People Get Ready-Alicia Keys and Lyfe Jennings

Evaluating each others' lesson plans

After completing in intense on-line class about Global Education, all 80+ Teachers for Global Classrooms teachers met up in Washington D.C. for an education symposium.  We spent two days learning how to better incorporate global education into our classrooms, new teaching strategies and resources that are available to teachers, and most importantly specifics about how to prepare for our in-country visit.  We were able to bring administrators with us and my principal, Ken Gibson, traveled with me for the administrator training.

There is another TGC teacher, Cynthia McBride, from Bozeman who brought an administrator as well.  Our schedule was packed but the four of us managed to squeeze in some serious sight-seeing, I think Ken's pedometer reported that we walked 11 miles on the first day alone!

Arlington

Einstein memorial

My roommate Jackie, a science teacher from Mississippi

White House

FDR Memorial

Learning how to eat oysters.

Overall it was a great weekend and we learned a lot.  I came back more energized about global education and excited to re-structure some things in the classes that I teach.  As a social studies teacher I always thought, "of course I teach global education, I teach social studies." In reality, I learned that global education can be incorporated into any subject matter and involves much more than just learning about where other countries are and what their cultures are like.  Global education is centered around the idea of preparing students to thrive in a technologically advanced, inter-connected world.   It focuses on the ideas of investigating the world, recognizing perspectives, communicating ideas, and taking action (Partnership for Global Learning, Asia Society.)


While in D.C. one of my favorite things was meeting the other teachers that will be going to Brazil, learning more about the country we will be visiting, and exploring the ideas we will think about while we are there.  Here are a few cultural things other teachers are excited to see: