Day 2 Afternoon Redefinition Drew Williams

One idea that I thought of was to use a cultural exchange to create a redefined learning setting. I will create a lesson that allows for students to engage in different topics about a country; including dance, food, sports and customs. Each student will be allowed to create talking points and questions about the different topics related to a country. At first, I will allow my students to search the internet on different sites that are from the Americanized point of view and writing. They will then research the same topics, but use websites from one particular country that we choose in class. They will have to use sites such as Site:gov or Site:edu only, so that they get the most reliable information. This will give my students a redefined learning experience, because it allows them to research topics about a country, that were written in that particular area of the world. They would not be able to do this without the access to the internet because our availability to points of view from other countries is very limited in our library systems.

I will find a teacher within the country that we chose willing to help us with the project we created. Each student will be teamed up with a student from the other country via Skype or FaceTime. They will have time to discuss their different topics and questions with the students, so that they are engaging in learning about another country from the point of view of a citizen within that given region. This incorporates the ideas of redefinition because the students would not have the ability to communicate with the students from another country if it weren’t for the technology we have available in the classroom for them.

After this, I will ask each of my students to create a blog about their research, discussions and personal opinions about the project they just did. This blog will be seen by the students from the other country, allowing them to give feedback and comments on what is written by my students. This utilizes the idea of redefinition, because without the blogging technology, the feedback and comments from the other country’s students wouldn’t happen. We need the technology to make this style of learning happen.