Global Citizenship

On 4th June Falkirk Council held its mini Commonwealth Games at Grangemouth Stadium. All 1800 Primary 7 pupils in the Falkirk area take part in this transition event, with each class group given a country to represent. This event takes place every two years to coincide with either the Commonwealth Games or the Olympics, so the 2010 event mirrors the Commonwealth Games to be held in October in Delhi, India. 

Each class joined the opening ceremony with a procession around the track carrying flags and banners representing their school and allocated country. A torch relay featured pupils running around the stadium track alongside international athletes from a variety of sports. The final leg of the relay was run by Commonwealth gymnastics gold medallist Steve Frew, currently assisting the Youth Sports Trust to promote active participation in sport. Steve, who was born and brought up close to Grangemouth Stadium, thrilled pupils with a series of handsprings and backflips as he completed his lap.

Pupils then moved into mixed school groups to take part in a chosen sport for the day. These included a range of athletic activities, hockey, football, rugby, basketball, swimming, tennis, cheerleading and even Boccia, an official Olympic and Commonwealth para-sport something like French boules. This enabled the participation of pupils with additional support needs, as part of the Council’s inclusion policy.

This event was part of a whole-authority approach to transition from Primary to Secondary school and also a means of embedding Health and Wellbeing and Global Citizenship in the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence. As part of the preparation, all schools were provided with a CfE planner offering them a range of resources and ideas for building on pupils learning. This encouraged pupils to learn about Commonwealth values, about their chosen country, about the importance of a healthy lifestyle and participation in physical activity. It made learning relevant, challenging, and fun.

Stirling Council recently held a Global Citizenship conference for pupils, which included coverage of many projects running in schools within the region. The work on show included activities in Africa and India, themes such as Fair Trade, and Sustainable Development. A Stirling Council webpage provides more detail of the schools and actions involved.

The Prince’s Rainforests Project for Schools aims to raise awareness and stimulate discussion in schools about the importance of rainforests and their role in mitigating Climate Change. The project is running two competitions for pupils which offer opportunities for creative activity.

The ‘Sony World Photography Awards / Prince’s Rainforests Project Schools’ competition invites pupils to take and submit a photograph on one of four themes, such as ‘what climate change means to you’.  The contest website has full details, and the closing date is 23rd October 2009.

And the ‘Frog competition’  offers the chance to design a ‘look’ and colour scheme for a large fibreglass sculpture Frog. Closing date is 15th October.

Here’s another example of Scottish teachers blogging about educational activity undertaken in their summer vacations. Two Edinburgh primary schools are involved in work with Burmese refugees and migrants living in Thailand, and teachers have used the DfID Global Schools Partnership programme to support their work with their partner schools on the Thai/Burma border.

Forthview Primary established the first link, and every year one or two teachers exchanged and worked in each others schools to develop learning themes together. Since 2007 Pirniehall Primary, Forthview’s neighbouring school, have had a link with another school for Burmese children at Mae Sot in Thailand. The link between these Scottish and refugee schools has created international art exhibitions in which children wrote and etched about an aspect of their life, with their work exhibited in Edinburgh, Chiang Mai and Mae Sot.

The Forthview teachers blog and the Pirniehall teachers blog provide much more detail about their summer 2009 visits and about life in these refugee communities. 

An article entitled ‘From Renfrew to Riyadh’ in last week’s ‘Times Educational Supplement’ Scottish edition focuses on the benefits of teaching overseas, using the examples of Scots working in International Schools in the Netherlands, Italy and Saudi Arabia.

Two exhibitors at this year’s Scottish Learning Festival offer other opportunities for Scots excited by the prospect of a period teaching in another country. Voluntary Service Overseas offers volunteer placements of between 12-24 months for experienced teachers and managers, usually in Asia, Africa and South America. And the VIF Program recruits teachers for schools in a number of US States on paid contracts. SLF 2009 provides an opportunity to speak to both organisations and find out more.

Our annual educational conference and exhibition, ‘Scottish Learning Festival 2009‘, is open for registrations through the event website. As usual, its in Glasgow at the SECC, and offers a great variety of international presenters, expert workshops, and an exhibition of educational services, products and experiences. This year’s dates are Wednesday 23rd September and Thursday 24th September.

Last year LTS welcomed over 7000 visitors to the show, mixing teachers, managers, trainee teachers, consultants, education companies and foreign educators.

Within the keynote and seminar programme, there are many opportunities to find out more about International Education, Education for Citizenship and Sustainable Development, all key contributors to the successful implementation of ‘Curriculum for Excellence’. Aspects of education in Brazil, China, Colombia, France and the USA are just some of the seminar themes.

Sign up online for this free Continuing Professional Development opportunity, and make your bookings for the best of the seminars.

Today’s ‘Scotsman’ includes a news story about a project in India in which teachers and pupils from Monifieth High School in Angus worked in local villages. Staff, students and local people gained greatly from this international experience.

An English educational charity DEA is concerned that many school pupils in England are “globally illiterate” because they are not educated about world events and equipped to live in a globalised world. A BBC story ‘Call for better Global Literacy’ covers this DEA research and some opinions.

 The Scottish Parliament’s European and External Relations Committee recently published its Report on International Development. A story in ‘Times Educational Supplement Scotland’ picks up on views on a few of the Educational aspects associated with Development issues, such as the importance of good quality and appropriate activities in school links with developing countries.

The Edinburgh ‘hub’ Confucius Classroom was launched at St.George’s School for Girls last week. St George’s will work in partnership with City of Edinburgh Council schools and others to support teaching and learning about China.�

An ‘online hub’ for the Confucius Classrooms programme is now live. It forms a key part of the Confucius Classrooms vision in Scotland, to extend access to teaching and learning about Chinese language and culture and support growth of a learning community.

The hub has a public web side, with information about the programme, resources and examples of current practice in Scottish schools. It also has a dedicated area within Glow, the broadband intranet service for Scottish education professionals and pupils, for collaboration, sharing and interaction in a secure environment.