2016 IIME REPORTCountry/Region [Taiwan, Chia Yi City ]School[ Wen Ya Elementary School] Teacher [ Ms. Tsai & Ms. Kuo] Grade (5)JP school [ Nishi Elementary School ] Teacher [Ms. Mizuno]

Member (56)# Subjects, Activities and Times of the lessons
Subject
Conception of the lesson
Social Studies
EnglishIntegrated
Curriculum
Performing
Art

Hours

Investigating the details of the aboriginal tribes in Taiwan
Mind-mapping the research results

4

Creating the greeting message in English
Preparing speech for Skype talk2

Introducing the research content to the younger graders

4

Creating headwear and costumes for the presentation at school anniversary

6

Creating greeting cards to our partners

6# Theme and Message of the mural
ThemeThe Beauty of Traditional Culture

Message

There are so many interesting cultural points to share with the world. The more weunderstand the diversity of different cultures, the more we cherish the invisible value of it.
Let’s open our minds to see the beauty of the amazing world.

United thoughts toshare with the world# Effects and the Problems
Effects your students have gained
Form the Artmile Project, the students had thesecond chance to present what they have learned
from the social studies class this year. Besides,from reading what our partner class has painted, we
had the chance to know more about ourselves andthe world.

Points for further improvement
In order to make the project successful, teachers haveprovided multi-dimensional learning for the kids. They
must have gained a lot, too. However, some kids are a
bit more passive in terms of further investigating thetopics in detail. Specific strategies need to be used toencourage more activeness in learning.

# How has your impression toward your partner’s country/region and the world changed?
Changes in the students
Changes in the teachers
In order to create more topics for exchange, we read Teachers were excited to see more active
through the features of aboriginal tribes in Taiwan. participation and cooperation while students wereStudents were excited to feel the beauty of
traditional cultures from singing, dancing, sewing and working on different tasks. Students always havebrilliant ideas and they are always potential learner.
panting about it.
Students also found it valuable to know more friends As teachers, we not only teach the kids but also
from Japan, who certainly broadened our world view. learn with the kids.
They respected each other much better afterparticipating in Artmile Project.

# Flow of the Activity
ContentMonthMEET
Selfintroduction

SHARE
Research onthe theme

UNITE
United message/

Mural design

Sep.
2016

Oct.
2016

Nov.
2016

Mural painting

Feb.
2017

APPRECIATE
Reflection/
Appreciation

March
2017

CREATE

What you did
Students made greetingcards to our partner classand asked them to offer thetheme
theylikedtoresearch.
In Social Studies Class, weread a lot about the tales ofthe aboriginal tribes inTaiwan. We loved them somuch.
In Art class, we learned tomake our own headwear andclothing for the talent show.
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 formed into small groups
and took turns to paint.
Most of the time, welistened to our art teacher
because she had a clearerview of the mural.
We carefully read throughthe mural before we sent itback to Japan. And we tried
to find the similarities anddifferences between thetwo sides. We have also
attended the Skype talk with
our partners and sharedwith each other what wehave tried to convey fromthe mural.

Your students attitude/reflection
Writing in English is not easy. Students
could not write much English to ourJapanese friends. But they were
excited to meet the friends from Japanand be their partners.
Focusing on the beauty of culture isgood for us to pay extra attention to ourown culture. We would like to have acloser look at our own culture as well as
the Japanese culture.

Students were excited to talk about
their ideas and some suggestions did
sound good. We found it hard to makethe final decision so we decided to wait
for our partners’ drawing and made thefinal decision later.
It was fun to join the project. We set up
the schedule and started painting assoon as we came back from the wintervacation. Painting may be scaring tosome of us but most of us enjoyedmaking an effort on the project.
The more time we read the mural, themore new ideas we had. In order tocorrespond well with our partners’drawing, we added more points that we
did not mention earlier on the mural. We
hoped our partners would like ourcreativity, too.

Subject

EnglishSocialStudies&ICT&
Art

SocialStudies &English &Integrated
Studies

Integrated
Studies &Art

Integrated
Studies &Art# Aim of the Lessons and Result
Aim: Rank A to C in order you put emphasis on (A: very much/ B: much / C: not so much)
Result: Rank 5 to 1 (5: very effective / 4: effective / 3: so- so / 2: not so effective / 1: not effective at all)

Expected EffectAimResult

Understanding our owncultures

A4

How your students have reached it
From the social studies class, students have had the first glanceof the values and importance of aboriginal cultures in Taiwan.
Thanks to the extra efforts made by Homeroom Teachers,
students learned more about the traditional Taiwanese culturesby making headwear, clothing, dancing on school sports day andreporting to the young graders in the school.

Understanding theother’s cultures

Communication ability
in the class/with partners

IT skills

Creating friendshipin the class/with partners

Collaborationin the class/with partners

Attitude in learning

Expression ability
in words, in pictures

B4B

4B

4A

4B

4A

5B

4B

4

Appreciation ability
Appreciate the mural and thewhole collaborative learning

Because of our close relationship with Nishi Elementary School,
we have heard of the story of Kanazawa City many times. It iseasy for us to understand what our partners have painted on themural.
During the process of co-working, students learned to see
his/her own talent. They did not see themselves only. Instead,they were willing to contribute their special talents in different
aspects in order to make the collaborative project as perfect aspossible.
While reporting to the younger graders, the students made very
good use of different to retell, re-attract the audience’sattention. They have surely acquired the different effective
communication skills.
Students did not have the chance to work on the forum. They
did not deal with the technical problem while the Skype talkstarted. However, they had very good abilities to sort out thephotos and information they needed on the project. They havegood abilities to make a comprehensible PPT to facilitate theiroral report.
Students had a good time reading every message from ourpartner class. We cherished the friendship between Wen Ya inTaiwan and Nishi in Japan. Language difference did not stop oursense of attachment because we enjoyed reading the loving
faces from photos and video clips.
Students were proud of our willingness to collaborate withdifferent group members. Different opinions did not stop ourwork but encouraged us to find better ways to persuade theothers. We were happy that we could always reach theconclusion at the end.
Students were highly motivated to find the time to complete theproject. 92% of the students said they enjoyed working on theproject. Most of the students would love to follow teachers’
instruction to behave properly while they had the cross-culture
exchange.
Students knew more about their own culture and their partners’
culture from the project. They have tried their best to explain
what they wanted to present to younger graders in Chinese. It isfor sure that they have acquired the necessary communication
skill after the project.
By reading the completed mural as a whole, students clearly saw
the different skills and interest between the Taiwanese andJapanese children at the same age. Being lack of special
attention on calligraphy, our students agreed that Japanese
students seemed to write their names better than theTaiwanese students did.