April Niemela

Since Day 4 in Kazakhstan defies description — and requires much savoring — I only provide you with a math problem for today. The task? Use the following picture to create a math word problem. Solve it. Happy figuring!

Nadezhda Trubova, or Nadia as she is called, spoke to us about the Soviet system, the Kazakh transition period, and the 2011-2020 education reform. What a phenomenal young woman: articulate, accomplished, and very patient. I learned so much.

The Soviet Way: What particularly intrigued me about the Soviet education system was the clever ways it used peer pressure, collective punishments, and immense pressure to keep everyone in line. “Good” students were awarded the October Kid award – a star with a baby Lenin – in the second or third grade. Everyone, of course, wanted this award — and would be immediately shamed by one and all if it wasn’t achieved. In the middle grades, “good” students were awarded the level of Pioneer, a red kerchief that one ironed every morning and wore with pride. (Nadia was a 7th grade Pioneer at the time of the Soviet collapse and remembers ripping off the kerchief, throwing it away — though has no member of previous resentment of the scarf.) As a senior, “good” students can earn the Komsomol, the Committee of Soviet Youth. This time the badge bears the face of an adult Lenin. The accumulation of these three awards allows one to get the party ticket, without which life wasn’t worth living.

The Kazakh Way: upcoming

The most important meal of the day: A large airy room, filled with tables draped in linen and lined with silverware, welcomed us to breakfast. The buffet consisted of cold meats, cheeses, and a vast array of breads. There was bacon and sausage, scrambled eggs, cereal, and yogurt. Cucumbers with a mint sauce. Tiny pastries. Coffee.

We spent the morning with Dr. Gulnara Mendikulova who regaled us with the history of Kazakhstan and the Kazakh people, the nomadic clans, the conquering tribes, the restless and contested history, the Russian help/occupation, the Soviet years, the new beginnings and stirrings of Independence.

She mentioned petroglyphs some 20 km away, and I would really like to go see them. I am contemplating this adventure as soon as I return from Ust-Kamenogorsk.

Our afternoon guide took us on tour. Incredibly knowledgeable and full of stories, he also sported a Canadian hat, which I wouldn’t have thought twice about except for the rather droll comment he made at the very beginning about trouble & Americans.    Regardless, he was fantastic, and we gave him no problems.

A fantastic dinner at the Tubeteka restaurant with new Kazakh friends, and then we were back to the hotel for the night. Once again it’s after 11pm — and morning comes too early!

No grand adventure can quite begin without a journey. This particular one began at 4am and ended some 34 hours later. Lewiston to Seattle to Frankfurt to Almaty. Over ten hours of layovers.

My seat mate to Frankfurt was absolutely delightful and the nine-plus hour flight melted away amid discussions of Daniel Pink’s Drive & theory on motivation and Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational. We contemplated the non-linear nature of life, goal acquisition, free will, and the psychology of failure. Eventually, we even moved on to politics and religion, those taboo topics that one must never broach. I’m deeply thankful for such intriguing conversation that practically eliminated the bone-numbing tediousness of plane travel.

The flight to Almaty wasn’t full at all, and the seat next to me was empty. I catnapped a bit, getting up to walk the plane every 20 minutes or so, trying to stretch out my legs and keep the blood flowing.

Once in Almaty, we shuffled to the customs line. One of the passengers pointed to a customs slip, motioning that we would need to complete one as well, which was good since none of us knew. (Not that I’m particularly well-traveled, but this slip has always been handed out on the plane, before.) Getting through customs was easy. Stamp. Stamp. A brusque nod. I went in search of my suitcase.

While waiting for my bag to come around the carousel, one of my TGC colleagues approached, a stern-looking official in tow. She was calm, but her eyes sparkled with tears. “They’re going to send me back,” she said.

“What?”

“My visa. The dates are wrong.”

I explained to the official that we were all traveling together and that the TGC person was waiting for us right outside. I pulled out the phone number and showed her. The official raised her eyebrows, then shrugged. “Call her.” I asked for access to a phone. She shook her head and sighed, rolling her eyes.

Long story short, nothing worked. The Kazakh officials put her on a plane back to Frankfurt.

The ride to the hotel was quiet, somber, long. It felt odd, wrong, somehow. Like we left a comrade behind. But there was no going back.

Note: the entirety of this post is cross-posted under my Global Competencies tab and is a part of an on-going series on global citizenship, global competencies, and global education.

What are global competencies? Delightfully, there are many thoughts, opinions, and views of global competence — probably as varied and as diverse as the world around us. I’ve chosen to adopt my guiding principles from the Asia Society’s Educating for Global Competence: Preparing Our Youth to Engage the World. If you haven’t had a chance to read the book, I highly recommend it. As with any publication, there are pieces that I, personally, do not endorse or agree with. However, there are other pieces that are invaluable for the 21st century educator.

