Who are we?
The question is regarding our individual identities... An important question especially when focusing on globalization and multicultural education.
I lived in New York City for 7 years from 2002-2009. The first 3 years I lived at International House, a dorm that houses 700 graduate students from around the globe.
A yearly tradition was the Fall Fiesta. Many students dressed up in local costumes from their respective countries. This was a fun and interesting way to see how different and similar we all were.
There is a great openness at I -House and my memories of living there are filled with appreciation for all the knowledge I gained from meeting so many people from around the world. I became a "Cultural Hour" assistant and helped create some wonderful cultural events with fellow students. My global perspective was definitely broadened from living in New York City and especially from my 3 years living at I -House!
Photo from Fall Fiesta.
How nice to meet you!:) I love learning about other cultures, and believe we need to start teaching children when they are young. I lived at an International House too when I was in college- it was so much fun (especially in the kitchen when everyone was cooking!). I would love to invite you to do a guest post on http://www.kidworldcitizen.org if you are ever interested:). Anything related to global education for kids, or anything about your own culture!:) I am always looking for experts who can share with my readers- spread the word to others in your program too! I love to connect with globally-minded people around the world. Congratulations on your site! I love your sustainability post, and am looking forward to the post on tolerance (2 of my favorite subjects). Cheers!
SvarSletDear Becky,
SletThank you for your blog mail. I will be sure to send your message to the rest of my class.
I would love to do a guest post on kidsworldcitizen.org with the following topic: Tolarance. I can send you a photo as well, just let me know where to post my message which is here below:
Today we had a wonderful class regarding “tolerance”. Among other things we learned a great activity our teacher called "the web". The foreign exchange students in my class had to write one word on a piece of paper that explained what they noticed was different in Denmark compared to their home country. Us Danes had to write what we thought would be the most different thing to notice in another country.
I wrote “poverty” but the more I think of it I would rather have chosen the word “inequality”. We Danes have free education and free healthcare. We pay very high taxes but it is worth it. We live in a democratic society where human rights and sustainability is taken seriously. I feel very privileged to live in this society. I know of many countries in the world where there is inequality and poverty.
Then we all placed ourselves in a circle. The first person to read her word explained the meaning of this word choice. This person was given a piece of string to hold on to. Then she had to pick another person in the group that had a somewhat similar word as to string the words together. The string was then passed on to this person who then explained his word and so on. At the end of our activity we had created a beautiful web that connected us.
This exercise can be used as an ice -breaker and also as a way to develop a common language. It could also be a good way to teach and approach tolerance by first finding similarities we have with people from another culture, as this may bring us together on a common ground. Later we can discover and talk about our differences. We should ask questions to gain knowledge instead of staying ignorant and in worse cases become frightened of what is different.
By
Jane Pejtersen - Danish student at Blaagaard Teacher's College in Denmark