Global Citizenship

September 6th, 2010

Climate change – new resource and forthcoming events

imenzies

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT, global citizenship, sustainable development

Learning and Teaching Scotland has launched a significant new online resource for practitioners. Our new Weather and Climate Change website supports the development of children and young people as global citizens and comprises over 50 high quality videos as well as images, background information and extensive links to other online resources.

The Weather and Climate Change website is now live at http://www.LTScotland.org.uk/weatherandclimatechange/

 This new online resource complements our existing website for learners in secondary schools which has recently been updated as part of the wider restructuring of LTS online. The Exploring Climate Change website can be viewed at http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/exploringclimatechange/

The popular Schools Global Footprint resource on LTS online has also be revamped and can be viewed at http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/schoolsglobalfootprint/

The launch of the new website kicks off a series of events that will support learning and teaching on climate change in the run up to the next United Nations Conference on Climate Change which this year will take place in Cancun, Mexico, in December.

 These forthcoming events include:

 CPD Glow meet – Weather as an interdisciplinary context for learning

3:45pm – 5:45pm, Tuesday 7^th September 2010

Target audience: Practitioners in primary and secondary schools

 This CPD glow meet for practitioners will led by meteorologist and former BBC weather presenter Heather Reid OBE. Participants will have the opportunity to learn more about this important and popular topic and pose questions to Heather. It will also highlight how the theme of weather relates to the experiences and outcomes and can be used to support interdisciplinary learning within Curriculum for Excellence. Opportunities will also be provided for participants to share interesting practice and ideas. To register and take part in this glow meet visit the national sustainable development education glow group or email: I.Menzies@LTScotland.org.uk

 Glow meet – International Year of Biodiversity

Oceans, climate change and biodiversity

11 am – 12pm, Monday 13^th September

Target audience: Learners in secondary schools

This Glow meet will be led by meteorologist and former BBC weather presenter Heather Reid OBE and Anuschka Miller from the Scottish Association of Marine Science. It will explore the often forgotten importance of oceans in climate science and explore issues relating to ocean currents, temperatures and impact on weather events. In this, the International Year of Biodiversity, participants will also have the opportunity to learn about the impact of climate change on biodiversity in and around oceans. To register and take part in this glow meet visit the national sustainable development education glow group or email: I.Menzies@LTScotland.org.uk

 Scottish Learning Festival – Climate change as a context for learning

9:30am – 10:15am, Thursday 23^rd September

This spotlight session will explore some of the high-quality weather and climate change resources that have been developed by LTS and will also exemplify good practice taking place in schools across Scotland with regards to partnerships and interdisciplinary learning relating to climate change. The seminar will also highlight some of the benefits of Glow and outdoor learning. This session is just one of many global citizenship seminars and activities taking place at the Festival this year. A full copy of the global citizenship programme is available from Glow or via email: I.Menzies@LTScotland.org.uk

 Regional events – Developing global citizens through sciences, social studies and technologies

Focus – climate change as an interdisciplinary context for learning within Curriculum for Excellence

Hilton Grosvenor Hotel, Edinburgh – 2^nd November

Drumossie Hotel, Inverness – 12^th November

Hilton Hotel, Glasgow – 19^th November

 These three regional events for practitioners in primary and secondary schools will showcase innovative school practice with regards to climate change within Curriculum for Excellence. Participants will have the opportunity to attend workshops and visit exhibitions from a wide variety of schools and support organisations and will also have the chance to explore how this important global issue can be embedded across curriculum areas – particularly within sciences, social studies and technologies. More details to follow in due course.

June 8th, 2010

World Cup football – more resources

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT, africa, citizenship, international

The start of the Fifa football World Cup 2010 is now only a few days away, and new educational resources and activities continue to appear online.

Among my favourites from the new material is the Teachers TV video programme ‘Rainbow Nation 2010′. This short documentary focuses on the history and people of South Africa, the host nation, in the period of build-up towards the competition finals. Another programme ‘Cape Talent’ presents interviews and profiles of a number of South African citizens excited about the forthcoming tournament, including Bishop Desmond Tutu.

Another excellent production is the Oxfam resource ‘Bring on the world’, a sequence of activities for pupils aged 9-11 on themes of world cup football and world trade.

This blog post supplements my earlier post ‘World Cup football’. Now its almost time to take a few personal hours to watch some of the fine football skills displayed on TV for the benefit of a worldwide audience. Enjoy. I know I shall.

June 1st, 2010

You can dance, you can sing

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories ICT, citizenship, europe

Last week the annual official Eurovision Song Contest took place in Oslo. But for those of us involved in Education, online school-focused events offered a great opportunity for young people to learn more about the culture of other countries and show off their own performance skills.

The ‘Eurodance 2010′ project brought together 26 schools in Scotland, the UK and the rest of Europe. Scottish participants included the children of Hallglen Primary and Larbert Village Primary in the Falkirk area. The project began in March. Each school introduced themselves to the other contestants by posting details of their class on a bog, and committed to perform a traditional dance from their country for the competition. The children practised their dances and filmed their final performances. These videos were posted online, to enable all the schools to watch the completed performances and score each school. The scores were collated and the winner identified, and the winning school in Cyprus was rewarded with a trophy. Pupils greatly enjoyed taking part and learnt a lot from the experience. The videos of dances from many regions of Europe are a window into the cultral life of those countries, and are online for us all to appreciate.

‘Schoolovision 2010′ is this year’s version of the successful singing competition pioneered last year by Yester Primary School in East Lothian. 34 schools in Europe participated this year, with the winners being from Iceland. Their blog has videos and details of the songs and schools. A BBC Scotland news story ‘Abba hit wins junior eurovision’ provides details.

Both the above projects were part of the e-twinning initiative which supports electronic communication links and partnerships between schools in Europe.