In a nutshell, Global competence is the capacity and disposition to understand and act on issues of global significance (p. xiii). It is also deeply important that students know and understand their own cultures, their own beliefs, their own histories. One of the speakers we listened to (his name escapes me, my apologies) made it clear that without deeply understanding ourselves, we cannot understand others. It is not necessary to agree with or even accept the beliefs of others, especially if they go against our fundamental beliefs. But it is important to understand where they are coming from — and how those beliefs will influence their behavior, choices, and decisions.

In preparing our students for a flattened world and for interacting with peoples from around the world in positive, collaborative, and productive ways, we must provide them with a set of global competencies.  In examining the ways in which we approach the classroom — the student choice we provide, the projects we assign, the multi-modal texts we dip into — it’s important to consider how we interweave the following aspects of global competence. Each of these four competencies has an entire chapter devoted to it.

• Globally competent students investigate the world;
• Globally competent students recognize perspectives;
• Globally competent students communicate ideas;
• Globally competent students take action.

Through my professional collaborations with educators, students, and school systems around the globe, I have found my own learning and thinking evolving, changing, and growing. I have learned deeply, laughed much, and forged invaluable friendships. I have also found that being globally competent does not necessarily encompass those key features that make international travel enjoyable. It’s not just about flexibility, go-with-the-flow attitudes, and being in the moment. Global competence is much, much more, and, in some ways, much more difficult. I hope to explore this more in the days to come.

Note: the entirety of this post is cross-posted under my Global Competencies tab and is a part of an on-going series on global citizenship, global competencies, and global education.

Why a global focus? The 21st Century, for all of the hype, really is a different sort of animal. While we are rushing toward that tipping point in online learning referenced by Christensen in his book Disrupting Class, we are still balancing on the cusp of a potential revolution in the education system. I say potential because there is a great deal of push back when it comes to digital learning, Common Core, and student-centered learning.

In the 21st century, learning is not about acquiring knowledge but about knowing where to access it. Learning is not about parroting back information but about applying what you’ve learned. Thus, in order for students to be able to apply new knowledge in authentic ways, they need to be guiding the focus of their own learning. This transition from a teacher-centered class to a student-centered class is a significant change. And, like any change, it is difficult, fraught with challenge, frustrations, and bumps in the road. It’s also entirely worth it. As we teach and live and use technology in our every day lives, we must fully immerse ourselves in the experience — and then spend time to deeply reflect. We must engage in writing, engage in thinking, engage in analyzing what works and what doesn’t work. And we need to bring this experience, this reflection, and this process into the classroom.

Back in 2005, Thomas Friedman published The World is Flat, reminding his readers that in this new digital age, boundaries are smudged, historical and geographical boundaries are becoming irrelevant, and that in order to stay competitive (and, indeed, a viable presence in the global dialogue), it’s important to make several purposeful and intentional perceptual shifts. This isn’t new. But it’s a reminder.

Why a global focus in the K-12 education system? When students are aware of the world about them and curious about how the world works, they are able to take on significant problems for research and exploration. Globally competent students are not only able to recognize perspectives other than their own but that they are able to articulate them with respect. Thus, as educators we bear a great deal of responsibility for crafting opportunities for our students to learn deeply, wonder fiercely, and experience the world around them.

Globally competent students understand that others may not share their views or perspectives and that this difference can often be attributed to economic conditions, religions, or access to education, knowledge, or technology. By recognizing one’s own perspectives and being able to compare them with others, one can identify the influencing factors. This allows one to craft a sort of “comprehensive perspective vital to addressing complex global issues” (p. 31).

In the Classroom: So what does this look like in the “real world”? As a 9^th grade English teacher, I created a social awareness multi-genre research project. But I didn’t do it in isolation. I read and scoured the internets and quoted Romano. Ever the Action Researcher, I piloted a portion of it. I brought the results to my teaching partners. They were just as excited as I was. We worked through the elements together, each of us contributing.

We now have students take on a topic of interest that has global significance, something that has meaning beyond the borders of our region, state, and nation. Students research their topics (integrating citelighter.com this year!), write the obligatory essay in proper MLA format, and then provide various artifacts that provide additional researched “views” into the topic. Students participate in Service Learning hours, where they volunteer in a setting that relates to the topic they’ve chosen. For example, if a student has chosen the topic of “child abuse”, she may volunteer at the Boys and Girls Club. It’s in this step that they go beyond communicating: they are taking “action to improve conditions” (p. 11).