Franklin Pierce University associate professor Zan Walker-Goncalves has found a way to make the pandemic’s normalization of Zoom and long-distance conversation work for her class curriculum, with the help of a fellow professor in Egypt.
Working together, Walker-Goncalves and professor Maha Bali of American University in Cairo have brought their classes together to emphasize intercultural exchange and its importance in education.
The curriculum, titled “Words Cross-Atlantic,” connects the two classes for a series of activities both synchronous and asynchronous, centered in particular on encouraging conversations about writing.
Walker-Goncalves’s class, “The Teaching of Writing,” has been having fun with the activities so far, she said.
“They’re so excited – they tell me, ‘I told my mom about it.’ They’re an excitable group,” Walker-Goncalves said. The students are in the education program, primarily going into elementary education, she said, and as such tend to be “very upbeat.”
Bali’s group of students in a class called “Digital Literacies in an Intercultural Context” have also been excited for the activities, especially the portion last week where the two classes met on Zoom. They used the face-to-face session to do ice-breaking activities, some of which were based on previous activities from the curriculum, including an “alternate CV” that allowed students to introduce themselves in a specific format. The groups also spent much of the time discussing writing, as that focus is something the courses share.
“My students loved it, they enjoyed it so much,” Bali said. “They were surprised by how much they had in common with the other students.” This is something she would have expected more from the American students, she said, but both groups found they had a lot in common from pop culture, including music taste.
Two of Walker-Goncalves’ students said they were delighted to find that the two Egyptian students they were paired with liked the same musical artist as them.
“I was kind of blown away,” said K.J. Williams. “One of the girls said her favorite artist was Travis Scott, who is an American musician that me and Connor listen to all the time.”
Juniors Connor Everidge and Williams were paired up for the class activities, and said they learned a lot from the exchange with their fellow students.
“It was unique, and being education majors, we learn how to incorporate inclusive classrooms,” said Everidge. “I think this would be a very unique way to do it, someone from across the world hearing what they have going on in their classrooms.”
“We could see ourselves doing it in our classrooms in the future,” said Williams. “Overall it was a great experience, and I hope we get to do it again.”
There are more activities in the curriculum to come, including a segment where both classes will read the same articles and annotate them. A reflection will conclude this shared curriculum.
This all came about because Bali and Walker-Goncalves met at the Summer Institute for Digital Learning at the University of Rhode Island two summers ago, and reconnected at the same event this summer. They decided to partner up for one of the activities to create a curriculum map, and decided to put their end product into practice.
The thing they most had in common, both Bali and Walker-Goncalves said, was that their students “bemoan” writing and don’t have much confidence in themselves.
“A lot of people feel very unconfident about themselves as writers or wouldn’t really consider themselves writers,” Walker-Goncalves said. With that in mind, the two professors wanted to instill good exchanges about the writing process.
“This is something I do all the time,” Bali said. Earlier in the pandemic, she worked with two faculty members in Australia and the United States to bring their students together to talk about managing their wellbeing. The difference with this collaboration, she said, is that it’s not just a one-off session, but a multi-week exploration.
And this one might happen again, as these classes are taught regularly by both.
“I’d love to do it again,” Bali said, and Walker-Goncalves agreed.
“It’s been a lot of fun to do this,” she said, adding that she was grateful for the university’s support, particularly with a digital literacy grant that has helped support this curriculum.
“Really making some lemonade out of the lemons of the coronavirus,” Walker-Goncalves said. “It’s really beyond my wildest dreams.”