2017 IIME REPORTCountry/Region [ Taiwan ]School[ Wen Ya Elementary School ] Teacher [ Ruth Hou ] Grade ( 5 )JP school [ Souri Elementary School] Teacher [ Yuri Iwake ]Member ( 48 )# Subjects, Activities and Hours of the lessons
Subject
Conception of the lesson
Social Studies

Hours

We investigated the endangered animals in Taiwan.

6

EnglishWe wrote the content for VC in English, practiced it and showed it in the VC.

6Art

We learned the basic skills of water painting and the mixture of differentcolors. We designed the drafts, re-drafted and reached the final agreement.

6ICT

We learned how to use a new software, called LoiLo Note so that we could
communicate with our partners in groups. We also joined Skype talk 5 -6times

6

IntegrativeActivities

We talked about the research results in different classrooms and learned tomake the mural painting as best as we could.

12# Theme and Message of the mural
Theme

Dream and Culture

Message

There are so many interesting and precious culture in the world. The more we know thebeauty of different cultures, the more we cherish. As long as we try our best to make ourdreams come true, we make the world a better place for everyone.

United thoughts toshare with the world# Effects and the Problems
Effects your students have gained
We had the precious opportunity to investigate ourown culture and listened to the presentation of ourJapanese friends. We also experienced theexcitement of working with others from different
country. Besides, we learned to work as a team andit encouraged our sense of cooperation.

Points for further improvement
We need to start the communication as early as
possible. While we were using different software for
global communication among students, we justneed more practice.

# How has your impression toward your partner’s country/region and the world changed?
Changes in the students
Changes in the teachers
Students with different talents, such as speaking inpublic, use of ICT had a chance to work together tomake the project successful. They learned torespect other classmates more.

# Flow of the Activity
ContentMonthMEET
Selfintroduction

SHARE
Research on
the theme

UNITE
United message/

Mural design

CREATE
Mural painting

APPRECIATE
Reflection/
Appreciation

Teachers loved to have a chance to experience theidea of “connecting global classroom.” Although theInternet connection might not go well every time,teachers still felt excited to work with othereducators to make the next generation better.

What you did

Your students attitude/reflection

Sep.
2017

We made greeting cards toour partner classes andasked them to offer thetheme
theylikedtoresearch. We had a Skypetalk to meet our friends.

Writing in English is not easy. We could
not write much English to our Japanesefriends. But we were so excited to meetthe friends from Japan and be theirpartners.

Oct.
2017

In Social Studies Class, weread about the animals in
danger in Taiwan. In Artclass, we learned to makeour own headwear andclothing for the talent show.

Focusing on the values of endangered
animals is good for us to pay extra
attention to our living environment. We
loved to have a closer look at our living
places as well as the Japanese culture.

SocialStudies&ICT&Art

We created the drafts andshared our thoughts with
our partners on Skype. We
posted our ideas on theForum, hoping that theagreement could be madequickly.

We were excited to talk about thepainting ideas and listened to thesuggestions from our Japanese friends
on Skype. We found it interesting andattractive when we stayed in the sameclassroom which was created by LoiLoNote.

SocialStudies&English&Integrated
StudiesDec.
2017
toFeb.
2018

We formed into small
groups and took turns topaint. Our art teacher gave
us enough freedom tocreate what we wanted topresent on the muralinstead of giving us a lot ofinstruction.

It was fun to join the project. We set up
the painting schedule in winter vacationand started painting as scheduled.
Painting may be scaring to some of us
but most of us enjoyed making an effort
on the project.

Mar.
2018

We carefully read throughthe mural before we sent itback to Japan. And we tried
to find the similarities anddifferences between Wen
Ya E.S. and Souri E.S.. We
wrote our feedbacks on theforum to so that we could
share with each other themessage on the mural.

In order to correspond well with ourpartners’ drawing, we changed theoriginal design of our mural. The design
might be different from what we havepromised, but all the essential points
have been included on the mural. We
hoped our partners would like ourcreativity, too.

Nov.
2017

SubjectEnglish

Integrated
Studies& ArtIntegrat
edStudies& Art# Effect and evaluation gained through the collaborative learning
Evaluation: Rank 5 to 1 (5: very effective / 4: effective / 3: so- so / 2: not so effective / 1: not effective at all)

Expected effect
Understanding yourown cultures

Understanding yourpartner's cultures

Information literacy(research, share)

Communication ability(interactive exchange)Critical thinking(objective, critical views)

Active learningand action
Collaboration(in the class, with partners)

Expression ability(in words, in pictures)

Evaluation

4

From the social studies class, students have had a close look at thevalues and importance of endangered animals in Taiwan. Thanks to theextra efforts made by Homeroom Teachers, students learned more
about the connection between our living environment and the animals.

4

Because of our good relationship with Souri E.S., we have many
wonderful Skype talk, using LoiLo Note with our Japanese partners. Itwas not hard for us to understand what our partners wanted to say
because they have shown us wonderful photos while we wereconnected to the same classrooms on LoiLo Note.

4

Students did not have the chance to work on the forum. They did notdeal with the technical problem while the Skype talk started. However,they had very good abilities to sort out the photos and look for theinformation they needed to present during Skype talk. Taiwanese
students have good abilities to make a comprehensible PPT to facilitate
their oral report.

4

During the process of co-working, students learned to see his/her own
talent. They did not see themselves only. Instead, they were willing tocontribute their special talents in different aspects in order to make thecollaborative project as perfect as possible.
While reporting to our Japanese partners, our students made a great
effort to post appropriate photos and speak easy English. The basic
goal of cross-country communication is accomplished.

4Students had a good time reading every message from our partners.
We learned from our partners that a dream does not have to be big but
to be carried out. The more small steps we take, the closer we canmake our dreams come true.

5

Students were highly motivated to find their free time to complete thePPTs which would be used in the Skype talk. 85% of the students said
they enjoyed chatting with their partners on LoiLo Note even though thelanguage for communication might be hard for both of them.

4

Students were willing to collaborate with their partners in Taiwan andJapan. Different opinions gave us different look of an issue. While wediscussed in detail, we found the better ideas at the end.

4

Students have tried their best to explain what they wanted to present tothe Japanese partners. There was enough patience to wait for theappropriate communication. Limited English did not stop our ambition todeliver our ideas on the project.

4

While reading the completed mural in class, students saw the clevercombination of different ideas between Taiwan and Japan. Comparedwith the other murals, we were proud that our art teacher respected ourideas and did not change anything on the mural. Reading and painting
the mural from children’s points of view is far more important thanpainting from adults’ points of view.

Appreciation ability(the mural, the wholecollaborative learning)

Scenes / points teachers felt the effects