May 24th, 2010

Early Years education international dialogue

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories ICT, europe, international

The Early Years team at Learning and Teaching Scotland has hosted an international online discussion about early childhood curricula, parental involvement, etc. Participants from Poland, Romania, Iceland, Sweden, Italy and Serbia joined their Scottish hosts for the Glow Meet. This week’s ‘Times Education Supplement Scotland’ has a story about this first summit event.

May 20th, 2010

Scottish Learning Festival in Glasgow

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT, china, citizenship, europe, international, sustainable development

The ‘Scottish Learning Festival 2010′ is now open for registrations, prior to the real event taking place in Glasgow on the 22nd and 23rd September 2010. The line-up at this year’s free show includes keynote presentations by Michael Russell MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning; Eric Booth, author, entrepreneur and arts education specialist; Richard Gerver, author of ‘Creating Tomorrow’s Schools Today’; and Professor Sugata Mitra, professor of Educational Technology at Newcastle University. The entire programme is online, to help reduce the carbon footprint of SLF, and also available for download.

SLF conference seminars are always popular with teachers, and there are a good number of seminars this year which focus on one or other aspect of Global Citizenship in the context of a Curriculum for Excellence. These include Holocaust Education (both a seminar and discussion sessions), Climate Change, a European Union Comenius Regio project for language learning, the London Olympics 2012, Global Footprinting, and Citizenship and young people.

The exhibition side of the show continues to attract organisations and companies with a lot to offer for Scottish education, and again there’s a good mix of exhibitors which relate directly to Global Citizenship activity in schools. British Council, the European Parliament office in Scotland, the British Red Cross, Holocaust Education Trust, Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, Get Set for London 2012, and Amnesty International.

LTS welcomes many international delegates to the show each year, and we make special efforts to provide opportunities for overseas education professionals to share experience with their Scottish counterparts. So sign up online and come along to enjoy the SLF professional development experience.

April 30th, 2010

Education and Religious Intolerance

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT, citizenship, europe

Learning and Teaching Scotland has a new online resource for teachers to support educational activities which challenge the problems of Sectarianism and Religious prejudice. It was produced in collaboration with teachers and offers information, ideas and activities for professional development. Its themes include discrimination, intolerance, religious equality, holocaust education, and school twinning.

Our ‘Education for Citizenship’ national Glow Group has a section on Anti-Sectarian education, and continues to be a place for teachers to share views on such work.

Today’s ‘Times Educational Supplement Scotland’ has a story entitled “Paint job puts a different gloss on graffiti-stained footbridge”, which describes how school pupils at Bellahouston Academy in Glasgow addressed a local sectarian problem and improved their community.

April 26th, 2010

African Partners in Development

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT, africa, citizenship, international

Link Community Development, a charity which promotes access to quality education in rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa, is running a programme to enhance school links between Link Schools in the UK, Ireland and their African partners. The ‘Partners in Development’ programme is funded by the European Union, and aims to sustain strong school partnerships and raise awareness of development issues.

LCD has created a competition for schools, to celebrate the launch of ‘Partners in Development’. The competition is open to both primary and secondary schools, and asks them to choose one or more global issues and tell LCD about the action the school and its pupils can take to make a difference. Full details for Scottish schools are online, and the closing date for entries is 24th May 2010.

March 1st, 2010

French, Europe and Citizenship

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories ICT, citizenship, europe, international, modern languages

East Dunbartonshire Council have celebrated the completion of their ‘Projet Citoyen’ project, which enabled sixth form pupils to undertake activities to raise European awareness in local schools. A group of students visited Strasbourg and the European Parliament, and produced video clips and presentations about their trip. They also improved the fluency of their spoken French.

This material was then converted into an online quiz for pupils in the first year of secondary. Now there are plans to extend this material further, with background information about Strasbourg and European institutions, and move the resource onto the Glow intranet for further use by pupils and teachers.

November 27th, 2009

Copenhagen and Climate Change

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories ICT, europe, international, sustainable development

The UN Copenhagen summit on Climate Change (COP15) in December is now just a few weeks away, and a steady flow of new websites and educational opportunities is emerging.

The Danish Ministry of Education has supported the creation of an international Teachers site (in English) on climate in education, called Teacherscop15.dk . This website assists teaching about climate issues and provides themes and ideas for learning more. Schools in Scotland can take part in educational activity with schools from Denmark and around the world, and can upload examples of their project work such as presentations, video clips, etc to put their own school on the interactive map.

Oxfam has published a new online resource to support education about climate change, its impacts, and the need for positive action.

And SCIAF, the Scottish aid and development charity, also has fresh educational resources about the injustice of climate change and the need to tackle its causes and consequences.

The UK government’s ‘Act on Copenhagen’ website provides updated international news about climate change and information about action in social and economic sectors of the UK.

November 10th, 2009

Innovative Teachers with ICT

nickmorgan

Comments: none Tags:  : Categories CPD, ICT

A Scottish teacher has taken the second place Award in the Community category at the worldwide ‘Innovative Education Forum’ in Brazil. He was recognised for his work on Computer Games in the classroom and promoting the benefits through learning communities.  (editorial interest: Ollie Bray is currently on secondment to Learning and Teaching Scotland)

Microsoft runs this international education gathering as part of its ‘Partners in Learning’ programme, which includes the Innovative Teachers network that connects teachers with an enthusiasm and talent for ICT through online communities in each country. The November edition of ‘Teaching Scotland’, the magazine of the General Teaching Council Scotland, includes an article about the programme and how Scottish teachers can get involved.

On the 1st December there is an opportunity for Scottish teachers to share experience,views and ideas with colleagues in the rest of the UK at the UK Innovative Teachers Froum in Birmingham. The Partners in Learning website has full details.