Education Around the World

As this chapter on the world roots of education makes clear, the traditions of many different cultures have contributed to the evolution of U.S. education. The educational systems in other parts of the world have also been shaped by global traditions. (The chapter on International Education explores this topic in more depth.) Together, you and your students may want to explore some of the differences and similarities in schools around the world.

You can start by checking out some Web sites from schools in different countries. Web 66 offers a gateway to thousands to school Web pages. International Web pages may be found at http://web66.coled.umn.edu/Schools/Lists/International.html.

If it fits your objectives, you may wish to encourage your students to strike up some correspondence with students in other countries. Students can directly share information about what school and everyday life are like. You can get some valuable tips about setting up e-mail exchanges from several sites, including "Global Schoolhouse" at http://www.gsh.org, the "ePALs classroom exchange" at http://www.epals.com, KidLink at http://www.kidlink.org/english/general/intro.html, and "KeyPals" at http://www.keypals.com/. These sites also suggest ideas for collaborative projects you can arrange between your students and those in another land.

Be sure to explore all arrangements and correspondents thoroughly before involving students, and encourage your students to adhere to your school's acceptable use policy, as well as use good "netiquette" when corresponding with other students.



Other web sites that you might want to visit if you are interested in schools in other countries include:

Classrooms of the Millennium
Compare three classrooms, one each in the U.S., Russia, and Thailand.

Computer Pals Around the World
This organization tries to link schools one to one, based on students' ages and interests.

Intercultural E-mail Classroom Connections
IECC is a free service that helps teachers find partners in other cultures and countries for classroom pen-pals via email as well as other project exchanges.

Jason Project
This project encourages students from around to communicate and cooperate with real scientists and explorers, via the Internet, on a different major research project every year, providing opportunities for international exploration and cooperation with students from other countries.

Mighty Media Keypals Club
This organization links classrooms for e-mail exchanges.

Yahooligans
The "Around the World" area of the children's version of Yahoo offers access to personal home pages of kids from everywhere.