their English language skills whether it is visually through group PowerPoint presentations or to create press kits that tie into common core themes and essential questions. Students must work together to create both research and analysis projects that require them not only to write and speak persuasively but to market their ideas effectively and professionally.
My Project
Traditionally, students resist group projects because one person does all the work due to the lack of technology in the room, individual differences or the inability of a few students to give up control. The IPAD mini would require students to divide and conquer and give them a taste of the real world because it forces them to work under time constraints to outline a project, adopt a plan of attack, divide the work and then produce a product that is both purposeful, yet, emulates the professional products found in the global market. An iPad would not only change the group dynamic by adding more leadership opportunities but, add another resource for group projects, freeing some students to research different themes, books and writing styles while other students work on design ideas and alternate inputting their parts of the project into one cohesive product. Students will be able to double their research opportunities, increase their creativity and establish ownership over their ideas.
ELD students benefit from Socratic seminars and presentations that highlight their verbal skills and incorporate their unique ideas through technology into projects that demand shared leadership and innovative ideas.
The iPad will unlock more doors to learning and more importantly require the students to communicate effectively with each other using research and visuals that help move them beyond their individual languages and cultural biases to work together as a unified team.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. O'Brien and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.