Education. Here or there. It's the same everywhere???

This afternoon we put on skits of various chapters from the text Flat Land.  It was interesting to note the interpretations my colleagues put on the message of each chapter and it was fascinating for me to watch Anna Maria’s face as each group performed.  She is such an animated woman and I often found myself wondering what her thoughts were about the messages we were conveying through our mostly mediocre acting!

Anna Maria also pulled out a Tupperware container full of blue sand, explaining that this could be used by young children to learn their letters without the stigma attached with getting something wrong and having it permanently etched on paper.  I genuinely liked this idea and would like to find ways to incorporate it into my own high school classroom, perhaps as a review game for a test or even as a way for students to demonstrate a difficult concept in a manner that would not single any one student out for being uncertain of the correct answer.

Another point made this afternoon with Anna Maria really resonated with me.  She stated quite simply that students learning about education in Brazil talk about the same things as we do in the United States.  While on some level I was aware of this, it was very enlightening for me to actually here these words spoken and to discuss some of the theories we have spent the past year and a half discussing at NC State.  In the end it does not matter what end of the earth we are coming from when it comes to educating our youth we all ultimately have the same objectives.  Perhaps the methods and ideas behind our best practices may vary, but overall we all understand that through education we can help our children obtain a better way of life and gain a greater appreciation for the world in which they live.  Certainly things about our education systems are different and it is important to focus on these things to see what is working and why and perhaps also to question why certain effective practices for one country may not be as effective in another country.  However, we can also find value in noting the similarities between our education systems.  These commonalities are a connection we share amongst ourselves that can bridge the huge gaps of differences common in a globally competitive society.