“Travel through Space and Time”

One of the presentations at the K12 Online Technology Conference 2007 is "Travel through Space and Time", which describes an amazing project from Silvia Tolisano, from San José Episcopal Day School in Florida (USA)

"Global awareness is making its way into the educational landscape. We are recognizing that our students are growing up in a “flat world” and cannot afford to live isolated from learning about other languages, cultures, traditions and points of view. The presenter took over 400 students and their teachers along…virtually…as she traveled physically half way around the world to China. Learn how, through the power of web 2.0 tools, she seamlessly combined a blog, podcasts, photos and videos to educate students about cultural universals, while addressing curriculum standards."

The presentation describes the pedagogical (Global Studies)and technical preparations for the trip, and the first trip to China. (The second trip, to Egypt, has just ended. (OCT 07)) After you watch the Conference presentation, read Blog your way through China and SJEDS Travels to Egypt: Creating a portrait of the world.

I as awed not only at the tech aspects of this projects, but the in depth curriculum thought and planning across the year levels of the school. The school community was willing to invest a great deal of time, thought, and resources to create unique opportunities for its students (and teachers). And we can share in the richness of their work!

I've posted this project here as a beautiful example of how a blog can serve learning.