Refine
H-BRS Bibliography
- yes (16)
Departments, institutes and facilities
Document Type
- Part of a Book (9)
- Conference Object (7)
Keywords
“Building Bridges Across Continents” (BBAC) is an intercultural and student-centered project that seeks to promote international communication and helps students develop competencies in entrepreneurship, international trade and global cultural awareness. The project, which is in its fourth phase of implementation, connects students from the United States, Germany, Ghana and Kenya with the help of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) in order to work on a common research assignment for a period of ten calendar weeks. The main ICTs used in the project are Skype, Facebook, wiki, email and WhatsApp. This paper describes and analyzes the background, structure, and results of the project.
New communication technologies are changing the way we work and communicate with people around the world. Given this reality, students in Higher Education (HE) worldwide need to develop knowledge in their area of study as well as attitudes and values that will enable them to be responsible and ethical global citizens in the workforce they will soon enter, regardless of the degree. Different institutional and country-specific requirements are important factors when developing an international Virtual Exchange (VE) program. Digital learning environments such as ProGlobe – Promoting the Global Exchange of Ideas on Sustainable Goals, Practices, and Cultural Diversity – offer a platform for collaborating with diverse students around the world to share and reflect on ideas on sustainable practices. Students work together virtually on a joint interdisciplinary project that aims to create knowledge and foster cultural diversity. This project was successfully integrated into each country’s course syllabus through a common global theme; sustainability. The focus of this paper is to present multi-disciplinary perspectives on the opportunities and challenges in implementing a VE project in HE. Furthermore, it will present the challenges that country coordinators dealt with when planning and implementing their project. Given the disparity found in each course syllabus, project coordinators uniquely handled the project goal, approach, and assessment for their specific course and program. Not only did the students and faculty gain valuable insight into different aspects of collaboration when working in interdisciplinary HE projects, they also reflected on their own impact on the environment and learned to listen to how people in different countries deal with environmental issues. This approach provided students with meaningful intercultural experiences that helped them link ideas and concepts about a global issue through the lens of their own discipline as well as other disciplines worldwide.
Telecollaborating and communicating in online contexts using English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) requires students to develop multiple literacies in addition to foreign language skills and intercultural communicative competence. This chapter looks at the intersection of technology and teaching ELF, examining mutual contributions of technologies, more specifically Web 2.0, and ELF to each other, and the challenges in designing and implementing collaboration projects across cultures. Moreover, it looks at how the development of digital competencies in ELF (DELF) can be enhanced through the implementation of Web 2.0 mediated intercultural dialogues. The detail of the research design including internet tools used, participants and tasks are also discussed. Data analysis points to a positive attitude towards telecollaboration, also providing confirmation of some of the problems identified in theoretical framework, such as different levels of personal engagement.
Telecollaborating and communicating in online contexts using English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) requires students to develop multiple literacies in addition to foreign language skills and intercultural communicative competence. This chapter looks at the intersection of technology and teaching ELF, examining mutual contributions of technologies, more specifically Web 2.0, and ELF to each other, and the challenges in designing and implementing collaboration projects across cultures. Moreover, it looks at how the development of digital competencies in ELF (DELF) can be enhanced through the implementation of Web 2.0 mediated intercultural dialogues. The detail of the research design including internet tools used, participants and tasks are also discussed. Data analysis points to a positive attitude towards telecollaboration, also providing confirmation of some of the problems identified in theoretical framework, such as different levels of personal engagement.
The most prominent education reform in Europe started in Bologna, Italy, in 1999, when the European Ministers responsible for higher education met to set the foundation for the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). The following process to reform and unify higher education and its systems in Europe is therefore known as the Bologna Process.
The curricula of all degree programs at H-BRS have many different practice-oriented activities and focus on hands-on learning. In labs and small classrooms (30–60 persons), students get a personalized learning environment which is complemented with many individual and group projects that foster collaborative work situations. There are several main areas that students learn from working with industry, local organizations or public institutions.
This paper examines how students learn to collaborate in English by participating in an intercultural project that focuses on teaching students to work together on a digital writing project using various online tools, and participated in this digital collaboration project. Mixed groups of students, two French and two German, used several synchronous and asynchronous tools to communicate with their counterparts (Facebook, WordPress blog, WIMS e-learning platform, email, videoconferencing). Students had to produce an article together, comparing French and German attitudes about a topic they negotiated freely in their groups. Before publishing their post, students were expected to peer-review the article written by their group. Once published, the stage consisted of voting for the best posts on the e-learning platform, WIMS. A videoconference was also organized to create cohesion between the participants. The result of the student evaluations, together with the administrative, technical vastly differing university setups is presented.
Virtual exchange
(2022)